Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.” • Hacker News Board

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#241

Post by cb18 » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 7:37 AM UTC

dang wrote: post #230

cb18 wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The subject of nationalism in Europe had already been brought up, and I responded in kind. If you don't want to talk about it that's fine, don't. I understand, it is a potentially uncomfortable subject. But don't try to shy away from the facts and bury your head in the sand with downvotes. As I said the topic was already brought up, this is not off topic or violating HN guidelines, to downvote simply because it makes…

Sex gangs and jihadists are utterly off topic. Please stop.

Yes, I know it is a bit of a stretch from the linked article, but the subject of nationalism in Europe was getting some traction in the comments and this matter(the subject of the killed post) seems to me to be tightly connected to rising nationalism in Europe. I've recently looked into this and it is shocking and disheartening, but I want to believe a not intractable problem and I was hoping to have some reasoned discussion about it since, somewhat understandably there seems to be such a tendency to sweep it away as quickly as possible.

If anybody is interested, just look into this[0,] and if you can bear it, consider the pattern of all the similar cases, the utter depravity of it all, how it was allowed to operate for so long, and with those facts considered, god knows how much of it is going on as we speak.

And because these problems and others like them throughout Europe, can be seen as the result of and directly traced to specific policies put in place by European governments, they are in desperate need of discussion. Especially by people who want to make the world a better place.

And now upon further consideration, an increasingly disruptive(not the good kind,) rapidly growing in size immigrant population in Europe does seem rather on topic in any broad discussion about the future of the Eurozone economy, already dealing with employment issues.

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotherham_child_sexual_exploit...

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#242

Post by claudius » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 7:43 AM UTC

x0x0 wrote: post #240

claudius wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem with "your money" (as well as Belgium's etc etc etc) is that it didn't "go to Greece": it went to private lenders, aka French and German banks which were holding Greek debt. The honest people of Portugal were swindled out of their money, in the tradition of socializing private losses (while privatizing profits wherever possible). Can I borrow 100€ from you to pay back this other guy from whom I borrowed…

so to recap, it's totally true that the first bailout didn't aid Greece but rather bailed out dodgy German, et al, bank loans to Greece by transferring them to the Greek public sector? I'm not sure why you fervently believe the banks deserve this. No-one held a gun to their head and forced them to make a loan to Greece, and it's not as if the, ah, looseness of Greek gdp calculations was exactly a secret. Perhaps cons…

Sorry, but in which way did Greece not get some 300 billion euros? Whether they first borrowed that money from private banks and then the rest of the eurozone paid back the banks for Greece or whether they received the money directly from the other eurozone countries, the end result is still that banks now have roughly as much as before (modulo minor interests etc.), Greece has some 300 billion more and the rest of the eurozone has some 300 billion less.

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#243

Post by junto » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 7:45 AM UTC

Chinjut wrote: post #223

Atropos wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh but the current generation of Germans has a moral responsibility to help the current generation of Greeks because Germany got debt forgiveness 60 years ago ???

The idea isn't that Germans have incurred a special moral responsibility (which they otherwise would not have) because Germany received debt forgiveness 60 years ago. Rather, the idea is that the debt forgiveness Germany received 60 years ago ended up working out quite well, most of us would agree. Thus, we would do well to learn from this history, instead of dogmatically keeping debt forgiveness off the table.

Although I agree with you, the situations are a bit different. In the case of post WWII it was widely recognised that Germany's debt and war reparations were a major cause of WWII and helped with the rise of the National Socialist Party in Germany.

Greece doesn't have a modern history of military aggression. Germany did. What the Allies put in place was in their own interests.

The Allies didn't want to make that mistake twice (one could argue 3rd time). Hence they made sure that Germany [a] had a political system that was extremely balanced and stable (ironically much more than their own).

And [b] (most importantly of all), they made sure that they Germans had hope. Hope to be able to dig themselves out of what must have appeared to be almost a impossible mess at the beginning. Hope is like a virus. It starts small and becomes a self fulfilling cycle upwards (the reverse is also true).

That is what the Greece requires now. It needs to restructure its debt in order to take advantage of the quantitative easing policy of the ECB and low interest rates.

