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I don't understand this comment. What about this article makes you think the Greeks can't make decisions for themselves? Is their land unsuitable for farming, a

I don't understand this comment. What about this article makes you think the Greeks can't make decisions for themselves? Is their land unsuitable for farming, and manufacture, and services? Did someone setup an embargo against them? Furthermore, the idea of needing to overhaul things at a global level makes many assumptions. For example, that anyone has the authority and intelligence to tell the entire world how it should function.

netsharc 10y ago
Decisions for themselves? Hah. It's not in the article, but Schäuble and the other EU finance ministers have set out to make an example out of Greece, or the apparatchiks just don't like the radical lefties that got into power. Paul Krugman has mused, before, EUcrats could tell government officials what to do, and when they follow them, even if the country fails and they get voted out, they'd get cushy EU jobs. But the current Greek government don't want cushy EU jobs, they want to save the population. That and other things (domino effect, if Greece gets forgiveness, the other countries would want it too) mean it is in the EUcrats' best interest to see Greece fail. Meanwhile, Schäuble's policy of Austerity über Alles mean the Greek government has been forced to abandon policies that might've rebooted the economy, and be forced to cut spending in hopes that the "confidence fairy" shows up. Even the IMF has said this policy is stupid...
- DanielBMarkham 10y ago
  Just so I'm clear, you are claiming that the finance ministers are purposely rigging things so that Greece will fail -- that all those loans and such were part of a plan to make an example out of them. First I've heard of this, but I haven't been following it. It sounds quite far-fetched though. I must be missing something.
  - StavrosK 10y ago
    I don't know if it's a "plan", but it's definitely a rigidity and "it's our way or the highway", because they can afford it. The current measures are beyond stupid. They've crippled the country's economy, shut down a large majority of businesses, made the climate hostile to new businesses, and generally ensured that the country doesn't recover. I don't think we've still seen the worst of it, because the economy has shut down almost completely, and it's still getting worse. The effect of this much deterioration on such a large system will take years to show, and what we're seeing now are the results of policies five years ago. I'm pretty confident it will get even worse in the next half-decade. Very much to blame for this is the leftist mindset of the average Greek, who thinks "bosses are the devil" and that making the country friendlier to entrepreneurship and investments is anathema.
  - cloudjacker 10y ago
    It's not about Greece or the people of Greece or its economy, it is about existing creditors of Greek assets having time to limit exposure and fallout to the broader financial system, as well as provide a framework of deterrents for other large European countries that are practically insolvent
  - soVeryTired 10y ago
    I wouldn't go as far as the OP: I think Heinlein's razor comes into effect here. There is a clear solution to the problem, which is debt forgiveness. The troika has known this since the crisis began. The problem is that it's politically untenable. So instead they kick the can down the road, do nothing, and hope everything gets better on its own. They've caused a depression in Greece. They've also turned me into a euroskeptic.
    - jbooth 10y ago
      Very much worth noting too that the bailouts ensure banks (mostly German banks) get paid back. Bankruptcy or debt forgiveness means the banks don't get paid back. And now when EU taxpayers get pissed about paying for the bailout, the EU bureaucrats can point at those darn lazy greeks as the problem. At the end of the day, it's the banks' job to assess risk, they lent money to Greece, and they're only getting paid because of this bailout. What's greece paying in interest, again? Some kind of huge risk premium, probably?
  - daptaq 10y ago
    Not quite like that, or at least the "rigging" part. Yanis Varoufakis, former finance ministers of Greece, has talked about how the finance ministers were pushing for the "failed policies", all through I don't remember what the reasons were.
  - pdkl95 10y ago
    > claiming that the finance ministers are purposely rigging things so that Greece will fail > First I've heard of this I suggest listening[1] to Yanis Varoufakis talk about his negotiations with the rest of the EU's finance ministers. He talks about the rigged process, and the ultimatum they gave him when he pushed for a saner refinancing plan. Schäuble's response, according to Mr. Varoufakis, was "Elections cannot be allowed to change the economic policies applied to Greece!" For background on how this situation was created, see Mark Blyth's very nice discussion[2] of the Greek situation and how it fits in with the larger Euro problem. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihVcrnFag1s#t=672 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihVcrnFag1s#t=672 [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6vV8_uQmxs#t=778 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6vV8_uQmxs#t=778
