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This makes me lose respect for Piketty. There's a very clear difference between a country that comes out of two world wars, with everything all but destroyed,

This makes me lose respect for Piketty. There's a very clear difference between a country that comes out of two world wars, with everything all but destroyed, including millions dead. I'm sorry, no matter how bad 2008 was, it was no World War. His inability to grasp this just boggles the mind. There's a very big difference between war caused debt and economic caused debt (note that I'm basically making these two "debts" up, and things are more nuanced obviously, but I'm going to ignore the nuances for now, these are very broad strokes.) When you come out of war, you're either the loser or the victor (one way or another, there are very few true "ties" in war.) And while capital may be destroyed in both cases, an economic crises doesn't necessarily leave your physical infrastructure and entire social system completely unrecognizable. Further, Piketty seemingly completely ignores the Marshall Plan and all that it included in rebuilding Europe. And yes the Marshall plan was a form of debt forgiveness, but as a huge portion of the European continent was a smoking crater, things were different in 1945 than Greece in 2015. Further, some historians/economists will argue that the "German miracle" (and "Japanese miracle" as well) were in part because of the destruction cased by the wars. With all the manufacturing capabilities destroyed, they were able to rebuild with the latest and greatest technology of the time. (and if you take this further, as the US was able to rest on it's un-destroyed capital equipment and make huge profits during the rest of the 1940's, 50's and early 60's, and never re-invested as Germany and Japan were forced too, this eventually lead to the downfall of the US Industrial might, in part.) Personally, I think this has more to do with his French nationalism than anything else, at least as it appears to me in the interview.

