Comments on: The improbable Greece plan

By: Staufer

Staufer — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 09:11:13 +0000

1. No one forced Greece into the Euro. Greece forced itself in.
2. No one forced Greece to keep up an arms race with Turkey. That is, and was Greece’s decision.
3. No one forced Greece to overborrow. That was Greece’s decision.
4. No one forces Greece to stay in the Euro. Greece can default completely and exit the Euro.
5. But Greece cannot expect the rest of the EU to keep paying for its bad decisions.

By: litzcan

litzcan — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 02:41:34 +0000

This is the new type of war that everyone better be aware of. No guns and bombs. Clean. Casualties are not visible anymore, TV channels do not broadcast this type of carnage. It does not generate revenue. No more pictures of killed children. No more remorse.Clean cut.
One could argue that Greeks have done it to themselves.
I argue that the main duty of a ruling class in any nation around the world is to cater to its citizens. When they start to cater to the needs of other country’s citizens it is a result of submitting to a higher power and in the past it was decided in battle. Greece is the first to go that way. Many will follow that path.
Any way you look at this , Greece is defeated.It’s citizens have lost the option of fighting the enemy and that is below any dignity level. Only option is selling what is left of the country at a very low price. They and their children are slaves with no say in the process or in regards to their future. This is a fact of life in the year of 2012. By the way , the new war is on for every nation.

By: TFF

TFF — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 01:44:28 +0000

Jmo2005, if you are being plundered by the people in power, then you need to put new people in power. Is Greece not still a democracy? If not, then you need a revolution.

Either that or sell your sovereignty to the Germans.

By: Jmo2005

Jmo2005 — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 01:23:24 +0000

FifthDecade I see your point.You are absolutely right.
All I am trying to tell is that you shouldn’t consider Greeks as some arrogant guys with money they never worked for,refusing to pay their taxes.That goes for many and we are all to blame,but I think it’s fair for all European people to know what brought us here, including Greeks.

By: Robbedoes

Robbedoes — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 13:54:41 +0000

So other Euro countries are pumping in the bulk of 240 Billion and they are the bad guys? Do you think the people of these countries were waiting for Greece to be bailed out in times of economic hardship of their own? They are implementing additional austerity just to be able to bail out Greece. Losing ratings and increased cost of lending for government and companies to help out the Greek.

And best of all, the countries criticizing most (UK and US) have contributed next to nothing and worse, hold large quantities of CDS (betting for/against Greece .. GS et al).

It is very easy to criticize, but be assured: come up with a great plan and it will be implemented.

Problem is, Greece has been a failed state for decades (centuries?) and will probably continue to do so for decades to come. The problems of Greece do not originate from the Euro, it merely made it easier for them to continue and even accelerate their lifestyle (due much lower interest). Call it culture, whatever. Promises are meaningless, they may ‘work’ 2100 hrs a year but they aren’t producing (even African countries are doing far better), corruption is not only accepted it’s a way of life, etc. etc.. You are not going to change that by pumping in additional funds, every Euro or Dollar is wasted from the start.

All you here from the people of Greece is ‘insulted’, no one accepts any form of responsibility. Worse, politicians (Samaras et al) already implied that after the elections in april every deal was up for ‘renegotiation’.

Europe’s politicians are fully aware of the Greek ‘ethos’ and therefore a guardian is appointed over the bailout money. Not because they like it, but the Greek politicians (who have been appointed over and over again by the voters of Greece.. who apparently enjoyed having Santa-Claus at the helm) have proven themselves incapable of doing so. No insult, plain hard facts, and its denial is the very problem of the Greek ‘ethos’: It is just everybody’s fault but the people of Greece.

With this new package effectively only the Greek bonds and the recapitalization of Greek banks is guaranteed. The ‘ethos’ of the people of Greece has to change, and the only ones who can do that are the people of Greece. It won’t be easy, but you just can’t keep on spending more than you earn. Europe is not taking responsibility for this process; it merely provides a framework in which the people of Greece have a fair fighting chance. Hard? No doubt, but the alternative is far worse.

Europe doesn’t impose terms per se; they impose terms in case the people of Greece want to keep on lending their money. If they don’t like the terms, by all means, exit the Euro zone and handle your problems your own way. It probably will be a whole lot messier than doing it the European way, but no-one in Europe will even try to stop you.

And implying WW2 debts need to be repaid.. Why not WW1, why not slavery, why not the occupation of Hawaii/Philippines, why not the extermination of Indians, why not the Roman Empire? How far back do you want to go? These phrases are just a lousy excuse for incompetence.

By: dors4626

dors4626 — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 02:11:58 +0000

On a further note, just to consider the vast insult added to injury, just know that Germany owes GREECE over $500Billion.