  - lifeisstillgood 10y ago
    That is the generally accepted view of the Greek crisis in much of Europe - The Euro hid huge debts in the same way securitised debt did in US. People would lend (via bonds) to risky countries (Greece and Spain) at the same EuroBond rate they lent to less risky countries (Germany, and well just Germany). And Greece took this and spent - at first on good infrastructure but slowly on low performing roads to nowhere and a lot on non capital spending (social welfare) And particular Greek social Problems made it far worse (a political class removed from the populace, etc) As the crisis hit Greece could not repay these huge debts and could not devalue their currency (the Euro was not theirs). And they got loans from Germany (cos a lot of German banks owned the A rated bonds) and paid interest with the loans thus doing nothing to solve the problem. After a few years of this the Greek people voted in a whole new radical party. The goal was to cancel the impossible to pay debt and follow sensible Keynesian rebuilding. The cancelling of the debt (spearheaded by charismatic economist Yanis Varoufakis) was not insane but it would mean all other countries in similar problems would also follow suit. So the Big players in Euro (Schable being the biggest) opposed it everyway they could. The Greeks took it to the brink but the PM could not plunge Greece into leaving the Euro and not being able to keep hospitals open backed down No solution - and we end up here
    - DanielBMarkham 10y ago
      Total outsider and novice here, but from what you're describing, it seems that Greece has to leave the Euro and default on its debts. If people are electing leaders who have no control over finances, there's no democracy at work. Horrible thing to have happen in the birthplace of democracy. The EU was sort of a beta version of a United Europe. They weren't as luck as the U.S., where a highly educated but small group of people tried to come up with the simplest thing they could that wouldn't fail. Instead it looks like quite a bit of architecture astronaut syndrome going on. If I'm right, and I'm just a passerby, the sooner they start down the road to refactoring the better it will be for everybody.
      - lifeisstillgood 10y ago
        > Greece has to leave the Euro and default on its debts. pretty much > architecture astronaut syndrome Not really. It started well. The Euro currency was the great achilles heel, as it meant there MUST be fiscal harmonisation between countries that were arguing over the amount of meat in a sausage. That said the more I learn about USA and the states, especially the southern states, the more I realise we need things like TIPP and TPP and the WTO. The states generally hate being in a federal system. I would try and listen to Yanis Varoufakis stuff online. (https://yanisvaroufakis.eu/ https://yanisvaroufakis.eu/ is his blog but there is a lot there with little organisation) Is in favour of defeating Pikkety with UBI: https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/basic-income-funded-by-capital-income-by-yanis-varoufakis-2016-10 https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/basic-income-fu...
- StavrosK 10y ago
  > But the current Greek government don't want cushy EU jobs, they want to save the population. The current Greek government doesn't seem to want anything other than line their pockets. They've gone back on every single big promise they made before getting elected, and are spreading lies and propaganda to try and keep their positions, even while being wildly unpopular.
- ferongr 10y ago
  I don't know, all I see is a goverment that tries to perpetuate the old system, only with their people in place. The recent TV spectrum fiasco is a good example. A SYRIZA-friendly construction mogul got a large loan to bid on a license, with no real guarantees except from a pasture whose ownership wasn't even clear. The subsequent findings showed that the bank essentially gave him "free" loans ever since SYRIZA came into power and put their people into various positions in the bank. The entire system is fucked, and I would consider booting everyone out of the parliament and becoming an EU protectorate a better option for the future of Greece, austerity or no austerity.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- Swinx43 10y ago
  This is a really good talk that will give some valuable insight into how Greece has been bullied. (YANIS VAROUFAKIS | NOAM CHOMSKY, NYPL, 26 April) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szIGZVrSAyc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szIGZVrSAyc More than 90% of the bailout money went to banks, not to Greece. Bank recapitalization via the back door while blaming Greece.
