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End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

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Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#61

Post by ben_w »

ravingraven wrote: post #8
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #2

>There is almost no work -- the main sources of income are beekeeping and a bit of forestry. There's no tourism, even though, according to UNESCO, the air here is cleaner than almost anywhere else in Europe. One of the greatest things the tech industry could do to decrease the economic inequality due to location would be to embrace remote work. Imagine what even having 10 developers living in the village could do for…

>Imagine what even having 10 developers living in the village could do for its economy. I guarantee that this village has no internet (other than 3/4G with a data cap).

I have PAYG roaming throughout the EU for one penny per megabyte (1 UK penny == 1.27¢ US). I think that’s unlimited in the EU but in the EEA goes up to 1.41p/MB after 12 GB (but if I used that much I would switch to something even cheaper).

Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#62

Post by namdnay »

onli wrote: post #34
ekianjo wrote: post #21

> turned Greece into a different country. They turned themselves into a different country by borrowing Euros at German market interest rates while their previous interest rates for borrowing were at 16% before they joined the Eurozone. They lived way above their means for more than 10 years, what did they expect for a country that has virtually no industry?

That's neoliberal propaganda. 1. Greece did not live above it means. It did not have more debts than other countries in the EU zone, countries that did not crash 2. Greece would have been fine it it had not been forced to destroy its economy with an austerity program > They lived way above their means You probably are german, because that is a BILD/CDU slogan. It's very hard to qualify what that is supposed to mean.…

In what parallel universe was Greece fine before austerity? They had fiddled their books for decades (with help from predatory bankers). Even in the 90s it wasn't hard to see there was a fundamental issue in the way the country was managed

Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#63

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

oblio wrote: post #24

I'm slightly salty: Hey, at least Greece is relevant. That Golden Ancient Age of Greece bought it relevance, support and sympathy for all eternity. I'm from Romania, a poorer member of the EU that faces an even greater demographic crisis. You don't hear a peep about us in the news, except for recently, when the corrupt government started beating up protestors who were asking for stronger anti-corruption measures. Any…

You do have Dracula, at least. What does FYR Macedonia (or however it's called now) have?

Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#64

Post by namdnay »

sgt101 wrote: post #54
dantheman wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why did they need an austerity program if they were fine?

the 2008 banking crisis caused credit to dry up, this caused a rise in debt costs which caused attention to focus on the greek economy which caused the fraud that allowed eurozone admission to become widely known which destroyed confidence in the greek administration which then turned to Europe who didn't help which destroyed confidence further.

Exactly - the crisis exposed the fundamental issues in Greece. It didn't create them, though of course it made things worse (as for pretty much every country in the developed world)

Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#65

Post by pjc50 »

TangoTrotFox wrote: post #58
shard972 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Liberalism itself isn't right wing at all. Consider that in the USA at the moment liberalism is most concentrated within the democratic party as most neo-liberals have left the party post Trump. Steve Schmidt and Joe Scarborough are two obvious examples of this shift.

I think this would depend on what you consider liberalism. For instance, I think two of the most important components of liberalism are the autonomy of the individual and the consent of the governed. If we wanted to create a truly liberal government we might have institutions where you were given the option of paying an education tax. And if you paid this tax, then you would be able to opt in to public education bene…

> opt in to public education benefits which would be equitably distributed and could approach "free" depending on how many people paid in and the cost of the education institute any given student was pursuing. However, if you chose to opt out of this tax, you would be obligated to pay the costs and fees all on your own

And if you opt out of the public education tax, every time you want to see a doctor or cross a bridge or use a computer program, you have to pay a contribution to the student loans of the people who wrote it?

(The history of public education in the west goes back to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prussian_education_system and wasn't originally "redistributive" in the modern sense at all, more the tail end of feudalism)

Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#66

Post by sonnyblarney »

arijo wrote: post #39
sonnyblarney wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the world runs on patrongage, or 'clientism' as you call it. Most large corporations are like that and so are Western governments. 'Getting in the door' at an entry-level job in government or even in business ... there are rules here, and tech tends to be more 'skills based' as are startups. But after that you'd be surprised how many people have the jobs just because they think they deserve them. Clearly, an…

Portugal's economy has been booming since 2015 - please resist the temptation of bad-mouthing Portugal before you understand more about it's current political, economical and social situation.

Greece goes into default every few decades for the last many hundred years. So if they were to go a few hundred years without problems, then we can talk about improvements there for example.

