Haven't heard the same complaints when non white countries get bled to death.
The drachma is a nonstarter. If they were to go that route they would never get out of debt, the world has changed a lot in the last 30 years.
There are various reasons to this :
- When other countries default, they can just borrow more money or devaluate their money. Or say fukk you to the banks. This is what happens usually. But Greece can't, because it is "stuck" within the eurozone. Which is an unprecedented situation.
- Actually there are grassroots organizations here in Europe seeking debt relief and complaining about debts in other countries (especially African countries). They would be labelled "communist" in the US probably, and obviously have no access whatsoever to mainstream media. But they do work with governments, if I recall well one (CADTM, from Belgium) worked latin american gvts to have part of their debt erased.
- Obviously this is in Europe, which is the first or second market in the world by its size and the first or second commercial partner in the world. Whatever happens in Greece will impact the Eurozone, which will impact the EU, which will impact the world economy. With all due respect, no one cares (politically or economically) if Malawi or Cambodia defaults.
- Moreover, what is happening in Greece is the opposition between the legitimacy of citizens from a sovereign state (Greeks) and the "legitimacy" of monetary institutions, none of which are elected. Basically, it's democracy vs technocracy. It's Europeans against EU civil servants (and no, most of them are not elected). It's much bigger than "just" the money. When you Martin Schulz, the president of the European Parliament (which, if you actually know what we're talking about, is supposed to represent the european CITIZENS) says that he hoped for a "Yes" vote so that Tsipras would be replaces by a technocrat government (chose by the troika, like it happened in Italy), there is a very serious problem.
- Bigger still, this is in the whole debate about what the EU itself should be : a free-market and nothing more (like GB, neo-liberals, the US and big business want...and needless to say, the ECB and the IMF) or should it be a deeper political union, with checks and balances, but also with real solidarity between the different areas?
I've always had that reflection.
We should have waited at least 5 or even 10 more years to expand to 25 and to 28 in the 2000s. We did it too fast because realistically it was already difficult at 15 but that move made things almost impossible considering the socio-economic state of the newcomers and some of current members. Though I can understand it strategically speaking which could have been done to undermine Russia's influence and "secure" eastern countries from Russia's hegemony. But really, the underlying problem is that their are no unique socioeconomic ground in the EU. For example, the very fact, that minimum wages (which are crucial matters when there are no borders) are different in every countries is a catastrophe.
I've seen from my own eyes how French construction companies would hire Polish or Portuguese workers (to cut costs) and win markets against French companies that hire French workers. Can't hate the hustle because those workers work as well as the French ones but I can't get jiggy with it either because it's not fair to hire foreigners whose countries have cheaper work cost and give them contracts relative to their countries' laws and not the one they working in.
A true Europe will consider every countries as federations but nationalisms are too high for this to happen.
I have a friend who works as a France representative (for a specific sector which shall remain nameless) in the European council and he tells me, that most of the time, they can't do anything because there are too much diverging wills. Say France wants to pass a law regarding, I don't know, oil exportation (randomly chosen). Spain for example may agree but will ask for adjustments, Italy may say nope because it messes up their own exports, GB may tell people to GTFOH for some reasons, the Netherlands may give a yes only if France give a "yes back" to one of their laws and so on and so on. It's a fukkin mess. And all of this cripples national administrations because when a European laws passes (which must then be applied within countries), it is so broad (in order to satisfy everybody) that it often is inapplicable.
Totally agree. We should have waited at least 10 pr 15 years before moving forward with expansion. The move was more political, to diminish Russia's influence but also I believe to undermine the chances of ever getting to a federal europe. This is why big business lobbies, GB and the US were pushing HARD for expansion.
@Reggie Rhodes
[="Reggie Rhodes, post: 14169083, member: 16201"]Yeah if things get dire enough, this is a definite possibility.
