The phrase "austerity first" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used in discussions about economic policies or strategies that prioritize austerity measures over other considerations.
Example: "In the current economic climate, many policymakers are advocating for an austerity first approach to reduce the national debt."
Alternatives: "prioritize austerity" or "austerity as a priority".
Or retreating again and again on his own plans for tough-guy austerity – first in 2012, but again this afternoon.
Now, as the German economic model of low wage-growth increasingly imposes itself as Europe's economic template, social democrats elsewhere have pain in admitting that their traditionally growth-oriented goals have mutated in real time into policies of austerity first, and, just maybe, expansion later.
In the cause of fiscal credibility – as laid down by the City and the press, rather than the public – Balls and Miliband have moved to embrace austerity: first backing public sector pay cuts, then coalition current spending limits for 2015-16, theirtheir plans to eliminate the deficit (though with a year's grace) and cut debt as a share of national income by 2020.
He came to power criticising the policy of austerity first.
He openly challenged the German prescription for Europe of putting austerity first.
Germany, which championed an austerity-first European fiscal pact signed in February, expressed little or no willingness to reopen the terms of the Greek loan agreement.
The Germans and others have often displayed a tin ear to the suffering caused by the austerity-first policies they have pushed (Mr Tsipras refers to "fiscal waterboarding").
If anything is likely to provoke a softening of the austerity-first line, it is this evidence that Merkel's austerity measures are starting to prove unpopular at home — given that she faces a general election next year.
So far, though, Merkel has been insisting on an austerity-first strategy, one which on the evidence looks as if it is doing a very good job of making a bad situation worse.
If anything is likely to provoke a softening of the austerity-first line, it is this evidence that Merkel's austerity measures are starting to prove unpopular at home given that she faces a general election next year.
But in a sign of just how fragile the Greek economic situation remains – and just how slender the margin of victory was for the pro-Europe backers in Athens – Mr. Obama couched his words with what seemed a veiled appeal to Germany to ease up on its austerity-first demand for how Greece should handle its fiscal crisis.