prawn 11y ago
Personally, I thought his argument was very reasonable, and I also appreciated that the interviewer pressed him where appropriate to draw out some quality discussion.
leoc 11y ago
(I am not an expert on anything.) It's probably a bit unfortunate that this Piketty interview is getting prominence, because the whole question of analogies or disanalogies to Germany's war-related sovereign debt problems is mostly beside the point. The most urgent disanalogy in Greece's case is to what happens to just about every other country from A to Z that goes broke and needs to enter an IMF program. The SOP is for their pre-existing sovereign debt to be haircut as far as is necessary (if it is necessary) to make their debt burden clearly sustainable from then on, as a central part of the program designed and supervised by the IMF. This is what the IMF was designed to do from Day 1 and no-one, including Germany or any Eurozone core countries, is running around shouting that the IMF system is morally depraved, or a source of unacceptable moral hazard or a surrender to blackmail etc. etc. because it frequently results in program countries defaulting on a large chunk of their sovereign debts. And compared to the rogue's gallery of mostly developing countries that enter IMF programs Greece is probably not exceptionally profligate, corrupt, structurally rigid, unreformable and so on. Instead Greece was moved onto the special, ad hoc Troika scheme, in which a country with a greatly unsustainable debt burden was given more loans but originally no debt relief at all, and great efforts were made to make the country run primary surpluses so that the creditors would not only get all their money back but make a profit. Greatly inadequate debt relief was only added later on when the original plan had collapsed. I'll let the former head of the Bundesbank explain why: http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/former-central-bank-head-karl-otto-poehl-bailout-plan-is-all-about-rescuing-banks-and-rich-greeks-a-695245.html http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/former-central-b... Politically this was a wonder solution for the EU core leadership: bail out their banks by stealth, avoiding the anger of their taxpayers by camouflaging it as a rescue mission for the wayward Greeks. Even better, the whole cost of the EU-wide bank bailout could be sweated out of the Greek taxpayer! Well, not really of course: probably no-one ever expected the official creditors to actually get their money back, but hopefully the defaults would be acceptably far in the future for the politicians, who live hand-to-mouth and election to election. Now that the whole thing has exploded, perhaps sooner and harder than they expected, those EU core politicians are trapped by their earlier lies. There is one further wrinkle: not only was the Troika fix-up job vastly harsher on Greece as a creditor than a normal IMF program, it was specifically forbidden by the treaty of Lisbon (the solemn document I was asked to vote on twice, as an Irish citizen) articles 123 http://euwiki.org/TFEU#Article_123 http://euwiki.org/TFEU#Article_123 and 125 http://euwiki.org/TFEU#Article_125 http://euwiki.org/TFEU#Article_125 while at the same time the treaty had been crafted to allow Euro member countries continued access to normal IMF programs while remaining inside the Euro. Or at least, everyone thought that it was specifically forbidden, until this prohibition was no longer convenient, and the wizards at the ECJ (the same visionaries who recently discovered the "right to be forgotten") helpfully made it go away. But if we do want to talk about the German example, we don't have to go back to the Marshall Plan either. The US Fed's cross-border largesse in 2008 would be a good place to start.
- DanielBMarkham 11y ago
  Although you and I probably disagree on root causes and perhaps solutions, this was a great summary. Thank you. Reading the HN comments, it occurs to me what a total mess this is. People on all sides are not happy. Furthermore it's one of those he-said, she-said stories where each party has a long and detailed argument for why outsiders should consider things one way or another. Along those lines, I am very unhappy that Piketty chose to give this interview on this topic. I want to see his ideas about wealth being put under harsh light and deep scrutiny -- after all, he's supposed to have something important to say in this matter. But now he's just turning into another Krugman -- economist-cum-pundit. That's probably great for his career, but it makes honest and objective evaluation of his ideas much more difficult because from now on everybody's going to conflate his political views on various matters with his academic ones. Bah.
Confiks 11y ago
You seem to place an awful lot of value on the cause of debt being war. The interview gives no indication that Piketty would be unable to grasp the difference of the Greek and post-war German situation. That this "boggles the mind" seems to be a bit disingenuous. Also, the 2008 crisis isn't the direct cause of the crisis in Greece right now. That crisis has been building ever since Greece joined the monetary union in 2002. As Piketty notes: "The Greeks have, without a doubt, made big mistakes. Until 2009, the government in Athens forged its books". Papandreou finally revealed this (indeed, around 2008), and the current Greek crisis and European monetary instability followed suit.
Mikeb85 11y ago
