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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 bailin

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.
    - looping__lui 4y ago
      Germany is the biggest contributor to the EU: https://www.statista.com/statistics/316691/eu-budget-contributions-by-country/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/316691/eu-budget-contrib... Contributing 18x as much as Greece. As I said before: Greece should be able to balance their trade deficit with their own funny money currency. THEM LYING in the process of joining the Euro sealed their economic doom in a sense.
      - 4gotunameagain 4y ago
        > Contributing 18x as much as Greece. 2.2x, when adjusted for population. 0.92x when adjusted for GPD. So Greece actually pays more ;) I suggest you start having alternative sources for news and geopolitical issues my fellow angry German.
        looping__lui 4y ago
        Yes, and Greek are also the hardest working… We all know that. https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2012/05/30/stereotypes-of-europe https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2012/05/30/stereoty...
        planetis 4y ago
- looping__lui 4y ago
  I pay my taxes. My taxes were used to pay for excessive irresponsible spend if a foreign country (Greek government) that lied about its finances to its partners.
  - planetis 4y ago
    Grow up a little. Your racism stems from your governments vile propaganda against the Greek people themselves IN ORDER TO GET PEOPLES CONSENSUS ON THE EXTREME AUSTERITY THEY IMPOSED ON GREEKS. αντε μαλακα
PaulDavisThe1st 4y ago
I think you should just take a more American view of the situation. Greece is like the poor US southern states. The richer states fund them (no loans, just give them money, never get it back), because "we're all Americans". You could call it stealing, or you could call it the way things are. It's a good thing for Europe to have Greece within the EU (and probably even within the eurozone). Asking them to be financially self-sufficient might be as silly as asking the same thing of Alabama or Mississippi ...
- looping__lui 4y ago
  They can be in the EU. They can screw up their budgets. But there is no need for them to be bound to the Euro. Plenty of countries that are part of the EU but don’t have the Euro. I’m happy to do business with them and I’m happy to let them have their way. But I won’t tie the stability of my savings and my currency to their falsified financial statements and unsustainable economic model… :-) Never understood why we wanted them in the Euro. They should have their own Greek currency they can devalue every couple of years by 50% or so to stay competitive
  - phs318u 4y ago
    Which is exactly what they used to do regularly pre-Euro. You seem to believe the German banks were hoodwinked into lending to the Greek government but that’s just not supported by the well known economic history of the country. The real reason they were willing to lend, ignoring the history (since independence, Greece had failed to repay international debts and debased its currency numerous times), is that the banks knew that the Euro governments would cover the losses on the basis that they couldn’t afford for the EU to fail. And they were right.
    - looping__lui 4y ago
      They lied about their finances when asking for money. I know that “American banks” are also often viewed as evil for selling crap (knowingly) mortgage backed securities to German banks and we often tend to just go easy by stating “banks are evil” and that’s where the story end. However: it was American households that lived beyond their means for decades and lived in houses they could not afford and lied on (unverified) loan applications; the US government mandated more homeowners, banks provided the means and took a cut. So, more differentiated and in those “evil bank discussions” we tend to forget it was often a significant number of “poor ordinary citizens” living well beyond their means (e.g., not paying adequate taxes in Greek, having fatter pensions than others in Europe etc.)
m000 4y ago
> Greek politicians demanded hefty bribes How come that it was usually a German company willing to pay the "hefty" bribe? Maybe because "until 1999 in Germany, bribes were a tax-deductible business expense, and there were no penalties for bribing foreign officials"? [1] Cause and effect. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siemens#2005_and_continuing:_worldwide_bribery_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siemens#2005_and_continuing:_w...
- davrosthedalek 4y ago
  Seems it's in principle tax deductible in the US as well: https://www.justia.com/tax/corporate-tax/business-tax-deductions/exclusions-from-deductions/ https://www.justia.com/tax/corporate-tax/business-tax-deduct... And without penalty at least until 1977. Switzerland ended tax deductions for bribes in 2022. https://www.energyvoice.com/oilandgas/europe/278815/switzerland-bribes-tax-deductible/ https://www.energyvoice.com/oilandgas/europe/278815/switzerl... In Greece, btw, they were deductible until 2006.
- looping__lui 4y ago
  So Greek became corrupt and went bankrupt because bribes were tax-deductible in Germany until the 90s? How far back should we turn the wheels of time? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_bribery_scandals https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_bribery_scandals And what does that have to do with the Greek government falsifying their statements to join the EU and take on debt? https://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/23/world/europe/greece-admits-faking-data-to-join-europe.html https://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/23/world/europe/greece-admit... Probably zeeee Germans bribed zeee Greek to force them join zeee EU. Greek f**d up, lied, covered it up, lied more, covered up more and then had to face the consequences.
  - m000 4y ago
    If you really want to turn the wheels of time, Siemens has been consistently involved in corruption in Greece since the 1920s. Governments and political alignments change. The constant factor is the bribing company. Also, FYI, the 2004 admission by finance minister Alogoskoufis was a total joke. Sadly for Greece, world politics is not the right place for this kind of jokes. The newly elected at the time ND government wanted an excuse to get a carte blanche to apply their financial agenda, so they invented one: Alogoskoufis ordered a retrospective "audit" where they switched from the standard Eurostat practice of budgeting defense contracts at the time of delivery to budgeting them at the time of signing [1]. This essentially shifted future expenses (many of them payable during his mandate) to the past, in order to make the previous PASOK administration appear disingenuous. Alogoskoufis essentially brought the country to world disrepute, so they could score a few cheap political points internally. And he was naive (stupid?) enough to believe that this would somehow only affect his political opponents and not the whole country [2]. [1] https://eprints.lse.ac.uk/84157/1/Greece%20%20a%20crisis%20in%20two%20level%20governance_cover%20._Final%20pdf.pdf https://eprints.lse.ac.uk/84157/1/Greece%20%20a%20crisis%20i... [2] https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/27649/alogoskoufis-expects-no-sanctions-for-past-deficits/ https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/27649/alogoskoufis-expe...
looping__lui 4y ago
I meant: should not have been part of Euro. EU membership makes total sense.
- mike_hearn 4y ago
  EU membership requires adoption of the Euro, at least theoretically - some countries officially state they will adopt it but somehow never get around to it, and excepting states that were grandfathered in as special exceptions.
  - looping__lui 4y ago
    I do not believe a shared currency for countries with such vastly different economical situations and dynamics makes sense. A joint economic union - absolutely. But a shared currency is probably an ideologically motivated step; not a rational or smart step…