- mfukar 10y ago
  > But the current Greek government don't want cushy EU jobs, they want to save the population. Well, they saved me by forcing me out of the country, so +1 there.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- JumpCrisscross 10y ago
  Greeks don't have complete sovereignty in the EU. They've repeatedly voted for that arrangement (I happen to think it's a terrible one). But the parent comment alleges a breakdown of the international system meriting, as I read it, global revolution. Given that we're in something of a golden age of humanity--what with record-low rates of per-capita violent-death rates, relative economic prosperity and technological advantage--the claim needs more than a First World country experiencing hardships around paying property taxes.
- Kurtz79 10y ago
  "That and other things (domino effect, if Greece gets forgiveness, the other countries would want it too) mean it is in the EUcrats' best interest to see Greece fail." There is zero interest from EU leaders to see Greece fail. Otherwise they would have to justify to their voters the fact of having bailed out the country multiple times, with no result. It would also cause additional instability and volatility, possibly unraveling an already unstable Union. The best result for them would be for Greece to recover under the austerity policies they are enforcing, but it's clear that this is not going to happen (at least any time soon, and without additional pain and suffering for Greece). Whether the reason is that these policies are wrong in themselves (which is Krugman's/Greece's point of view), or the problem lies in Greece's failure of enforcing them (which is the EU point of view), personally I'm not sure. As always the answer probably is somewhere in the middle.
- meira 10y ago
  Current greek government is far from left.
cloudjacker 10y ago
Where have you been for the whole decade There is no self determination possible for Greece
- pjmorris 10y ago
  It is astonishingly sad to me that the country from which Democracy was exported no longer has a say (or do they?)
  - nradov 10y ago
    Greece does have a say. They can choose to secede from the EU, drop out of the Euro, and default on their debts. And then they'll have to live with the consequences. But democracy doesn't mean they can vote to force other countries to forgive their debts.
    - pjmorris 10y ago
      History doesn't repeat, but it rhymes. Germany was in the same position wrt to the League of Nations after WWI.
    - MrMullen 10y ago
      > But democracy doesn't mean they can vote to force other countries to forgive their debts. Bingo! Greece can do whatever it wants. If they want to stay in the Euro, then they can stay in the Euro but have to follow certain guidelines. If they want to do what they want to do then they can leave the Euro, but they should not complain when their overspending ways catch up to them and it all falls apart.
- krona 10y ago
  Why the downvotes? "Elections change nothing. There are rules." -- Wolfgang Schäuble (in reference to the election of a Greek government in 2015)
  - tzmudzin 10y ago
delegate 10y ago
Just like everyone else, Greeks want to buy Samsung and Apple and Sony and VW and Facebook ads and materials and services from all over the world. It's the way our system works - I want avocados now, even though I'm thousands km away from an avocado tree. One solution would be for me to give up on the avocado, but then the world needs me to buy it, otherwise the balance of avocados in the economy will move and the futures will go down and everyone panics and now maybe I will say no to mangos too ... sell, sell, sell! This is how it works - not because someone conceptualised, thought through the whole complexity - it just ended up being like this.. > For example, that anyone has the authority and intelligence to tell the entire world how it should function. I'm not getting my hopes too high for a global change - in fact I think this can't happen without some sort of global crisis or conflict preceding it. It's very easy to see that the system is broken - much harder to fix it of course.
- DickingAround 10y ago
  A very reasonable response. Thank you. I would like to push back on one point of the top though, I don't think the world is so locked in to the consumption of a small nation or any small population. Indeed, panic would happen if America banned imports. But if many in Greece had to take a step back and dramatically reduce their IPhone consumption until they invented new ways to add value, I doubt anyone would notice. The panic of a Greek default seemed to more step from the many who invested there without expecting a collapse. Even now I think a Greek default would be pretty non-eventful given how much warning time everyone had. (Debt defaults of small countries being relatively common)

