Austerity is just a cover to allow Europe's right to privatize essential public services, Use taxpayers money to protect private casino banks shareholders from losses and to create so much unemployment that Europeans are prepared to work for the price of a Coolie. In Germany real wages lagged productivity in the euro era. the excess output of Germany was mopped by others who imported it. Germany was being over-competitive in the 00s. There is also a mythology that the Greek productivity fell during the Euro era, Read this article and you will see that the OECD data shows that Greek productivity was increasing consistently at rates faster than that of Northern Europe during the EURO era. that is until 2009. Since then productivity fell. Also, from the same source, for the period between 2004 and 2011: Average Greek labour productivity was 73% of the EZ. Average Greek labour cost 76% of the EZ....So there is no justification for the teratologies written in the press regarding the party of the unproductive and overpaid Greek workers during the EURO era. I won't get into detail regarding the rest of the "facts" you mentioned like Greek train drivers getting 50K (I have seen up to 70K) and people retiring at 50 on average. All these have been repeatedly proved wrong with facts (Greek used to retire on average at the same age as Germans - now I am sure later). There is of course benefit abuse in Greece, and there are various weaknesses in the public sector but even in 2009 the public sector spending in Greece was the average European in relation to GDP. The key problem is Greece was poorer tax collection than other places. I also quote from the OECD report for 2011 on public sector employment - another big myth there : all Greeks work in the public sector. "Greece has one of the lowest rates of public employment among OECD countries, with general government employing just 7.9% of the total labour force in 2008. This is a slight increase from 2000, when the rate was 6.8%. Across the OECD area, the share of government employment ranges from 6.7% to 29.3%, with an average of 15%. The Greek government has plans to further decrease this share, by replacing only 20% of staff leaving on retirement. Public employment is also highly centralised in Greece, with over 80% of staff working at the central government level".
Surprise, surprise, the European Commission in favor of banks again!
With over 3 million empty properties in Spain and hundreds of evictions occurring everyday of people who can't keep up with their mortgage payments due to the massive unemployment rate, a few days ago the gvnt of the autonomous region of Andalusia approved a decree to allow for the temporary expropriation of empty homes from banks in order to house the increasing number of homeless people.
Well, Brussels has replied with a letter to the Spanish central government warning them that they are studying whether the decree is contrary to the Memorandum of Understanding that Spain was forced to sign last year to bailout the banks. The letter also warns of the risks of these expropriations to the Spanish financial system.
Bruselas se entromete en el decreto andaluz de Vivienda y se pone del lado de la banca
We must destroy this EU before it destroys us all.
With over 3 million empty properties in Spain and hundreds of evictions occurring everyday of people who can't keep up with their mortgage payments due to the massive unemployment rate, a few days ago the gvnt of the autonomous region of Andalusia approved a decree to allow for the temporary expropriation of empty homes from banks in order to house the increasing number of homeless people.
Well, Brussels has replied with a letter to the Spanish central government warning them that they are studying whether the decree is contrary to the Memorandum of Understanding that Spain was forced to sign last year to bailout the banks. The letter also warns of the risks of these expropriations to the Spanish financial system.
Bruselas se entromete en el decreto andaluz de Vivienda y se pone del lado de la banca
We must destroy this EU before it destroys us all.
4 comments:
Spain's leaders are pinning their hopes on banking union, and eventually fiscal union too. But the risk of a "crash landing" remains dangerously real, he warns:
That's not just because unemployment in Spain has risen by three and a half million since the start of the crisis and has now reached 27%, or that the domestic economy has shrunk by a sixth. It is that Spain is up to its eyeballs in debt, with no likely improvement in prospect.
Despite austerity, little progress is being made in reducing the budget deficit and national debt is heading for well over 100% of gross domestic product. In the absence of more rapid growth and a banking union being agreed swiftly, a Greek-style debt restructuring seems eminently possible.
Spain is perhaps the emblematic eurozone country. Its past performance reflects the design flaws in the single currency; it is trapped in a low-growth, high-debt vortex; and it can only recover if a reluctant Germany backs plans for integration.
Cyprus is hoping to patch up relations with the eurozone during today's Eurogroup meeting, its finance minister has said.
Haris Georgiades (appointed in April) told CNBC that he was eager to repair any damage with relations with Brussels, following March's botched bailout that resulted in capital controls being imposed in Cyprus and heavy losses on larger bank customers.
Georgiades also warned that Europe must learn lessons from the Cyprus debacle and rethink its decision-making process.
And you're complaining, are you, about the Greek/Spanish/Cypriot...-bashing when in each and every of these countries there simply are no popular parties demanding immediate exit from the common currency.
Apart from being inaccurate regarding Cyprus, what does this have to do with anything at all? Does the people voting for an idiotic policy give anyone the right the bash their nation?
I'd say, either Greeks, Spanish, Cypriots...are into masochism or you're terribly out of tune with what these countries' peoples really want.
In relation to the euro they are into masochism indeed. And it's their goddamn right to do that if they so please.
Each of those countries that you say are bashed would still need to auction their sov. bonds, even if tomorrow they were back to their original currencies.
Greek bond auctions would be Greece's problem and no-one else's. What more do you want
t the latest authority to examine whether Bloomberg journalists “spied” on staff by tracking the way they used Bloomberg terminals.
Earlier, the US Treasury and Federal Reserve said they were investigating whether there could have been leaks of confidential information.
"The ECB takes the protection of confidentiality in the usage of data products by ECB management and staff very seriously," an ECB spokesman said on Monday. "Our experts are in close contact with Bloomberg."
A slew of Bloomberg customers are seeking urgent answers from the media and financial data company over potential privacy breaches, after it emerged that journalists been using the $20,000-a-year information feeds to keep tabs on individual users.
Matthew Winkler, the editor in chief of Bloomberg News , apologised to clients in a op-ed published on Bloomberg's website on Monday.
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