Greece has definitely been living under the harshness of austerity over the past few years, but what's spooking people is their history of mismanagement and a lack of institutional controls being put in to avoid the same scenario that caused this problem in the first place. I think the debt needs to be restructured, but I don't believe anyone would or should be lending them money until they've at least done some heavy fiscal and social reform.
Iceland and Argentina are tempting comparisons, but both had crucial differences from Greece that make Greece's situation a bit more sticky. Iceland's recovery was due to allowing their banks to fail, and while they did default and tell creditors to fukk off, they were in a stronger economic and social position to do that than Greece is right now. Argentina recovered because they luckily came across a boom in demand from Chinese and Brazilian for soy and corn, Argentina's top 2 exports. Greece doesn't have any analogous exports to support them like that.
The problem isn't Greek laziness, it's Greek corruption, tax flight and institutional holes that allowed money to seep out in the first place. I just don't see lenders ignoring those things, especially with the NO vote and Syriza's rhetoric. Like, does Greece even have a viable plan for self-recovery if they go the default route? Tourism looks like their best bet, but that industry was really helped out by lax travel rules within the EU, and if they're kicked out of the Eurozone and EU, that becomes a difficult industry to maintain.
The thing is, everyone is catching up now on what has been going in Greece. But Greeks themselvs should remind everyone that corruption has always been around, including under right governments. That the so-called "chaos" in Greece did not stop Germany from doing a lot of business there, and if you study the Eurozone you realize it works because some countries are customers : Germany needs Greece, among others, to imports German goods. That's how Germany keeps it economy going, because the interior market is stagnant (yes, you guessed it : because of austerity measures). Also, Golden Sachs helped previous greek gvt to "work the books" in order to get into the eurozone. And the crisis was out of hand a long time before Syriza was even formed. This would be like blaming Obama for the war in Irak.
Wha people fail to understand, I thinlk, is just what Greece has ALREADY done : they have been doing ALL THE STUFF required by the IMF, ECB and Commission for YEARS now. And the situation has only gotten worse and worse, like every serious economist knows it would. Austerity policies cannot lead to growth, it's almost mathematically impossible. And now eldery people are dying, people don't have access to school, o medecine, to public transportation, to their pension, etc. How exactly are they supposed to create any kind of growth?
Syriza is asking to change the focus from just repaying the debt to actually investing in the future. Because, it MUST be repeated time and time again, 3/4 of all the money "given" to Greece never made it to Greece : it went straight in the French, German banks and the IMF. IMF already made 2.5 billion euros off the Greek debt.
So what Syriza is asking is that instead of having all that money go the banks, let's actually invest for the future with it. A sor of New-Deal if you will. Because how else do we create growth?
Greece is TOTALLY at fault for this.
And we need to stop blaming the people with power and money for everything.
Greece is ignored every opportunity to get on the right side of this matter and each time they've responded like children, avoided responsibility, and kicked the can down the road.
Greece's only threat is "releasing immigrants"...fukk them.
See this is the shyt i'm talking about
Back in 2008 NO ONE wanted to shoulder the blame on people who took out loans they couldn't handle.
Yes, banks shouldn't have done it, but we're not even talking about low financial-education buyers...we're talking about ENTIRE governments.
Greece has been doing this shyt for too long and its time they pay. All 11 million of them.
The EU isn't a safety net, its supposed to be a partnership.
Its easy to paint the lenders as the bad guys, but as long as we keep this trope up, the true responsibility of the greek people will NEVER be discussed.
Actually, the EU IS a safety net. And if you actually read up on Greece and the crisis, as well as EU internal politics, you will understand why Tsipars and Syriza are being made examples of.
The fact is that the banks and the IMF don't need the money, and the ECB could easily negotiate with the IMF in order to cover up for Greece, and then organize an intra-European agreement with Greece in the long-term. This is not economical, it is a political game, a show of power by Merkel, the ECB, the IMF and banks. There is no economic founding to the way all of this is being handled by EU institutions. It's actually counter-productive, except for banks.