When Greece borrowed money, it was sustainable. Their GDP was growing, in large part because the European economy was growing before the crisis. When the European and world economy went down, it dragged Greece with them. The debt became unsustainable. Instead of the creditors losing out (much as an investor or normal creditor would when they invest in something that loses), the Europeans decided to bail out the initial creditors, and convinced the then-current Greek government to take a bad deal, all the while basically 'socializing' the risk. Their shitty economics led to a 25% contraction in the Greek economy. If you follow the chain of events, this crisis is as much Germany's fault as Greece's. Another thing to keep in mind, is that it doesn't matter whose fault it is. If Greece stops paying its creditors and stops taking loans, Germans will lose out. It's actually in Germany's best interest to forgive some of the debt, and have Greece pay the rest. Greece's economist/finance minister knows this, that's why they can play this game.
- melling 11y ago
  I haven't followed Greece that closely but this story about Greece hiding its debt to gain entry into the Euro has been mentioned more than once: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/business/global/14debt.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/business/global/14debt.htm...
- tptacek 11y ago
  The stats I can find suggest Greece ran a primary deficit pretty consistently starting in 2002 --- long before the crisis --- in fact, they appear to have run a primary deficit during the boom years that preceded the crisis.
  - Mikeb85 11y ago
    A deficit isn't necessarily unsustainable over a period of economic growth. If growth and inflation outpace the cost of borrowing, it's worthwhile to borrow. Kind of like the US is doing right now.
    - tptacek 11y ago
jsprogrammer 11y ago
>There's a very clear difference between a country that comes out of two world wars, with everything all but destroyed, including millions dead. Which allows us to provide a further distinction: the country who had everything destroyed was directly responsible for that destruction. Yet, the debt that they racked up because they tried to take over eurasia while killing and torturing millions in the process, was forgiven not many years after the killings and torturings took place. I think there should be a distinction between a country that kills and tortures millions and one that does not. So, why again should we forgive the debts of those responsible for killing and torturing millions, but not those of a country who has done nothing comparable?
- peterfirefly 11y ago
  > I think there should be a distinction between a country that kills and tortures millions and one that does not. Which reminds me... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War 158,000 killed due to those bloody stupid Communists :(
  - pacifist 11y ago
    Here's another take on it: [1]"As the war’s outcome became apparent, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was determined to return Greece to the prewar rule of the monarchy and the old regime. He was motivated by fear of Communist influence within the resistance movement. Churchill tried to get the Anglo-American army that was getting ready to invade Italy to attack Greece instead. Indeed, he tried so hard to change the war plan that he almost broke up the Allied military alliance; when he failed, he threw all the soldiers he still controlled into Greece and precipitated a civil war that tore the country apart." [1] http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026942363 http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026942363
  - kungfooguru 11y ago
    You mean damn those Greeks wanting to run their own lives? Something that was violently crushed and kept through an oppressive military junta?
aikah 11y ago
who started World War II ? > There's a very big difference between war caused debt and economic caused debt not if you started the very war that put you in debt.
- latch 11y ago
  Your sibling posts pick much, much stronger arguments. "This is not a peace. It is an armistice for twenty years"
- mcv 11y ago
  Maybe Greece should declare war on Germany to get rid of their debt?
coldtea 11y ago
>This makes me lose respect for Piketty. There's a very clear difference between a country that comes out of two world wars, with everything all but destroyed, including millions dead. Yes. The main difference being that Greece didn't invade anyone, didn't cause millions of deaths and didn't exterminate 6 million Jews. Just over-borrowed. And it has paid for it with 5 years destruction of its economy (40-50% effective less buying power per person among other things and unemployment rates similar to the Weimar republic). Hey, Greece didn't even ask for its loans NOT to be repaid -- they just asked for a better deal, without heavy taxation and anti-business austerity measures that prevent development and make it even more impossible to reboot. The idea that the first case is somehow more justified to relieve is ludicrous -- not to mention insulting to the victims of the Holocaust and WW. [EDIT] Besides, the main historical reason Germany was "forgiven" wasn't that it had suffered losses too (war agressors have no right to complain about that), but because it suddenly was in the right place to serve as a nice Cold War ally, half to the West/NATO and half to the USSR, so both sides wanted it to be in good standing.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- afsina 11y ago
  >Yes. The main difference being that Greece didn't invade anyone.... Actually Greece Invaded Turkey in WW-I. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Turkish_War_(1919%E2%80%9322) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Turkish_War_(1919%E2%80%...
  - twobits 11y ago
    Well, not exactly. You get a better context if you say that the two countries have a sweet little history going back to byzantium, where turks invaded, greeks invaded, turks invaded, greeks invaded, turks invaded,... PS: And yes, it was the ottoman empire, etc, but that's semantics.
    - afsina 11y ago
