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Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

#141

Post by ivanhoe »

bsaul wrote: post #52
popee wrote: post #45

Hi, croat here. Just one detail, this year there will be elections in Croatia and current gov didn't do anything useful for our economy, so this is kind of popular measure. Don't get me wrong, it's always nice to help, but situation is little bit complicated, taxes are very high and in some way this is not fair to people that are paying everything. Also, there are huge number of people living and exploiting social me…

Your comment made me realize a more appropriate title would be : "Current croatian government cancels poor citizen's debts one year before election". But that would probably cast a VERY different light on the event. The original intent was probably to give the (positive i guess) impression that the greek trend of not paying debts is spreading.

Actually, this law was proposed way before the elections in Greece were held, so it wasn't related in any way.. except that Croatia and Greece are in a similar positions debt wise, so similar political moves can be expected

Re: Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

#142

Post by michael2l »

nickthemagicman wrote: post #121
byoogle wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting, this quote comes to mind: “The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.” – Alexis de Tocqueville

The term, bribery, is extremely subjective in this context. It's the same ephemerality as saying someone is a hater of "Freedom". It makes an easy soundbite but what does that even mean?

I think most people use the concept of being for or against "Freedom" to refer to the opposite sides of the bottom-up versus top-down modes of economic development and governance.

Certainly, it's an over-generalization, and the word freedom is used specifically to evoke an emotional response, but I don't think it's devoid of meaning.

An unfortunate side-effect of having a democracy with 300 million plus people in it, is that to a certain extent these sort of over-generalizations are a necessary part of coalition building.

Re: Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

#144

Post by enupten »

popee wrote: post #45

Hi, croat here. Just one detail, this year there will be elections in Croatia and current gov didn't do anything useful for our economy, so this is kind of popular measure. Don't get me wrong, it's always nice to help, but situation is little bit complicated, taxes are very high and in some way this is not fair to people that are paying everything. Also, there are huge number of people living and exploiting social me…

The Indian polity resorts to similar schemes, come election time.

I'm hardly surprised at WP not taking a more critical stance.

Re: Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

#145

Post by ptaipale »

popee wrote: post #45

Hi, croat here. Just one detail, this year there will be elections in Croatia and current gov didn't do anything useful for our economy, so this is kind of popular measure. Don't get me wrong, it's always nice to help, but situation is little bit complicated, taxes are very high and in some way this is not fair to people that are paying everything. Also, there are huge number of people living and exploiting social me…

Just nitpicking one thing:

> taxes are very high

Doesn't seem so: Croatia's tax to GDP ratio is 26.6 %. Compare that to 46.8 % in Belgium, 43.4 % in Austria, 40.6 % in Germany, 45.8 % in Sweden. 26.9 % in U.S. which is internationally known as a low-tax regime.

Surely some taxes are high, and taxation is not necessarily fair, but I'd say that Croatia's taxes overall are not high. I would also expect that the "black market" GDP is higher there than in "old" EU countries, say Germany or even France, or the U.S. Though I admit this is mostly based on just prejudice.

(Using Heritage Foundation figures in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_tax_revenu... - OECD numbers are slightly different but not that much)

Re: Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

#146

Post by hellbanner »

baddox wrote: post #135
stefantalpalaru wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Say goodbye to educational loans, healthcare loans, car loans. Say hello to life outside the US. In most of Europe you don't need loans to get an education, healthcare or to buy a car.

How do poor people in Europe get cars? Or are you saying they don't need them?

Public transportation is quite good in Europe compared to say, the USA, where car companies purchased intranational train tracks, dismantled them for highways

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspi...

Re: Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

#147

Post by themartorana »

maxerickson wrote: post #41
themartorana wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I argue, albeit inexpertly, that TARP money given directly to homeowners to make payments on their toxic mortgages would have been of infinitely better societal good than handing b(tr?)illions to banks without any oversight at all. But you are morally bankrupt for taking out a mortgage difficult for you to pay. The bank, however, doesn't have such moral failings for they are not people. Wait...

Saying TARP had no oversight is a bit much. The money mostly got paid back, it wasn't a festival of stealing from the government: http://projects.propublica.org/bailout/ The best way to look at TARP is as a preservation of the status quo. Whether that was the right thing or not, given how many people have investment assets that are exposed to banking and insurance, the benefits were a lot wider than just to the banki…

Well, yes, except for where not entirely or at all. [0]

[0] http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/11/28/142854391/rep...

Re: Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

#148

Post by _cudgel »

baddox wrote: post #135
stefantalpalaru wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Say goodbye to educational loans, healthcare loans, car loans. Say hello to life outside the US. In most of Europe you don't need loans to get an education, healthcare or to buy a car.

How do poor people in Europe get cars? Or are you saying they don't need them?

Cities old enough they were designed for foot-traffic, not car-traffic; modern-ish train systems and other public transit; the high price of fuel... My guess is less need.

Re: Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

#149

Post by hnnewguy »

raffomania wrote: post #140
bmmayer1 wrote: post #116

Let's just look at the predictable consequences of this move: 1) Banks and other corporations will never lend money to poor people again. Full stop. If there is a chance that the government will write off that debt (effectively stealing future earnings from banks) for these loans, banks just won't issue them. Say goodbye to educational loans, healthcare loans, car loans. Say goodbye to home loans and mortgages. If yo…

Did you read the entire article? > Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic has convinced multiple cities, public and private companies, the country's major telecommunications providers, as well as nine banks to clear some of their citizens of their debt. This means that the losses happen with consent of the corporations involved.

>convinced

I wouldn't put much stake in that. What choice do you have when the government is trying to "convince" you to do something? You play ball.

Re: Croatia just canceled the debts of its poorest citizens

#150

Post by ptaipale »

raffomania wrote: post #140
bmmayer1 wrote: post #116

Let's just look at the predictable consequences of this move: 1) Banks and other corporations will never lend money to poor people again. Full stop. If there is a chance that the government will write off that debt (effectively stealing future earnings from banks) for these loans, banks just won't issue them. Say goodbye to educational loans, healthcare loans, car loans. Say goodbye to home loans and mortgages. If yo…

Did you read the entire article? > Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic has convinced multiple cities, public and private companies, the country's major telecommunications providers, as well as nine banks to clear some of their citizens of their debt. This means that the losses happen with consent of the corporations involved.

There's consent and there's consent. Like as a shop owner I consent to give some money to a don, because it would be such a shame if my business burned down.

Not saying that the convincing is necessarily done via threats, or is a bad thing at all, but "convincing" has many meanings.

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