netsharc 10y ago

Decisions for themselves? Hah. It's not in the article, but Schäuble and the other EU finance ministers have set out to make an example out of Greece, or the apparatchiks just don't like the radical lefties that got into power. Paul Krugman has mused, before, EUcrats could tell government officials what to do, and when they follow them, even if the country fails and they get voted out, they'd get cushy EU jobs. But the current Greek government don't want cushy EU jobs, they want to save the population. That and other things (domino effect, if Greece gets forgiveness, the other countries would want it too) mean it is in the EUcrats' best interest to see Greece fail. Meanwhile, Schäuble's policy of Austerity über Alles mean the Greek government has been forced to abandon policies that might've rebooted the economy, and be forced to cut spending in hopes that the "confidence fairy" shows up. Even the IMF has said this policy is stupid...

DanielBMarkham 10y ago
Just so I'm clear, you are claiming that the finance ministers are purposely rigging things so that Greece will fail -- that all those loans and such were part of a plan to make an example out of them. First I've heard of this, but I haven't been following it. It sounds quite far-fetched though. I must be missing something.
- StavrosK 10y ago
  I don't know if it's a "plan", but it's definitely a rigidity and "it's our way or the highway", because they can afford it. The current measures are beyond stupid. They've crippled the country's economy, shut down a large majority of businesses, made the climate hostile to new businesses, and generally ensured that the country doesn't recover. I don't think we've still seen the worst of it, because the economy has shut down almost completely, and it's still getting worse. The effect of this much deterioration on such a large system will take years to show, and what we're seeing now are the results of policies five years ago. I'm pretty confident it will get even worse in the next half-decade. Very much to blame for this is the leftist mindset of the average Greek, who thinks "bosses are the devil" and that making the country friendlier to entrepreneurship and investments is anathema.
- cloudjacker 10y ago
  It's not about Greece or the people of Greece or its economy, it is about existing creditors of Greek assets having time to limit exposure and fallout to the broader financial system, as well as provide a framework of deterrents for other large European countries that are practically insolvent
- soVeryTired 10y ago
  I wouldn't go as far as the OP: I think Heinlein's razor comes into effect here. There is a clear solution to the problem, which is debt forgiveness. The troika has known this since the crisis began. The problem is that it's politically untenable. So instead they kick the can down the road, do nothing, and hope everything gets better on its own. They've caused a depression in Greece. They've also turned me into a euroskeptic.
  - jbooth 10y ago
    Very much worth noting too that the bailouts ensure banks (mostly German banks) get paid back. Bankruptcy or debt forgiveness means the banks don't get paid back. And now when EU taxpayers get pissed about paying for the bailout, the EU bureaucrats can point at those darn lazy greeks as the problem. At the end of the day, it's the banks' job to assess risk, they lent money to Greece, and they're only getting paid because of this bailout. What's greece paying in interest, again? Some kind of huge risk premium, probably?
- daptaq 10y ago
  Not quite like that, or at least the "rigging" part. Yanis Varoufakis, former finance ministers of Greece, has talked about how the finance ministers were pushing for the "failed policies", all through I don't remember what the reasons were.
- pdkl95 10y ago
  > claiming that the finance ministers are purposely rigging things so that Greece will fail > First I've heard of this I suggest listening[1] to Yanis Varoufakis talk about his negotiations with the rest of the EU's finance ministers. He talks about the rigged process, and the ultimatum they gave him when he pushed for a saner refinancing plan. Schäuble's response, according to Mr. Varoufakis, was "Elections cannot be allowed to change the economic policies applied to Greece!" For background on how this situation was created, see Mark Blyth's very nice discussion[2] of the Greek situation and how it fits in with the larger Euro problem. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihVcrnFag1s#t=672 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihVcrnFag1s#t=672 [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6vV8_uQmxs#t=778 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6vV8_uQmxs#t=778
- lifeisstillgood 10y ago
  That is the generally accepted view of the Greek crisis in much of Europe - The Euro hid huge debts in the same way securitised debt did in US. People would lend (via bonds) to risky countries (Greece and Spain) at the same EuroBond rate they lent to less risky countries (Germany, and well just Germany). And Greece took this and spent - at first on good infrastructure but slowly on low performing roads to nowhere and a lot on non capital spending (social welfare) And particular Greek social Problems made it far worse (a political class removed from the populace, etc) As the crisis hit Greece could not repay these huge debts and could not devalue their currency (the Euro was not theirs). And they got loans from Germany (cos a lot of German banks owned the A rated bonds) and paid interest with the loans thus doing nothing to solve the problem. After a few years of this the Greek people voted in a whole new radical party. The goal was to cancel the impossible to pay debt and follow sensible Keynesian rebuilding. The cancelling of the debt (spearheaded by charismatic economist Yanis Varoufakis) was not insane but it would mean all other countries in similar problems would also follow suit. So the Big players in Euro (Schable being the biggest) opposed it everyway they could. The Greeks took it to the brink but the PM could not plunge Greece into leaving the Euro and not being able to keep hospitals open backed down No solution - and we end up here