      Does that change the fact that this was an invasion? Last time Ottomans invaded Anatolia was 12th century. Current Greece was invaded in end of 15th century. And Greece tried to invade Anatolia in 20th century.
tomp 11y ago
The underlying assumption in the German "NO" to Greek pleas of debt relief is the "moral hazard" of writing off a country's debt just because they cried really hard. Why don't we talk about the moral hazard of writing off a country's debt after they kill 60 million people?
- tedunangst 11y ago
  Well, as part of their debt relief, Germany got a new government. Is that what Greece wants?
  - tomp 11y ago
    Greece has a new government. One that has no connection with either the thieves that caused the problem in the first place nor the incompetent idiots that didn't solve it in the last 5 years.
    - tedunangst 11y ago
      Wikipedia tells me the Greek constitution dates to 1975. Is that wrong?
      - peterfirefly 11y ago
        A constitution under which it is illegal to fire state workers unless by law!
        fwn 11y ago
        Unless by law? Well, at least that one isn't a problem for a government.
        peterfirefly 11y ago
        Yes it is. Laws require debate and public voting in Parliament which exposes many/all members of the governing coalition to lots of bad press, which is /so/ unfair since all they really wanted was to get reelected and, honest, they didn't want to be a bother to anyone.
njs12345 11y ago
The Greek economy has shrunk by a quarter over the course of the crisis. Not quite a smoking crater, but not exactly a trifle either, and not incomparable to the impact of a war, I'd say..
- hackuser 11y ago
  > The Greek economy has shrunk by a quarter over the course of the crisis. Not quite a smoking crater I disagree; that's a smoking crater. I'd bet the U.S. economy hasn't experienced that since 1900, or maybe only in the Great Depression.
SoftwareMaven 11y ago
You'll excuse me if I express some skepticism about the "downfall of the US Industrial might". Only China produces more and only a handful of G20 countries' industrial base is growing faster.[1] 1. https://www.quandl.com/collections/economics/industrial-production-by-country https://www.quandl.com/collections/economics/industrial-prod...
- tsotha 11y ago
  Yeah, it's more the rise of China than the downfall of the US.
tptacek 11y ago
I'm also not clear on what Germany's payment history has to do with the crisis. The problem isn't simply that Greece is defaulting on loans, but that it's doing so while asking for more loans, without which it will be forced into austerity.
- alexqgb 11y ago
  Um, what? It will be forced into austerity? I'm sorry, but they have been. Past tense, like…years ago. That's why they're suffering a 25% unemployment rate and a contraction of GDP that exceeds what the U.S. saw in the Great Depression.
  - tptacek 11y ago
    Yes, but wherever they are now (after troika-mediated austerity), it's going to be worse after they lose their funding, isn't it?
    - alexqgb 11y ago
      Not necessarily. In the short run, perhaps, but that's not the point. The point is that your analysis reflects a very poor grasp of what's happening.
      - tptacek 11y ago
        I believe you, but could you flesh that critique out some more? My understanding of Greek's fundamentals start here: http://pseudoerasmus.com/2015/02/23/greece-orthodoxy-peronism/ http://pseudoerasmus.com/2015/02/23/greece-orthodoxy-peronis... (this was linked from the Interfluidity thing everyone was talking about before) and continues through here: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/scr/2015/cr15165.pdf http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/scr/2015/cr15165.pdf (which I read when someone claimed Greece had a 2014 primary surplus, which IMF disputes), and is colored by Tyler Cowen: http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2015/07/the-greeks-vote-for-austerity-now.html http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2015/07/the... ... who I do not agree with on most things, to the extent that matters, but whose commentary on Syriza and Greek financing I now understand a little better.
ForHackernews 11y ago
So what you're saying is Greece needs to declare war on the rest of the Eurozone, and then lose badly?
stfp 11y ago
> I'm sorry, no matter how bad 2008 was, it was no World War. His inability to grasp this just boggles the mind. Ss far as I could understand, that's not the point he's making, at all. He's saying that financially punishing countries is shortsighted and counterproductive and that we have recent examples of doing just that (1918), and doing the opposite (1945/1953), and clearly different outcomes. The rest of your points are irrelevant - he's not discussing post WW2 recovery in Germany in a void or for fun, like we are, he's trying to steer a super important debate about a Greek exit, which has so far been very simplistic and populist (the greek are lazy and must learn their lesson, even if it means they'll be in debt for 40 years). So he's also pointing out that it just so happens that the same countries are involved, then and now, and calling for a bit of a look at _recent_ history. Also, points for dropping 100% unsubstantiated nationalism accusations right at the end, great!
mcv 11y ago
Are you saying that initiating (and losing) two world wars is less bad than financial mismanagement and corruption? Keep in mind that Nazi Germany did a lot of damage in Greece, and still hasn't repaid that debt either. Insisting that Greece pays back all their debts when Germany is so good at avoiding to pay their own, is outright hypocritical. Sending an economy into destruction like this is a terrible idea, and goes against everything the EU should stand for. It's disgusting to see Germany at the helm of such a ride to hell.