It also needs time to put its house in this order and it needs stability (politically and economically) to build itself back up.

The EU powers that be hates referendums. The people always vote that opposite to what they want. Welcome to democracy.

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#244

Post by x0x0 » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 7:49 AM UTC

claudius wrote: post #242

x0x0 wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so to recap, it's totally true that the first bailout didn't aid Greece but rather bailed out dodgy German, et al, bank loans to Greece by transferring them to the Greek public sector? I'm not sure why you fervently believe the banks deserve this. No-one held a gun to their head and forced them to make a loan to Greece, and it's not as if the, ah, looseness of Greek gdp calculations was exactly a secret. Perhaps cons…

Sorry, but in which way did Greece not get some 300 billion euros? Whether they first borrowed that money from private banks and then the rest of the eurozone paid back the banks for Greece or whether they received the money directly from the other eurozone countries, the end result is still that banks now have roughly as much as before (modulo minor interests etc.), Greece has some 300 billion more and the rest of t…

You're determined to ignore where the money went.

German, Dutch, et al banks -- specifically banks that had unacknowledged bad loans to Greece -- have several hundred billion more than before. Public sector balance sheets have that much less.

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#245

Post by lorenzfx » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 7:49 AM UTC

HSO wrote: post #59

At the risk of being a moralizing bore, may I remind everybody that "Germany", "Greece" etc. are not people, and that people are not countries? I am surprised by the national coloring, however faint, of some comments here and there https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9834721 . "I am a German" or "Greek here" should have no relevance to the ideas put forth. "Your money" and "your banks" are not really "my money" and…

What really gets me going is how "we" helped the banks fill their coffers and socialize the losses. Again. Lending Greece money went along with earning (comparably) a lot of interest exactly because of the high (perceived) threat of Greece defaulting. And now that it has (nearly) come to that, all the risk has been moved to the EZB, etc.

I called my local elected representative about it, SPD (social democrat), and "voiced my concern", but only got met with talk about chain reactions and responsibility. Perhaps I shouldn't have shouted.

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#246

Post by verinus » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 7:59 AM UTC

sdenton4 wrote: post #173

This all reminds me of what we've learned about forest management. You see, for a long time we thought that all forest fires were bad, and set out to extinguish fires whenever even a small one broke out in a forest. After a few decades of almost no fire, a huge amount of burnable debris collected in the forests, and now, when fires break out, they're gigantic and far, far more damaging than normal forest fires. Likew…

this is wrong. in the Eurozone the target value for inflation rates was 3%. problem was that while most countries got over 3% Germany was much lower, thus damaging the relative competitiveness...

recently the euriborturned negative- the reason for that was to increase the money available to the economy as saving on bank accounts lost attraction and turned to stock exchanges...

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#247

Post by ZeroGravitas » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 7:59 AM UTC

claudius wrote: post #242

x0x0 wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so to recap, it's totally true that the first bailout didn't aid Greece but rather bailed out dodgy German, et al, bank loans to Greece by transferring them to the Greek public sector? I'm not sure why you fervently believe the banks deserve this. No-one held a gun to their head and forced them to make a loan to Greece, and it's not as if the, ah, looseness of Greek gdp calculations was exactly a secret. Perhaps cons…

Sorry, but in which way did Greece not get some 300 billion euros? Whether they first borrowed that money from private banks and then the rest of the eurozone paid back the banks for Greece or whether they received the money directly from the other eurozone countries, the end result is still that banks now have roughly as much as before (modulo minor interests etc.), Greece has some 300 billion more and the rest of t…

As well as ignoring the banks culpability here, you're doing the same thing the original starter of this thread wanted to point out. Greece is a country, not a person. Did all Greeks benefit equally from that money? Or is large amounts of it sitting in accounts of corrupt politicians and the corporations (not necessarily Greek ones) that the money got spent on.

I've seen accusations that the high military spending goes to northern European arms dealing countries. I have no idea if that's true but the pattern is very familiar, the UK have a long history of giving "foreign" "aid" which is basically giving taxpayer money to arms dealers.