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.
  - looping__lui 4y ago
    Germany is the biggest contributor to the EU: https://www.statista.com/statistics/316691/eu-budget-contributions-by-country/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/316691/eu-budget-contrib... Contributing 18x as much as Greece. As I said before: Greece should be able to balance their trade deficit with their own funny money currency. THEM LYING in the process of joining the Euro sealed their economic doom in a sense.
    - 4gotunameagain 4y ago
      > Contributing 18x as much as Greece. 2.2x, when adjusted for population. 0.92x when adjusted for GPD. So Greece actually pays more ;) I suggest you start having alternative sources for news and geopolitical issues my fellow angry German.
      - looping__lui 4y ago
        Yes, and Greek are also the hardest working… We all know that. https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2012/05/30/stereotypes-of-europe https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2012/05/30/stereoty...
        planetis 4y ago
looping__lui 4y ago
I pay my taxes. My taxes were used to pay for excessive irresponsible spend if a foreign country (Greek government) that lied about its finances to its partners.
- planetis 4y ago
  Grow up a little. Your racism stems from your governments vile propaganda against the Greek people themselves IN ORDER TO GET PEOPLES CONSENSUS ON THE EXTREME AUSTERITY THEY IMPOSED ON GREEKS. αντε μαλακα

PaulDavisThe1st 4y ago

I think you should just take a more American view of the situation. Greece is like the poor US southern states. The richer states fund them (no loans, just give them money, never get it back), because "we're all Americans". You could call it stealing, or you could call it the way things are. It's a good thing for Europe to have Greece within the EU (and probably even within the eurozone). Asking them to be financially self-sufficient might be as silly as asking the same thing of Alabama or Mississippi ...