prawn 11y ago

Personally, I thought his argument was very reasonable, and I also appreciated that the interviewer pressed him where appropriate to draw out some quality discussion.

leoc 11y ago

(I am not an expert on anything.) It's probably a bit unfortunate that this Piketty interview is getting prominence, because the whole question of analogies or disanalogies to Germany's war-related sovereign debt problems is mostly beside the point. The most urgent disanalogy in Greece's case is to what happens to just about every other country from A to Z that goes broke and needs to enter an IMF program. The SOP is for their pre-existing sovereign debt to be haircut as far as is necessary (if it is necessary) to make their debt burden clearly sustainable from then on, as a central part of the program designed and supervised by the IMF. This is what the IMF was designed to do from Day 1 and no-one, including Germany or any Eurozone core countries, is running around shouting that the IMF system is morally depraved, or a source of unacceptable moral hazard or a surrender to blackmail etc. etc. because it frequently results in program countries defaulting on a large chunk of their sovereign debts. And compared to the rogue's gallery of mostly developing countries that enter IMF programs Greece is probably not exceptionally profligate, corrupt, structurally rigid, unreformable and so on. Instead Greece was moved onto the special, ad hoc Troika scheme, in which a country with a greatly unsustainable debt burden was given more loans but originally no debt relief at all, and great efforts were made to make the country run primary surpluses so that the creditors would not only get all their money back but make a profit. Greatly inadequate debt relief was only added later on when the original plan had collapsed. I'll let the former head of the Bundesbank explain why: http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/former-central-bank-head-karl-otto-poehl-bailout-plan-is-all-about-rescuing-banks-and-rich-greeks-a-695245.html http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/former-central-b... Politically this was a wonder solution for the EU core leadership: bail out their banks by stealth, avoiding the anger of their taxpayers by camouflaging it as a rescue mission for the wayward Greeks. Even better, the whole cost of the EU-wide bank bailout could be sweated out of the Greek taxpayer! Well, not really of course: probably no-one ever expected the official creditors to actually get their money back, but hopefully the defaults would be acceptably far in the future for the politicians, who live hand-to-mouth and election to election. Now that the whole thing has exploded, perhaps sooner and harder than they expected, those EU core politicians are trapped by their earlier lies. There is one further wrinkle: not only was the Troika fix-up job vastly harsher on Greece as a creditor than a normal IMF program, it was specifically forbidden by the treaty of Lisbon (the solemn document I was asked to vote on twice, as an Irish citizen) articles 123 http://euwiki.org/TFEU#Article_123 http://euwiki.org/TFEU#Article_123 and 125 http://euwiki.org/TFEU#Article_125 http://euwiki.org/TFEU#Article_125 while at the same time the treaty had been crafted to allow Euro member countries continued access to normal IMF programs while remaining inside the Euro. Or at least, everyone thought that it was specifically forbidden, until this prohibition was no longer convenient, and the wizards at the ECJ (the same visionaries who recently discovered the "right to be forgotten") helpfully made it go away. But if we do want to talk about the German example, we don't have to go back to the Marshall Plan either. The US Fed's cross-border largesse in 2008 would be a good place to start.

DanielBMarkham 11y ago
Although you and I probably disagree on root causes and perhaps solutions, this was a great summary. Thank you. Reading the HN comments, it occurs to me what a total mess this is. People on all sides are not happy. Furthermore it's one of those he-said, she-said stories where each party has a long and detailed argument for why outsiders should consider things one way or another. Along those lines, I am very unhappy that Piketty chose to give this interview on this topic. I want to see his ideas about wealth being put under harsh light and deep scrutiny -- after all, he's supposed to have something important to say in this matter. But now he's just turning into another Krugman -- economist-cum-pundit. That's probably great for his career, but it makes honest and objective evaluation of his ideas much more difficult because from now on everybody's going to conflate his political views on various matters with his academic ones. Bah.

Confiks 11y ago

You seem to place an awful lot of value on the cause of debt being war. The interview gives no indication that Piketty would be unable to grasp the difference of the Greek and post-war German situation. That this "boggles the mind" seems to be a bit disingenuous. Also, the 2008 crisis isn't the direct cause of the crisis in Greece right now. That crisis has been building ever since Greece joined the monetary union in 2002. As Piketty notes: "The Greeks have, without a doubt, made big mistakes. Until 2009, the government in Athens forged its books". Papandreou finally revealed this (indeed, around 2008), and the current Greek crisis and European monetary instability followed suit.

Mikeb85 11y ago

When Greece borrowed money, it was sustainable. Their GDP was growing, in large part because the European economy was growing before the crisis. When the European and world economy went down, it dragged Greece with them. The debt became unsustainable. Instead of the creditors losing out (much as an investor or normal creditor would when they invest in something that loses), the Europeans decided to bail out the initial creditors, and convinced the then-current Greek government to take a bad deal, all the while basically 'socializing' the risk. Their shitty economics led to a 25% contraction in the Greek economy. If you follow the chain of events, this crisis is as much Germany's fault as Greece's. Another thing to keep in mind, is that it doesn't matter whose fault it is. If Greece stops paying its creditors and stops taking loans, Germans will lose out. It's actually in Germany's best interest to forgive some of the debt, and have Greece pay the rest. Greece's economist/finance minister knows this, that's why they can play this game.

