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Probably worth adding that a hefty number of scandals involving corrupt Greek politicians had huge German companies involved (Siemens, HDW, Rheinmetall..) Plus

Probably worth adding that a hefty number of scandals involving corrupt Greek politicians had huge German companies involved (Siemens, HDW, Rheinmetall..) Plus Germany benefited greatly from the introduction of import based economies in the Eurozone, and the financial crisis. It is no wonder they like corrupt politicians in power.

ChuckNorris89 4y ago
Same with Romania and Eastern Europe in general. Western EU countries criticize them immensely for corruption in the public eye, yet their governments, banks and major corporations profit immensely from the business deals corruption there enables them to do, and so they have a vested interest to keep just enough corruption there so they can keep profiteering, while maintaining enough rule of law so that their investments there are safe and ensures the free flow of profits back home.
- nayroclade 4y ago
  This is boilerplate conspiratorial nonsense. West European countries would benefit far more from East European countries being free from the economic drag imposed by endemic corruption. The EU internal market overall would be much richer and stronger, and those banks and corporations would have a better quality consumer and labor base. Banks and corporations can make plenty of money in high-trust societies just as in low-trust ones, and they get more regulatory certainty as well.
  - JetSpiegel 4y ago
    Most corruption cases benefit the German companies, so no, they would not benefit more, otherwise they would just lobby their local governments for fiscal transfer to the poorer countries. The opposite happens, the German constitutional court can veto foreign budgets if they don't pay the Danegeld (i.e. not wasting all european funds buying goods and services from Germany). The litmus test is this: can a EU country use european funds to create a new carmaker to compete with central european carmakers? Hell no. But you can spend all european funds buying cars from Germany, that's never wasteful. The EU has no policy to enrich the entire union, only the central countries. The EU funds are basically a workaround for direct transfers of money from the German government to German companies, via foreign countries. I'm not from a Eastern European country, but I do live in a poor Eastern European economy, it's the same dynamic.
  - ChuckNorris89 4y ago
    >This is boilerplate conspiratorial nonsense It's not though. EU wide corruption scandals prove this. Western EU companies routinely pay bribes to dump plastics and toxic waste in Romanian landfills under the disguise of "recyclable material". This way those private companies save a few bucks to stay competitive, and their countries keep getting to call themselves "green" by exporting their environmental damage across the border. IKEA, plus Austrian and German wood companies routinely paid bribes in the Romanian timber industry to be able to perform mass deforestation. Austrian companies, like STR*BAG, paid bribes to Romanian politicians to get preferential juicy building contracts, sometimes using EU funds, for highways that never get completed due to various technicalities that got intentionally omitted from the contract so that the building company can just bail out from the deal without having built anything while getting paid in full. Basically, the EU taxpayer is paying for a western EU company to make bank in the east, all through EU funds funneled trough Romania, to build roads that never get built. All this high level corruption benefits major western EU companies, and corrupt eastern EU politicians a lot. Western EU politicians also benefit from this as the major companies in their countries lobby for them to keep this corrupt system going so they can keep making bank. The EU is a great thing, but it's also ripe with corruption that's costing the taxpayers tens of billions.
- jq-r 4y ago
  You're exactly right. In Croatia everything of any value is owned or being sold to German companies and they pretty much own the place (or at least what worth anyway). All of this is facilitated by the same government for the last 30 years or so. The same government has been completely and obviously corrupted to the core, but never, even much of a peep criticised by the EU.They are all friends there. As long as the public is not openly rioting, EU likes this arrangement.