  - DanielBMarkham 10y ago
    Total outsider and novice here, but from what you're describing, it seems that Greece has to leave the Euro and default on its debts. If people are electing leaders who have no control over finances, there's no democracy at work. Horrible thing to have happen in the birthplace of democracy. The EU was sort of a beta version of a United Europe. They weren't as luck as the U.S., where a highly educated but small group of people tried to come up with the simplest thing they could that wouldn't fail. Instead it looks like quite a bit of architecture astronaut syndrome going on. If I'm right, and I'm just a passerby, the sooner they start down the road to refactoring the better it will be for everybody.
    - lifeisstillgood 10y ago
      > Greece has to leave the Euro and default on its debts. pretty much > architecture astronaut syndrome Not really. It started well. The Euro currency was the great achilles heel, as it meant there MUST be fiscal harmonisation between countries that were arguing over the amount of meat in a sausage. That said the more I learn about USA and the states, especially the southern states, the more I realise we need things like TIPP and TPP and the WTO. The states generally hate being in a federal system. I would try and listen to Yanis Varoufakis stuff online. (https://yanisvaroufakis.eu/ https://yanisvaroufakis.eu/ is his blog but there is a lot there with little organisation) Is in favour of defeating Pikkety with UBI: https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/basic-income-funded-by-capital-income-by-yanis-varoufakis-2016-10 https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/basic-income-fu...
StavrosK 10y ago
> But the current Greek government don't want cushy EU jobs, they want to save the population. The current Greek government doesn't seem to want anything other than line their pockets. They've gone back on every single big promise they made before getting elected, and are spreading lies and propaganda to try and keep their positions, even while being wildly unpopular.
ferongr 10y ago
I don't know, all I see is a goverment that tries to perpetuate the old system, only with their people in place. The recent TV spectrum fiasco is a good example. A SYRIZA-friendly construction mogul got a large loan to bid on a license, with no real guarantees except from a pasture whose ownership wasn't even clear. The subsequent findings showed that the bank essentially gave him "free" loans ever since SYRIZA came into power and put their people into various positions in the bank. The entire system is fucked, and I would consider booting everyone out of the parliament and becoming an EU protectorate a better option for the future of Greece, austerity or no austerity.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
Swinx43 10y ago
This is a really good talk that will give some valuable insight into how Greece has been bullied. (YANIS VAROUFAKIS | NOAM CHOMSKY, NYPL, 26 April) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szIGZVrSAyc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szIGZVrSAyc More than 90% of the bailout money went to banks, not to Greece. Bank recapitalization via the back door while blaming Greece.
mfukar 10y ago
> But the current Greek government don't want cushy EU jobs, they want to save the population. Well, they saved me by forcing me out of the country, so +1 there.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
JumpCrisscross 10y ago
Greeks don't have complete sovereignty in the EU. They've repeatedly voted for that arrangement (I happen to think it's a terrible one). But the parent comment alleges a breakdown of the international system meriting, as I read it, global revolution. Given that we're in something of a golden age of humanity--what with record-low rates of per-capita violent-death rates, relative economic prosperity and technological advantage--the claim needs more than a First World country experiencing hardships around paying property taxes.
Kurtz79 10y ago
"That and other things (domino effect, if Greece gets forgiveness, the other countries would want it too) mean it is in the EUcrats' best interest to see Greece fail." There is zero interest from EU leaders to see Greece fail. Otherwise they would have to justify to their voters the fact of having bailed out the country multiple times, with no result. It would also cause additional instability and volatility, possibly unraveling an already unstable Union. The best result for them would be for Greece to recover under the austerity policies they are enforcing, but it's clear that this is not going to happen (at least any time soon, and without additional pain and suffering for Greece). Whether the reason is that these policies are wrong in themselves (which is Krugman's/Greece's point of view), or the problem lies in Greece's failure of enforcing them (which is the EU point of view), personally I'm not sure. As always the answer probably is somewhere in the middle.
meira 10y ago
Current greek government is far from left.