See the following:

http://www.greece.org/blogs/wwii/?page_i d=220

By: FifthDecade

FifthDecade — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 02:08:59 +0000

I saw an interesting interview with some guy from the Institute of International Finance who represent bondholders with €100 billion exposure to Greek debt who said the situation was accept a 53.5% haircut or a 70% haircut. They were going to push for universal acceptance of the latest deal on the basis that it was in their interests to do so.

@Jmo2005 While I respect and understand the feelings of those Greeks on low incomes, in a democracy you cannot just wipe your hands and blame someone else: you as the general public voted for the governments who promised you more goodies than those who didn’t. It’s a hard lesson to learn that goodies always have to be paid for, but that’s democracy for you.

Personally I am not a great fan of austerity in recessions, I think it is far better to apply it in times of plenty, build up reserves that are not paid out as tax breaks for the wealthy, and then use these reserves in times of famine. Heck, they even knew about that in Biblical times! But what happens these days? The total reverse, and its bonkers.

By: dors4626

dors4626 — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 02:08:11 +0000

I urge you all to read Mikis Theodorakis’ “An Open Letter to Public Opinion: The Truth About Greece.” It will set you straight on what has really happened.

By: geovla

geovla — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 01:22:58 +0000

“bondholders have to guess what might happen if they fail to tender into the exchange”

This is a joke. Quite clearly Greece said it would legislate to allow it to enforce losses on bondholders who do not take part voluntarily.

If bondholders are forced to take a loss – involuntarily – that is a credit default. If this is not a default – then what in the world would classify as a default? The Wall Street Bankers running the ISDA are playing games with everyone. Their only concern if the profits of their members. If they don’t payout on the CDS’s – why would any investor every want to purchase a CDS in the future.

By: Jmo2005

Jmo2005 — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 00:56:27 +0000

I am Greek and I have to tell you that what some of you might think about people here is kind of virtual reality.I know you are right about taxes not being paid and pensions of 125% at the age of 50 but that goes only for the minority.Maybe it’s a big minority of 25% or something but it is still not enough to tell what has been going on here.
Corruption, lack of legislation or/and its application and a social structure of inter-dependence that couldn’t allow us to see the forest behind the tree, are all to blame.
Employees with annual salary below 7000 and pensioners with annual income of 4000 are the ones that constitute the main body of the people you consider greedy or not having social conscience and all I am telling you is you are wrong when you call Greeks this or that because most of the people hardly managed to cope with their lives and now face major difficulties even to survive.
The rest, including much of the current political system, still have a lot of money and security when all we face is uncertainty and depression.So please don’t call us just Greeks…most people couldn’t have seen this coming and have very little contribution to all this crap, unlike irresponsible and corrupted politicians and parties.We are all responsible to a point but only because of naivety and excess tolerance.

By: fp3690

fp3690 — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 23:07:28 +0000

“During the 1950s and 60s, huge numbers of Greeks emigrated to Australia, because the Greek economy did not recover like those of northern and western Europe.
Melbourne became the city with the second largest population of Greeks after Athens.”

That is not true. Greece had a remarkable growth from the mid-50s onwards, 3rd largest in the world I believe, on par with Japan, Italy and Korea. There was however a civil war right after WW2 that delayed growth, and a political climate oppressive towards leftists, who left en masse towards greener pastures (and not so green, as some went to communist countries). And also, despite growth, the country, and especially the countryside was just so ravaged that many people were still impoverished – so there was large internal (to Athens) migration as well. Italy is another such example: the North was on steroids, but the South was lagging, and there was massive migration too, to Australia and Belgium mainly.

But your point stands – migration will occur.

PS: Melbourne is actually the 3rd largest Greek city, after Thessaloniki as well :)

By: Serreos1950

Serreos1950 — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 22:50:23 +0000

