LOL Greece!

[Boges]

Germany is basically subsidizing this country and in order to keep Greece solvent they have to take control of their books at least a little.

I thought the entitlements public services in Canada demanded was crazy. At they don't riot in the street. . . yet.

Since when is retiring at 55 a civil right?

[Shady]

Germany is basically subsidizing this country and in order to keep Greece solvent they have to take control of their books at least a little.

I thought the entitlements public services in Canada demanded was crazy. At they don't riot in the street. . . yet.

Since when is retiring at 55 a civil right?

Greece is a great example of what happens when the liberal entitlement culture becomes entrenched in a society. It's also a great example of what happens when the public sector is given preference over the private sector. Heckuva job lefties!

[Michael Hardner]

Greece is a great example of what happens when the liberal entitlement culture becomes entrenched in a society. It's also a great example of what happens when the public sector is given preference over the private sector. Heckuva job lefties!

It's strange that the countries with the best situation for workers and the ones with the worst are the ones in turmoil.

[Michael Hardner]

Heckuva job lefties!

Thanks !

Seriously, when we have such disparity in compensation for countries competing in the same market, no wonder we have these problems. How much better is life for a Greek civil servant than a Chinese worker ?

[M.Dancer]

How much better is life for a Greek civil servant than a Chinese worker ?

You really have to ask that question?

[Boges]

You really have to ask that question?

Do public servants even compete with other countries? I thought they provided services to the population that paid their taxes.

The problem with employment equity is a real one, but that's not what's going on here.

Greece gave their public servants way more than it could afford and now that they need a bailout to stave off ruin their soiled brat populace is rioting.

This is a great warning for the rest of the Western world. You can also another warning from the opposite end of the spectrum coming from the US.

[Michael Hardner]

You really have to ask that question?

I'm looking for a raw number. Maybe, like, 42 ?

[Michael Hardner]

You can also another warning from the opposite end of the spectrum coming from the US.

The opposite end is China.

[Michael Hardner]

The opposite end is China.

...or India, or whomever is at the low end of the wage scale in countries that are part of our major trading blocs.

[M.Dancer]

How much better is life for a Greek civil servant than a Chinese worker ?

42

[WIP]

Greece is a great example of what happens when the liberal entitlement culture becomes entrenched in a society. It's also a great example of what happens when the public sector is given preference over the private sector. Heckuva job lefties!

Oh, and how do you explain America's race to the bottom? We know where budget cuts and low taxes for the rich leads over here; you're just taking advantage of a situation that is remote and unknown to most of us over here to follow the conservative/neoliberal strategy of trickle up economics.

[Oleg Bach]

My Greek butcher explained to me how this took place - I forget the name of the economist advisor type but he as an American who showed the Greek government on how to lever the system - most Greeks blame their woes on American advice - bad advice.

[bush_cheney2004]

Oh, and how do you explain America's race to the bottom?

Is that the same as America's race to the Moon?

We know where budget cuts and low taxes for the rich leads over here; you're just taking advantage of a situation that is remote and unknown to most of us over here to follow the conservative/neoliberal strategy of trickle up economics.

It may be unknown to you, but many Canadians know about budget cuts from the 1990's when faced with going over the same cliff.

Canadian economists say the first success of Mr Chretien's government was to secure widespread public support for what would be deep and painful spending cuts.

Scott Reid, a former adviser to the Canadian government, told the BBC's Today programme that the administration was greatly helped by the widespread coverage given to a story in the

Wall Street Journal that described Canada as a "Third World banana republic".

Given most Canadians' dislike of all things American (think sibling rivalry), this insult by a US newspaper was enough to make them realise they had to get their national finances in order, whatever the misery along the way.

[GostHacked]

Greece is a great example of what happens when the liberal entitlement culture becomes entrenched in a society. It's also a great example of what happens when the public sector is given preference over the private sector. Heckuva job lefties!

Greece is an example of what happens when international bankers come and try to save you. These bail outs are designed so that when a country borrows the money, there is no hope in ever paying it off 100% because you are always going to owe more than you make. This is why austerity measures were taken. That means stuff like unemployment insurance, health care funds and retirement funds are getting raped.

Also, Greece tried to sell much of it's public infrastructure (obviously to foreign entities) in order to qualify for this loan and to be in a position to (ahahah) pay it off.

This is not a left or right think Shady. Because the left and the right are BOTH involved in this screw up. All these banks should do what Iceland did recently, which is to tell the international bankers to piss up a rope. They never had financial problems before that.

This has been developing for about a year now. And it's coming to a head, the people are pissed because they have had enough of the raping.

[M.Dancer]

Greece is an example of what happens when international bankers come and try to save you.

Oh so it has nothing to do with a bloated government payroll? Nothing to do with being a mess to begin with...all the banks fault? Banks should perhaps not assist Greece?

32% of the Greek workforce are employed by the government.

http://www.euronews.net/2010/02/11/greece-civil-servants-resist-austerity-plan/

Above, that is the problem.