cloudjacker 10y ago

Where have you been for the whole decade There is no self determination possible for Greece

pjmorris 10y ago
It is astonishingly sad to me that the country from which Democracy was exported no longer has a say (or do they?)
- nradov 10y ago
  Greece does have a say. They can choose to secede from the EU, drop out of the Euro, and default on their debts. And then they'll have to live with the consequences. But democracy doesn't mean they can vote to force other countries to forgive their debts.
  - pjmorris 10y ago
    History doesn't repeat, but it rhymes. Germany was in the same position wrt to the League of Nations after WWI.
  - MrMullen 10y ago
    > But democracy doesn't mean they can vote to force other countries to forgive their debts. Bingo! Greece can do whatever it wants. If they want to stay in the Euro, then they can stay in the Euro but have to follow certain guidelines. If they want to do what they want to do then they can leave the Euro, but they should not complain when their overspending ways catch up to them and it all falls apart.
krona 10y ago
Why the downvotes? "Elections change nothing. There are rules." -- Wolfgang Schäuble (in reference to the election of a Greek government in 2015)
- tzmudzin 10y ago

delegate 10y ago

Just like everyone else, Greeks want to buy Samsung and Apple and Sony and VW and Facebook ads and materials and services from all over the world. It's the way our system works - I want avocados now, even though I'm thousands km away from an avocado tree. One solution would be for me to give up on the avocado, but then the world needs me to buy it, otherwise the balance of avocados in the economy will move and the futures will go down and everyone panics and now maybe I will say no to mangos too ... sell, sell, sell! This is how it works - not because someone conceptualised, thought through the whole complexity - it just ended up being like this.. > For example, that anyone has the authority and intelligence to tell the entire world how it should function. I'm not getting my hopes too high for a global change - in fact I think this can't happen without some sort of global crisis or conflict preceding it. It's very easy to see that the system is broken - much harder to fix it of course.

DickingAround 10y ago
A very reasonable response. Thank you. I would like to push back on one point of the top though, I don't think the world is so locked in to the consumption of a small nation or any small population. Indeed, panic would happen if America banned imports. But if many in Greece had to take a step back and dramatically reduce their IPhone consumption until they invented new ways to add value, I doubt anyone would notice. The panic of a Greek default seemed to more step from the many who invested there without expecting a collapse. Even now I think a Greek default would be pretty non-eventful given how much warning time everyone had. (Debt defaults of small countries being relatively common)