I have a plan to ease the austerity of the Greek people. To make structural changes in the Greek society and bring eventual prosperity. I don’t want to be a politician and never had such aspirations. Some of the the changes that I would implement:
All employers in Greece would have to pay their employees by cheque, or bank deposit, and they would be required to hand a payroll stub outlining the payroll deductions. Employees would be required to contribute 7.5% of their wages for pension benefits. Employers would have to contribute another 10%. This would be for the next 10 years until the system is well funded and it becomes viable. Then the contribution that the employer makes can gradually be reduced to the same proportion as that of the employee. -Pension benefits would have a minimum of 400,00 Euro and a maximum of 1300,00
Politicians’ wages would be reduced to 48.000,00 Euro, and a budget of 52.000,00 for a secretary and travel expenses. That would have to be the total expenditures allowed per elected parliamentarian.
The austerity measures introduced are hard for the common people in Greece. To make it easier for them to bear it, I would ask the politicians to legislate that Wholesalers be limited to 12% mark-up on the products they manufacture or buy from farmers. This should have the immediate effect of lowering the cost of living, and thus would reduce the anxiety and pain the Greek people feel right now. -The Wholesalers who buy produce from farmers have to pay up front the farmers when they receive their produce. At the very latest, within a month.
Greek people are probably some of the most unruly people in the world. They are the most dangerous drivers in the world. I have a solution that is not going to cost anything the government or the municipality that hires them. First order of business, call a meeting of all police forces and tell them that starting today you have to make more money than you cost us to work here. You must bring in at least 100 traffic violations per month, other than parking tickets. Minimum fine being 100,00 Euro. It should be easy getting at least 20 traffic violations a day per police officer, but as I pointed out above, all they would have to do is bring 100 violations per month. Not only would the police force be self supporting, but would also generate money for other purposes. It would also make for a safer place! It is not uncommon for Greeks not to stop at a stop sign, to pass another vehicle when there is a double solid line, to speed, to throw trash out the window,etc.
Another measure would be to outlaw “pereosi” in the tax system. This is the most diabolical plan ever devised by the Greek Government. This plan is one of the main reasons why Greek business people cheat on their taxes. It’s because the Greek Government lumps them all together as thieves and cheats. So they send a letter asking the businessman to cough up some more money, or else. Rather then do that, why not go and check their books to see if they were cheats? To safe guard the possibility of the Revenue people cheating, have them paired with other agents from another area that they do not know, and thus cannot conspire to make deals with the one who is audited. There are other measures that I would implement to bring about change for the better. I would do all that for an Annual income of 25.000,00 Euro with the provision that they pay me only 1.000,00 per month till the end of the year. If there is no marked improvement at the end of the year, they could release me without payment of the 13.000,00 that would be due.
I would do this under one condition:
That no civil employee earns more than 40.000,00 Euro per annum.

By: BehG.

BehG. — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 22:16:49 +0000

Great article.

It’s just a matter of time before the Greeks are working for large Northern European corporations for 15-20 Euros a day. Frankly, it can’t get any better than this for the Germans et al – having cheap labour much closer to home (versus East Asia) with full control and oversight NOW put into place, where you don’t have to deal with the unpredictability of closed political systems like China. On top of that, Southern Europe is keeping the value of the Euro low, increasing the competitiveness of Northern Euro service and manufacturing sectors.

But best of all, you get to call an invasion a rescue and having appointed a PM and insisted on an almost 50% cut in the defence budget in just over 2 years, there’s not much to fear. The bright side is that this time around, no shots were fired, no one died and the Greeks don’t have to resort to eating cats and mice off the streets for like the last time – at least not for another few months. And the markets have been loving this excitment since the end of summer.

So, I don’t know why everyone, on both sides of the argument, is complaining! Sooner or later something has to give in this situation. Either the Greeks will accept their fate and the famine, or there will major social unrest and they will pull an Oedipus, get rid of the Sphynx (i.e. Merkozy) and their father (i.e. their politicians) and get back with their mother (i.e. the Drachma) and live live happily thinking that they have cheated their fate, at least for a little while – a well defined and well played Greek tragedy either way.

So, I think Borg (the Swidish finance minister) hit the nail right on the head when he said that hey’re stuck in their tragedy. But he should have probably closed off the interview with a message to the Greeks, that “resistance is futile”! ;)

By: klauskastner

klauskastner — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 20:09:51 +0000

I find it absolutely amazing that 2 years have gone by, many all-night sessions with top-level politicians have taken place, and — not a single initiative to start some sort of private sector stimulus. I guess Keynes once gave the example that, as a stimulus, it would be a good idea to pay a man to dig a hole only to have him fill it again afterwards. True, with one important proviso in the case of Greece: not the government and/or public sector should do that. Instead, the private sector.

People are throwing around 3-digit BN EUR figures. How about using just 1 BN EUR to fund meaningful new investments in the Greek private sector. Investments which create jobs; which jobs pay income taxes; which companies pay corporate taxes; and whose owner pay taxes on dividends.

Why not???

http://klauskastner.blogspot.com/2012/01 /what-ever-happened-to-mckinsey-report. html

By: NukerDoggie

NukerDoggie — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 19:41:56 +0000

The Germans wanted an immediate Greek default and a Greece exit from the euro, as shown by their heartless approach, but they (the Germans) were pressured to settle for this “deal”, which delays the catastrophe for a little while only. During the delay, the explosive buildup of chaotic forces in Greece and elsewhere, where austerity is being pushed hard, ensures a big explosion down the road. The core (Germany, France et al) will survive in some meaningful fashion, at the expense of blasting away the PIIGS. The core increasingly realizes its fortunes lie in surviving such a cleansing blast and in allying ever closer with the East – Russia, China, India – and with the South. We’re just witnessing the process, step-by-step.