melling 11y ago
I haven't followed Greece that closely but this story about Greece hiding its debt to gain entry into the Euro has been mentioned more than once: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/business/global/14debt.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/business/global/14debt.htm...
tptacek 11y ago
The stats I can find suggest Greece ran a primary deficit pretty consistently starting in 2002 --- long before the crisis --- in fact, they appear to have run a primary deficit during the boom years that preceded the crisis.
- Mikeb85 11y ago
  A deficit isn't necessarily unsustainable over a period of economic growth. If growth and inflation outpace the cost of borrowing, it's worthwhile to borrow. Kind of like the US is doing right now.
  - tptacek 11y ago

jsprogrammer 11y ago

>There's a very clear difference between a country that comes out of two world wars, with everything all but destroyed, including millions dead. Which allows us to provide a further distinction: the country who had everything destroyed was directly responsible for that destruction. Yet, the debt that they racked up because they tried to take over eurasia while killing and torturing millions in the process, was forgiven not many years after the killings and torturings took place. I think there should be a distinction between a country that kills and tortures millions and one that does not. So, why again should we forgive the debts of those responsible for killing and torturing millions, but not those of a country who has done nothing comparable?

peterfirefly 11y ago
> I think there should be a distinction between a country that kills and tortures millions and one that does not. Which reminds me... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War 158,000 killed due to those bloody stupid Communists :(
- pacifist 11y ago
  Here's another take on it: [1]"As the war’s outcome became apparent, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was determined to return Greece to the prewar rule of the monarchy and the old regime. He was motivated by fear of Communist influence within the resistance movement. Churchill tried to get the Anglo-American army that was getting ready to invade Italy to attack Greece instead. Indeed, he tried so hard to change the war plan that he almost broke up the Allied military alliance; when he failed, he threw all the soldiers he still controlled into Greece and precipitated a civil war that tore the country apart." [1] http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026942363 http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026942363
- kungfooguru 11y ago
  You mean damn those Greeks wanting to run their own lives? Something that was violently crushed and kept through an oppressive military junta?

aikah 11y ago

who started World War II ? > There's a very big difference between war caused debt and economic caused debt not if you started the very war that put you in debt.

latch 11y ago
Your sibling posts pick much, much stronger arguments. "This is not a peace. It is an armistice for twenty years"
mcv 11y ago
Maybe Greece should declare war on Germany to get rid of their debt?

coldtea 11y ago

>This makes me lose respect for Piketty. There's a very clear difference between a country that comes out of two world wars, with everything all but destroyed, including millions dead. Yes. The main difference being that Greece didn't invade anyone, didn't cause millions of deaths and didn't exterminate 6 million Jews. Just over-borrowed. And it has paid for it with 5 years destruction of its economy (40-50% effective less buying power per person among other things and unemployment rates similar to the Weimar republic). Hey, Greece didn't even ask for its loans NOT to be repaid -- they just asked for a better deal, without heavy taxation and anti-business austerity measures that prevent development and make it even more impossible to reboot. The idea that the first case is somehow more justified to relieve is ludicrous -- not to mention insulting to the victims of the Holocaust and WW. [EDIT] Besides, the main historical reason Germany was "forgiven" wasn't that it had suffered losses too (war agressors have no right to complain about that), but because it suddenly was in the right place to serve as a nice Cold War ally, half to the West/NATO and half to the USSR, so both sides wanted it to be in good standing.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
afsina 11y ago
>Yes. The main difference being that Greece didn't invade anyone.... Actually Greece Invaded Turkey in WW-I. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Turkish_War_(1919%E2%80%9322) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Turkish_War_(1919%E2%80%...
- twobits 11y ago
  Well, not exactly. You get a better context if you say that the two countries have a sweet little history going back to byzantium, where turks invaded, greeks invaded, turks invaded, greeks invaded, turks invaded,... PS: And yes, it was the ottoman empire, etc, but that's semantics.
  - afsina 11y ago
    Does that change the fact that this was an invasion? Last time Ottomans invaded Anatolia was 12th century. Current Greece was invaded in end of 15th century. And Greece tried to invade Anatolia in 20th century.

tomp 11y ago

The underlying assumption in the German "NO" to Greek pleas of debt relief is the "moral hazard" of writing off a country's debt just because they cried really hard. Why don't we talk about the moral hazard of writing off a country's debt after they kill 60 million people?