looping__lui 4y ago
They can be in the EU. They can screw up their budgets. But there is no need for them to be bound to the Euro. Plenty of countries that are part of the EU but don’t have the Euro. I’m happy to do business with them and I’m happy to let them have their way. But I won’t tie the stability of my savings and my currency to their falsified financial statements and unsustainable economic model… :-) Never understood why we wanted them in the Euro. They should have their own Greek currency they can devalue every couple of years by 50% or so to stay competitive
- phs318u 4y ago
  Which is exactly what they used to do regularly pre-Euro. You seem to believe the German banks were hoodwinked into lending to the Greek government but that’s just not supported by the well known economic history of the country. The real reason they were willing to lend, ignoring the history (since independence, Greece had failed to repay international debts and debased its currency numerous times), is that the banks knew that the Euro governments would cover the losses on the basis that they couldn’t afford for the EU to fail. And they were right.
  - looping__lui 4y ago
    They lied about their finances when asking for money. I know that “American banks” are also often viewed as evil for selling crap (knowingly) mortgage backed securities to German banks and we often tend to just go easy by stating “banks are evil” and that’s where the story end. However: it was American households that lived beyond their means for decades and lived in houses they could not afford and lied on (unverified) loan applications; the US government mandated more homeowners, banks provided the means and took a cut. So, more differentiated and in those “evil bank discussions” we tend to forget it was often a significant number of “poor ordinary citizens” living well beyond their means (e.g., not paying adequate taxes in Greek, having fatter pensions than others in Europe etc.)

m000 4y ago

> Greek politicians demanded hefty bribes How come that it was usually a German company willing to pay the "hefty" bribe? Maybe because "until 1999 in Germany, bribes were a tax-deductible business expense, and there were no penalties for bribing foreign officials"? [1] Cause and effect. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siemens#2005_and_continuing:_worldwide_bribery_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siemens#2005_and_continuing:_w...

davrosthedalek 4y ago
Seems it's in principle tax deductible in the US as well: https://www.justia.com/tax/corporate-tax/business-tax-deductions/exclusions-from-deductions/ https://www.justia.com/tax/corporate-tax/business-tax-deduct... And without penalty at least until 1977. Switzerland ended tax deductions for bribes in 2022. https://www.energyvoice.com/oilandgas/europe/278815/switzerland-bribes-tax-deductible/ https://www.energyvoice.com/oilandgas/europe/278815/switzerl... In Greece, btw, they were deductible until 2006.
looping__lui 4y ago
So Greek became corrupt and went bankrupt because bribes were tax-deductible in Germany until the 90s? How far back should we turn the wheels of time? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_bribery_scandals https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_bribery_scandals And what does that have to do with the Greek government falsifying their statements to join the EU and take on debt? https://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/23/world/europe/greece-admits-faking-data-to-join-europe.html https://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/23/world/europe/greece-admit... Probably zeeee Germans bribed zeee Greek to force them join zeee EU. Greek f**d up, lied, covered it up, lied more, covered up more and then had to face the consequences.
- m000 4y ago
  If you really want to turn the wheels of time, Siemens has been consistently involved in corruption in Greece since the 1920s. Governments and political alignments change. The constant factor is the bribing company. Also, FYI, the 2004 admission by finance minister Alogoskoufis was a total joke. Sadly for Greece, world politics is not the right place for this kind of jokes. The newly elected at the time ND government wanted an excuse to get a carte blanche to apply their financial agenda, so they invented one: Alogoskoufis ordered a retrospective "audit" where they switched from the standard Eurostat practice of budgeting defense contracts at the time of delivery to budgeting them at the time of signing [1]. This essentially shifted future expenses (many of them payable during his mandate) to the past, in order to make the previous PASOK administration appear disingenuous. Alogoskoufis essentially brought the country to world disrepute, so they could score a few cheap political points internally. And he was naive (stupid?) enough to believe that this would somehow only affect his political opponents and not the whole country [2]. [1] https://eprints.lse.ac.uk/84157/1/Greece%20%20a%20crisis%20in%20two%20level%20governance_cover%20._Final%20pdf.pdf https://eprints.lse.ac.uk/84157/1/Greece%20%20a%20crisis%20i... [2] https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/27649/alogoskoufis-expects-no-sanctions-for-past-deficits/ https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/27649/alogoskoufis-expe...

looping__lui 4y ago

I meant: should not have been part of Euro. EU membership makes total sense.

mike_hearn 4y ago
EU membership requires adoption of the Euro, at least theoretically - some countries officially state they will adopt it but somehow never get around to it, and excepting states that were grandfathered in as special exceptions.
- looping__lui 4y ago
  I do not believe a shared currency for countries with such vastly different economical situations and dynamics makes sense. A joint economic union - absolutely. But a shared currency is probably an ideologically motivated step; not a rational or smart step…