[Oleg Bach]

Just like here in the modern west - 89% are employed by governmenatal corporations where all they do is click a mouse all day...making nothing - producing nothing - generating no real material wealth. All we do is maintain and attempt to manage a system though electronics that has become dependent on the immigrant who can hammer a nail.

[GostHacked]

Oh so it has nothing to do with a bloated government payroll? Nothing to do with being a mess to begin with...all the banks fault? Banks should perhaps not assist Greece?

http://www.euronews.net/2010/02/11/greece-civil-servants-resist-austerity-plan/

Above, that is the problem.

Big government is part of the problem.

[WIP]

Greece is an example of what happens when international bankers come and try to save you. These bail outs are designed so that when a country borrows the money, there is no hope in ever paying it off 100% because you are always going to owe more than you make. This is why austerity measures were taken. That means stuff like unemployment insurance, health care funds and retirement funds are getting raped.

This is what Naomi Klein calls "Disaster Capitalism." Big profits can be made by destroying entire economies. Right from the start, the intentions of international bankers is to use public debt owed as leverage to gain more and more control of a society. This is how, for all intents and purposes the Colonial Era never ended in much of the third world. The only difference is that they have a puppet government who gets payed by foreign interests and has no concern for, or even much ability to do anything for his own people...if he really wanted to.

[Shady]

This is what Naomi Klein calls "Disaster Capitalism."

Complete nonsense. This has nothing to do with captialism, and everything to do with socialism. Inflated salaries based on nothing. Full pensions based on nothing. Artifically low retirement age, an ever growing public sector at the expense of an ever shrinking private sector. Heckuva job lefties!

[Oleg Bach]

Complete nonsense. This has nothing to do with captialism, and everything to do with socialism. Inflated salaries based on nothing. Full pensions based on nothing. Artifically low retirement age, an ever growing public sector at the expense of an ever shrinking private sector. Heckuva job lefties!

There is nothing that exists that can be called an arifically low retirement age. If the person paid in it is not anyones buisness when he or she wants to retire and spend their own money - What the problem is - lays in the fact that extremist capitalism has become dependant on fraud. Historically when the gangsters get super greedy they run off with the pension plan. It is not about socialism or proper capitalism...It is about an artifical and fraudulent application of economic theory...making something out of nothing! Those that worked and contributed did it with honesty...those that deny them their own pensions are simply crooks who have reached their limit and are now desperate to survive.

[Shady]

There is nothing that exists that can be called an arifically low retirement age.

There is if you're asking other people to pay for it.

[Shady]

This is not a left or right think Shady.

You're damn right it is. Who do you think is responsible for lowering the retirment age to 55? Increasing an ever growing public sector? Increasing an ever growing public sectors salaries, based on nothing. Increasing their pensions, based on nothing. And expecting people in the private sector to foot the bill. Don't be ridiculous.

[GostHacked]

You're damn right it is. Who do you think is responsible for lowering the retirment age to 55? Increasing an ever growing public sector? Increasing an ever growing public sectors salaries, based on nothing. Increasing their pensions, based on nothing. And expecting people in the private sector to foot the bill. Don't be ridiculous.

Well, you keep on about Obama, while giving Bush a pass. Both the left and the right have put the USA into the situation they are in today, and this is pretty much the same in every other country as well.

We are both expected to pay for the fuck ups of BOTH the left and the right. We are ALWAYS on the hook for their screw ups. While they sit in the parliaments debating on how they are going to screw the country over next.

Because Greece is now owned by international bankers. The left or the right, really does not matter. Never has. They both worked towards the same goal. And that was screwing the country over.

[msj]

Not sure why we have a thread discussing this when Michael Lewis already had a great article about this back in October, 2010.

For the love of Pete! Before anyone else writes something stupid please read the above article first.

--------

Glad I went to Greece in October 2009.

Would love to go again as it's a great country. But too bad about the people and their dysfunctional ways (culturally, politically, bureaucratically).

[bud]

i guess it's always easiest to blame 'the people' (or the lefties like the simpleton shady likes to do) and not look at why greece is where it's at right now.

Periods of frenzied speculative lending are inexorably followed by government or sovereign debt defaults, or near defaults. Like the Third World debt crisis of the early 1980s and the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s, the so-called sovereign debt problem of countries like Greece, Spain, and Portugal is principally a supply-driven crisis, not a demand-driven one.

Wall Street powerhouse Goldman Sachs showed Greek financial authorities how financial instruments known as derivatives could be used to make large chunks of Greek debt ‘disappear,’ thus making the national accounts look good to bankers eager to lend more. Then the very same agency turned around, and, through a kind of derivatives trading known as ‘credit default swaps,’ bet on the possibility that Greece would default, raising the country’s cost of borrowing from the banks but making a tidy profit for itself."

http://www.yesmagazine.org/new-economy/greek-mythology-the-real-story-of-the-european-debt-crisis

Edited June 29, 2011 by bud