tedunangst 11y ago
Well, as part of their debt relief, Germany got a new government. Is that what Greece wants?
- tomp 11y ago
  Greece has a new government. One that has no connection with either the thieves that caused the problem in the first place nor the incompetent idiots that didn't solve it in the last 5 years.
  - tedunangst 11y ago
    Wikipedia tells me the Greek constitution dates to 1975. Is that wrong?
    - peterfirefly 11y ago
      A constitution under which it is illegal to fire state workers unless by law!
      - fwn 11y ago
        Unless by law? Well, at least that one isn't a problem for a government.
        peterfirefly 11y ago
        Yes it is. Laws require debate and public voting in Parliament which exposes many/all members of the governing coalition to lots of bad press, which is /so/ unfair since all they really wanted was to get reelected and, honest, they didn't want to be a bother to anyone.

njs12345 11y ago

The Greek economy has shrunk by a quarter over the course of the crisis. Not quite a smoking crater, but not exactly a trifle either, and not incomparable to the impact of a war, I'd say..

hackuser 11y ago
> The Greek economy has shrunk by a quarter over the course of the crisis. Not quite a smoking crater I disagree; that's a smoking crater. I'd bet the U.S. economy hasn't experienced that since 1900, or maybe only in the Great Depression.

SoftwareMaven 11y ago

You'll excuse me if I express some skepticism about the "downfall of the US Industrial might". Only China produces more and only a handful of G20 countries' industrial base is growing faster.[1] 1. https://www.quandl.com/collections/economics/industrial-production-by-country https://www.quandl.com/collections/economics/industrial-prod...

tsotha 11y ago
Yeah, it's more the rise of China than the downfall of the US.

tptacek 11y ago

I'm also not clear on what Germany's payment history has to do with the crisis. The problem isn't simply that Greece is defaulting on loans, but that it's doing so while asking for more loans, without which it will be forced into austerity.

alexqgb 11y ago
Um, what? It will be forced into austerity? I'm sorry, but they have been. Past tense, like…years ago. That's why they're suffering a 25% unemployment rate and a contraction of GDP that exceeds what the U.S. saw in the Great Depression.
- tptacek 11y ago
  Yes, but wherever they are now (after troika-mediated austerity), it's going to be worse after they lose their funding, isn't it?
  - alexqgb 11y ago
    Not necessarily. In the short run, perhaps, but that's not the point. The point is that your analysis reflects a very poor grasp of what's happening.
    - tptacek 11y ago
      I believe you, but could you flesh that critique out some more? My understanding of Greek's fundamentals start here: http://pseudoerasmus.com/2015/02/23/greece-orthodoxy-peronism/ http://pseudoerasmus.com/2015/02/23/greece-orthodoxy-peronis... (this was linked from the Interfluidity thing everyone was talking about before) and continues through here: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/scr/2015/cr15165.pdf http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/scr/2015/cr15165.pdf (which I read when someone claimed Greece had a 2014 primary surplus, which IMF disputes), and is colored by Tyler Cowen: http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2015/07/the-greeks-vote-for-austerity-now.html http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2015/07/the... ... who I do not agree with on most things, to the extent that matters, but whose commentary on Syriza and Greek financing I now understand a little better.

ForHackernews 11y ago

So what you're saying is Greece needs to declare war on the rest of the Eurozone, and then lose badly?

stfp 11y ago

> I'm sorry, no matter how bad 2008 was, it was no World War. His inability to grasp this just boggles the mind. Ss far as I could understand, that's not the point he's making, at all. He's saying that financially punishing countries is shortsighted and counterproductive and that we have recent examples of doing just that (1918), and doing the opposite (1945/1953), and clearly different outcomes. The rest of your points are irrelevant - he's not discussing post WW2 recovery in Germany in a void or for fun, like we are, he's trying to steer a super important debate about a Greek exit, which has so far been very simplistic and populist (the greek are lazy and must learn their lesson, even if it means they'll be in debt for 40 years). So he's also pointing out that it just so happens that the same countries are involved, then and now, and calling for a bit of a look at _recent_ history. Also, points for dropping 100% unsubstantiated nationalism accusations right at the end, great!

mcv 11y ago

Are you saying that initiating (and losing) two world wars is less bad than financial mismanagement and corruption? Keep in mind that Nazi Germany did a lot of damage in Greece, and still hasn't repaid that debt either. Insisting that Greece pays back all their debts when Germany is so good at avoiding to pay their own, is outright hypocritical. Sending an economy into destruction like this is a terrible idea, and goes against everything the EU should stand for. It's disgusting to see Germany at the helm of such a ride to hell.