- t0bia_s 4y ago
  Yes, in Czechia we have same corrupted politics and business. Since summer 2021 prices goes up around 30% on food, 50% for energy. Most ridiculous is that our power plants make enough energy for entire country and 15% are sold abroad, but... All energy is auctioned on the Leipzig Stock Exchange for 600% higher price than it is actually made (1 kWh cost around 1 CZK to made, it's sold for 6-7 CZK and rising. Now our gonverment need to cap prices from our taxes so state budget has this year recorded deficit since 70’s around 350 bilion CZK. Trust in gonverment is very low, voter turnout was around 48% in regional elections. Our politicians blame war in Ukraine, it's ridiculous.
  - tasuki 4y ago
    I'm Czech, though somewhat disconnected from local situation/politics. > Most ridiculous is that our power plants make enough energy for entire country and 15% are sold abroad, but... All energy is auctioned on the Leipzig Stock Exchange for 600% higher price than it is actually made (1 kWh cost around 1 CZK to made, it's sold for 6-7 CZK and rising. Why is that ridiculous? We make something cheap, and sell it abroad for profit. Isn't it a good thing we're exporting? (I'd get it if your argument was against the coal power plants, I don't get why selling abroad for a profit is bad in general.)
    - t0bia_s 4y ago
      When you import it back with that price, I find it immoral. Who decide to sell it back to country wher it came from with 6 time higher price? It's called "lichva". Germans have cheaper prices and also 3 times more average income. Also what's the point to make own people suffer and be poor by this business? It's absolutely ridiculous.
      - tasuki 4y ago
        I can't follow your comment, apart from seeing that you're outraged about the situation. It's a global world. If someone else is willing to pay more for the energy than us, we should sell it to them and use the money we earn to buy the things we value more, things we're willing to pay more for.
looping__lui 4y ago
Or maybe you are mixing up cause and effect: Greek politicians demanded hefty bribes to do business in the first place. Yes, Germany is a real winner in bailing out Greek and all the southern European economies than cannot pay their bills. You are aware that exporting stuff to countries that take a loan and don’t pay it back is like not exactly “beneficial”. Greek should never have been in the EU in the first place. They lied about their financial situation and deliberately stole money from their European neighbors.
- 4gotunameagain 4y ago
  You know that all the money sent to the Greeks were only used to bail out European banks, right ? And that they framed it that way because they had already bailed out said banks ? Anyway, of course I don't know exactly what's going on. I'm just a rando with no skin in the game
  - makomk 4y ago
    In particular, the money was used to bail out a bunch of German banks, who as far as I can understand it ended up with all that debt because Germany was running a trade surplus with Greece directly enabled by the structure of the Eurozone without any corresponding fiscal transfers that would balance it out, and that in turm directly benefitted Germany as well.
    - looping__lui 4y ago
      Maybe Greek should have paid taxes after all: https://www.businessinsider.com/corruption-in-greese-hampering-economic-recovery-2010-1?amp https://www.businessinsider.com/corruption-in-greese-hamperi... But the funny thing is: Greek themselves find their country too corrupt and bloated that they aren’t willing to pay for it with THEIR OWN money… Much of Greeks debt problem would not have existed had the Greek citizens paid taxes like the rest of Europe.
    - Gibbon1 4y ago
      That whole bit caused me to rethink the fiscal transfers between regions in the US. So California sends a bunch of money to the feds who turn around an give some to Mississippi? Okay fine because that's way better than what the EU did to the schmucks living in Greece. Or if the banks fail in Texas it's the FED that's not on the hook not random Texans. The underlying thing is in the US states give up being able to use monetary policy to balance trade. In return the Fed's backstop a lot of stuff and transfer money around. Overall that's fair. In the EU states give up being able to use monetary policy to balance trade. In return no fiscal transfers. And the EU backstop's French and German banks by squeezing poorer states. That's not fair at all.