It's similar with Portugal, or anywhere else. That said, they had a much more recent Empire. Nothing substantial changes in 2 years or even 20, apart from a collapse in government, war, invasion ... or a major treaty with the rest of the EU, which I believe will do to them what NAFTA does to Canada: make Portugal permanently less well off than the rest of Europe, but have some kind of 'bottom baseline' standard of living.

We can re-open discussion in a decade to see if there is real change.

I did take a quick look into it though and it does look positive at least to some [1]

[1] https://voxeu.org/article/turnaround-portuguese-economy

Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#67

Post by emptyfile »

onli wrote: post #34
ekianjo wrote: post #21

> turned Greece into a different country. They turned themselves into a different country by borrowing Euros at German market interest rates while their previous interest rates for borrowing were at 16% before they joined the Eurozone. They lived way above their means for more than 10 years, what did they expect for a country that has virtually no industry?

That's neoliberal propaganda. 1. Greece did not live above it means. It did not have more debts than other countries in the EU zone, countries that did not crash 2. Greece would have been fine it it had not been forced to destroy its economy with an austerity program > They lived way above their means You probably are german, because that is a BILD/CDU slogan. It's very hard to qualify what that is supposed to mean.…

Hilarious, is this what Greeks think?

Its not the size of the debt or the deficit that matters but what its spent on.

Take a look at pre-2009 retirement ages, number of employees in the public sector and the wages in the public sector.

Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#68

Post by pjc50 »

TangoTrotFox wrote: post #30
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #2

>There is almost no work -- the main sources of income are beekeeping and a bit of forestry. There's no tourism, even though, according to UNESCO, the air here is cleaner than almost anywhere else in Europe. One of the greatest things the tech industry could do to decrease the economic inequality due to location would be to embrace remote work. Imagine what even having 10 developers living in the village could do for…

> "One of the greatest things the tech industry could do to decrease the economic inequality due to location would be to embrace remote work. Imagine what even having 10 developers living in the village could do for its economy. " In rural areas I think you have to start thinking more concretely about what "economy" means. With smaller populations things are much more micro than macro. One huge difference between rur…

> single large whitetail deer

Are these widely available in Greece?

> Get into things like raising chickens and pigs, and you literally will never have to pay a dime for food again if you don't want.

Have you actually done this? I know people who have tiny farms as a hobby, and people who've retired from smallholding because it was uneconomic, and people who live in remote areas of Scotland .. and this resembles none of their lives. You might not have to pay for food (of a few types at certain times of the year), but you can't grow your own petrol or heating oil.

Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#69

Post by oblio »

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #63
oblio wrote: post #24

I'm slightly salty: Hey, at least Greece is relevant. That Golden Ancient Age of Greece bought it relevance, support and sympathy for all eternity. I'm from Romania, a poorer member of the EU that faces an even greater demographic crisis. You don't hear a peep about us in the news, except for recently, when the corrupt government started beating up protestors who were asking for stronger anti-corruption measures. Any…

You do have Dracula, at least. What does FYR Macedonia (or however it's called now) have?

Yeah, you're right, as a principle. However:

Romania:

* country formed 150 years ago (with precursor states dating back 800 years)

* 20 million people

* EU, NATO member

vs

FYROM/Macedonia:

* country formed 20 years ago

* 2 million people

* neither of those things

This strikes me as comparing apples to oranges :)

Re: End of Greek Aid Package as Country Faces Demographic Crisis

#70

Post by lvoudour »

antouank wrote: post #10

> She wants to abolish Greek clientelism. Although every politician has promised this since taking office, none has succeeded. For centuries, the Greek administration was little more than an excuse for legal nepotism. Clientelism was the functional principle of society. Its roots reach into the Ottoman era, when clan leaders represented the Greeks to the Ottoman authorities, and they have continued to this day. Jobs…

That's Greece in a nutshell right there. Skills were never relevant, and still aren't. It's all about who you know, and what political leverage you have. The results are there for all to see. I left Greece 6 years ago, and unfortunately whenever I visit, nothing seems to change.

Same as you, I left about 6 years ago, but I think things are gradually changing (albeit slowly). The state's "tit" has dried out and clientelism is not as rampant anymore, businesses that used to rely on state funded projects (and took advantage of connections) are much fewer, run of the mill shops that offer no quality of service are quickly phased-out by competition.

There's still lots of tax-evasion, undeclared employment, etc. and lots of dodgy businesses staying afloat (especially in tourism) but I still see a glimpse of change in the horizon.

The three big problems I see that make actual change hard are (a) too many young educated people have fled the country (b) the political environment is still fluid and (c) there are still many obstacles that make starting a business there unattractive. If (b) and (c) are solved, (a) will solve itself and people will come back to start again

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