Contributor(s): Professor Leszek Balcerowicz | Unsustainable fiscal policy hampers growth - the effect not only of sovereign debt distress but also of an overblown welfare state. What can we learn from the financial-fiscal crisis (US, UK, Ireland, Spain) and the fiscal-financial crisis (Greece, Portugal)? Professor Leszek Balcerowicz has served three times in the Polish government and the central bank, being in charge of economic reforms. Between 1989–1991 and 1997-2000 he held the position of Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister, and between 2001-2007 he served as Governor of the National Bank of Poland. He is a member of the group of trustees of the Institute of International Finance (US) and also a professor of economics at the Warsaw School of Economics. He is also a Distinguished Associate of the International Atlantic Economic Society (IAES), a member of the Group of Thirty and a board member of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. Professor Balcerowicz is chairman and a founder of the Civil Development Forum Foundation (FOR) and in 2011, he was appointed a member of the Advisory Scientific Committee providing advice and assistance on issues relevant to the work of the European Systemic Risk Board (ESRB).