ChuckNorris89 4y ago

Same with Romania and Eastern Europe in general. Western EU countries criticize them immensely for corruption in the public eye, yet their governments, banks and major corporations profit immensely from the business deals corruption there enables them to do, and so they have a vested interest to keep just enough corruption there so they can keep profiteering, while maintaining enough rule of law so that their investments there are safe and ensures the free flow of profits back home.

nayroclade 4y ago
This is boilerplate conspiratorial nonsense. West European countries would benefit far more from East European countries being free from the economic drag imposed by endemic corruption. The EU internal market overall would be much richer and stronger, and those banks and corporations would have a better quality consumer and labor base. Banks and corporations can make plenty of money in high-trust societies just as in low-trust ones, and they get more regulatory certainty as well.
- JetSpiegel 4y ago
  Most corruption cases benefit the German companies, so no, they would not benefit more, otherwise they would just lobby their local governments for fiscal transfer to the poorer countries. The opposite happens, the German constitutional court can veto foreign budgets if they don't pay the Danegeld (i.e. not wasting all european funds buying goods and services from Germany). The litmus test is this: can a EU country use european funds to create a new carmaker to compete with central european carmakers? Hell no. But you can spend all european funds buying cars from Germany, that's never wasteful. The EU has no policy to enrich the entire union, only the central countries. The EU funds are basically a workaround for direct transfers of money from the German government to German companies, via foreign countries. I'm not from a Eastern European country, but I do live in a poor Eastern European economy, it's the same dynamic.
- ChuckNorris89 4y ago
  >This is boilerplate conspiratorial nonsense It's not though. EU wide corruption scandals prove this. Western EU companies routinely pay bribes to dump plastics and toxic waste in Romanian landfills under the disguise of "recyclable material". This way those private companies save a few bucks to stay competitive, and their countries keep getting to call themselves "green" by exporting their environmental damage across the border. IKEA, plus Austrian and German wood companies routinely paid bribes in the Romanian timber industry to be able to perform mass deforestation. Austrian companies, like STR*BAG, paid bribes to Romanian politicians to get preferential juicy building contracts, sometimes using EU funds, for highways that never get completed due to various technicalities that got intentionally omitted from the contract so that the building company can just bail out from the deal without having built anything while getting paid in full. Basically, the EU taxpayer is paying for a western EU company to make bank in the east, all through EU funds funneled trough Romania, to build roads that never get built. All this high level corruption benefits major western EU companies, and corrupt eastern EU politicians a lot. Western EU politicians also benefit from this as the major companies in their countries lobby for them to keep this corrupt system going so they can keep making bank. The EU is a great thing, but it's also ripe with corruption that's costing the taxpayers tens of billions.
jq-r 4y ago
You're exactly right. In Croatia everything of any value is owned or being sold to German companies and they pretty much own the place (or at least what worth anyway). All of this is facilitated by the same government for the last 30 years or so. The same government has been completely and obviously corrupted to the core, but never, even much of a peep criticised by the EU.They are all friends there. As long as the public is not openly rioting, EU likes this arrangement.
t0bia_s 4y ago
Yes, in Czechia we have same corrupted politics and business. Since summer 2021 prices goes up around 30% on food, 50% for energy. Most ridiculous is that our power plants make enough energy for entire country and 15% are sold abroad, but... All energy is auctioned on the Leipzig Stock Exchange for 600% higher price than it is actually made (1 kWh cost around 1 CZK to made, it's sold for 6-7 CZK and rising. Now our gonverment need to cap prices from our taxes so state budget has this year recorded deficit since 70’s around 350 bilion CZK. Trust in gonverment is very low, voter turnout was around 48% in regional elections. Our politicians blame war in Ukraine, it's ridiculous.
- tasuki 4y ago
  I'm Czech, though somewhat disconnected from local situation/politics. > Most ridiculous is that our power plants make enough energy for entire country and 15% are sold abroad, but... All energy is auctioned on the Leipzig Stock Exchange for 600% higher price than it is actually made (1 kWh cost around 1 CZK to made, it's sold for 6-7 CZK and rising. Why is that ridiculous? We make something cheap, and sell it abroad for profit. Isn't it a good thing we're exporting? (I'd get it if your argument was against the coal power plants, I don't get why selling abroad for a profit is bad in general.)
  - t0bia_s 4y ago
    When you import it back with that price, I find it immoral. Who decide to sell it back to country wher it came from with 6 time higher price? It's called "lichva". Germans have cheaper prices and also 3 times more average income. Also what's the point to make own people suffer and be poor by this business? It's absolutely ridiculous.
    - tasuki 4y ago
      I can't follow your comment, apart from seeing that you're outraged about the situation. It's a global world. If someone else is willing to pay more for the energy than us, we should sell it to them and use the money we earn to buy the things we value more, things we're willing to pay more for.

looping__lui 4y ago

Or maybe you are mixing up cause and effect: Greek politicians demanded hefty bribes to do business in the first place. Yes, Germany is a real winner in bailing out Greek and all the southern European economies than cannot pay their bills. You are aware that exporting stuff to countries that take a loan and don’t pay it back is like not exactly “beneficial”. Greek should never have been in the EU in the first place. They lied about their financial situation and deliberately stole money from their European neighbors.

4gotunameagain 4y ago
You know that all the money sent to the Greeks were only used to bail out European banks, right ? And that they framed it that way because they had already bailed out said banks ? Anyway, of course I don't know exactly what's going on. I'm just a rando with no skin in the game
- makomk 4y ago
  In particular, the money was used to bail out a bunch of German banks, who as far as I can understand it ended up with all that debt because Germany was running a trade surplus with Greece directly enabled by the structure of the Eurozone without any corresponding fiscal transfers that would balance it out, and that in turm directly benefitted Germany as well.
  - looping__lui 4y ago
    Maybe Greek should have paid taxes after all: https://www.businessinsider.com/corruption-in-greese-hampering-economic-recovery-2010-1?amp https://www.businessinsider.com/corruption-in-greese-hamperi... But the funny thing is: Greek themselves find their country too corrupt and bloated that they aren’t willing to pay for it with THEIR OWN money… Much of Greeks debt problem would not have existed had the Greek citizens paid taxes like the rest of Europe.
  - Gibbon1 4y ago
    That whole bit caused me to rethink the fiscal transfers between regions in the US. So California sends a bunch of money to the feds who turn around an give some to Mississippi? Okay fine because that's way better than what the EU did to the schmucks living in Greece. Or if the banks fail in Texas it's the FED that's not on the hook not random Texans. The underlying thing is in the US states give up being able to use monetary policy to balance trade. In return the Fed's backstop a lot of stuff and transfer money around. Overall that's fair. In the EU states give up being able to use monetary policy to balance trade. In return no fiscal transfers. And the EU backstop's French and German banks by squeezing poorer states. That's not fair at all.