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#248

Post by toyg » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 8:13 AM UTC

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #247

claudius wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but in which way did Greece not get some 300 billion euros? Whether they first borrowed that money from private banks and then the rest of the eurozone paid back the banks for Greece or whether they received the money directly from the other eurozone countries, the end result is still that banks now have roughly as much as before (modulo minor interests etc.), Greece has some 300 billion more and the rest of t…

As well as ignoring the banks culpability here, you're doing the same thing the original starter of this thread wanted to point out. Greece is a country, not a person. Did all Greeks benefit equally from that money? Or is large amounts of it sitting in accounts of corrupt politicians and the corporations (not necessarily Greek ones) that the money got spent on. I've seen accusations that the high military spending go…

Some info from 2011: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/analysis-and-feat...

And again in 2012, it was widely speculated that the bailout was granted on condition that Greece kept up buying stuff from Germany: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/apr/19/greece-military...

And these are the first two google hits, really.

Adding a bit of context: Greece basically had a full-out war with Turkey over Cyprus about 40 years ago, and tension has been high ever since. The Cyprus issue is one of the many sticking points that resulted in Turkey being refused EU membership. If you look carefully at maps, you'll see that many Greek islands are extremely close to the Turkish mainland (tourist guides joke that you can get "instant Greece" when visiting Turkey with a quick boat trip). Part of the reconstruction process of Turkish national identity after the end of the Ottomans involved ethnic cleansing against long-time Greek enclaves. This is complicated further by the Cold War and the strategic location of both countries, which means they both "have to be" NATO members by hook or by crook (i.e. the US will never let them go). In this framework, high defence spending is not unnatural; however, reliance on specific northern-European dealers is a bit suspect.

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#249

Post by cb18 » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 8:29 AM UTC

cb18 wrote: post #241

dang wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sex gangs and jihadists are utterly off topic. Please stop.

Yes, I know it is a bit of a stretch from the linked article, but the subject of nationalism in Europe was getting some traction in the comments and this matter(the subject of the killed post) seems to me to be tightly connected to rising nationalism in Europe. I've recently looked into this and it is shocking and disheartening, but I want to believe a not intractable problem and I was hoping to have some reasoned di…

I know it is a little déclassé or something to talk about downvotes, but that above post seems to be racking up about 1 every 5 min for that past 40 minutes.

So as I think I pretty civilly and clearly laid out my reasoning for why I think it is an important topic to discuss, and so many of you feel strongly enough about it to downvote, maybe one or two of you wouldn't mind to put your thoughts into words?

edit: Also, I should maybe note, in my original, now dead, post I did position myself pretty far to one side of an interpretive spectrum, as I find that is often a good way to elicit a response I had not considered and whittle down my view to a more thoroughly thought through viewpoint.

Re: Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

#250

Post by vidarh » Mon, Jul 06, 2015, 8:37 AM UTC

TheCondor wrote: post #125

sgnelson wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll put it this way. World War I: Germany loses, is forced to pay not just debt, but reparations. Huge economic and political instability as a result leads to a new leadership which leads directly to World War II. World War II: Germany loses, is split up, due to the Marshall plan (in part do to a fear of Communism, so not solely due to compassion), West Germany given millions of dollars to rebuild, a rather thriving…

West Germany did repay some of the defaulted WWI debt to help rebuild their reputation after they lost WWII. Also, there is another gigantic difference here, Germany lost a bloody war and we told them how it was going to be, we restructured their economy, wholesale, and they were in no position to disagree. About half the debt was forgiven because they did what we made them do. If Greece wants to put their sovereignt…

> If Greece wants to put their sovereignty on the table and let their creditors structure their economy for them, that's a very different negotiation than what they've had.

Given that even the IMF have admitted that pretty much all their projections were flat out wrong for Greece, of course the Greek government would be total idiots if they did this.

> All this hypocrisy talk misses the point. Greece should go elsewhere to finance their debts if they don't like dealing with Germany.

This is missing the point: Sure, Greece can't demand whatever they like. But at the same time, it is irrational for Europe to treat Greece this way, because all it achieves is weakening the Greek economy further, which nobody benefits from.

If the EZ governments wants to lose all the debt, that's a good approach. If they want some of it repaid and would like Greece to remain a viable part of the common market, it's not.