Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

theatlantic.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 120 posts

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#91

Post by onemorepassword »

dpe82 wrote: post #38
tsotha wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The plan was "harmonization" of tax and spending policies. It's not really any secret the people actually running Europe were trying to cobble a United States of Europe together, first by sharing a currency and then by moving all the decision making to Brussels over time. Of course Italians and Spaniards don't have any desire to become Germans, and vice-versa. The currency part was easy - the "harmonization" part wil…

Indeed. It's hard to "harmonize" countries or regions that don't speak the same language. Workers can't easily move from country to country to take advantage of job opportunities (and thus spread culture through direct interaction), and there's little shared media.

Language is a doable barrier to overcome, and so is harmonizing various regions on a regulation level. Remember that in Europe those cultural differences exist within countries and have for centuries. Hell, Brussels itself symbolize that.

If you think they don't easily move from country to country, I suggest you visit London, Amsterdam or Berlin.

Harmonization is a political issue, and what hampers it is selfish and corrupt politicians.

Making it a cultural issue is dangerous nonsense. An average Greek would be quite happy to live under German style regulations, if he could trusts the authorities to play by the rules. Ordinary people and their cultural differences are not the problem.

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#92

Post by forgottenpaswrd »

pfortuny wrote: post #88

I -Spaniard here living in Spain- tend not to believe those figures. Also: 1) Hiring is unbelievably costly due to Social Security. 2) Hence you tend to pay "in black". 3) People HAVE TO pay for the Soc Sec even though they do not earn enough for a living. At the very leas, 250 bucks per month whatever your earnings are. 4) We are spectacular liars at polls. Nobody in the black market will say he has a job. So a grai…

True. Americans can't understand it without traveling and living abroad.

It is very easy for them to make business.

Also, lot of people here are in "paro" subsidy earning 400euros a month and working in the black, 600 or 700 euros. There are also lots of other subsidies like PER witch is part of the "social net" that make Social Security so expensive(a millennial is earning more than 2000euros before taxes make it 1000).

If they report they are working, they lose the subsidy.

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#93

Post by yeureka »

lolcraft wrote: post #25

I don't know why journalists, when writing about economics, invariably pick the least adequate people to be interviewed. Some time ago, there was a feature about unemployment for college graduates in the US... which talked about a woman with a dance degree. Now it's about a fucking cani [1] whose major accomplishment in life is pasting some rubber and metal together, earning 1200 undeserved euros a month. Before that…

In 2007, at the peak of the property boom, I was working in Barcelona as video games programmer earning around 1700€/month after tax.

I felt lucky since most people I knew there ( including other programmers ) earned around 1000€ per month. But I couldn't understand how the economy functioned when highly educated people working in Barcelona earned so little in comparison to living costs and still property prices kept on rising at double digit percentages.

Then I met a young guy who worked on building sites mixing cement and laying bricks. He said he loved to play videogames and he wanted to be a tester. When I told him how much I was paid he looked at me in disbelief and said he got 2500€/month and that I should man up and demand more or quit.

I guess in his trade at the time you could do that...

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#94

Post by justincormack »

brc wrote: post #75
jorgeortiz85 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have we totally forgotten Keynes? My spending is your income. The resources of an economy (in this case, many of Spain's workers) are lying idle. The entire country would be wealthier if they were put to work. Further, I don't know what you mean by "easy living", but Spain was more fiscally responsible than even Germany before the crisis. Spain's deficits are not the result of irresponsible borrowing and spending (as…

Te entire country would be wealthier if they were put to work...doing something productive, in which the investment of their labor were to return future benefits. The problem of most 'stimulus' spending is that this does not happen.

They spent the last ten years building houses no one wants now and creating a property bubble. It wasn't deficit spending it was just excess borrowing. Sure it created jobs for a bit but then they went away just leaving a lot of debt. Somehow you need to actually build a sustainable economy.

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#95

Post by primitur »

auctiontheory wrote: post #29
lolcraft wrote: post #25

I don't know why journalists, when writing about economics, invariably pick the least adequate people to be interviewed. Some time ago, there was a feature about unemployment for college graduates in the US... which talked about a woman with a dance degree. Now it's about a fucking cani [1] whose major accomplishment in life is pasting some rubber and metal together, earning 1200 undeserved euros a month. Before that…

What, pray tell, is a "chav"?

Politically-Okay discrimination against a cultural group not ones own.

I would say that the OP is one of the very serious reasons for the problems in Spain : that he considers 'a fucking cani' does not deserve 1200 euro's a month.

Socially inbred discrimination against other workers/classes in ones society are a key cause of economic disaster. Since there are whole classes of society who don't 'deserve' what they get all over the place ..

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#96

Post by Someone »

nhebb wrote: post #50
jwcooper wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany isn't completely innocent here though either, even though it can look like they were frugal during the boom years. From Michael Pettis [1]: The strength of the German economy in recent years has largely to do with its export success. But for Germany to run a large current account surplus – the consequence I would argue of domestic policies aimed at suppressing consumption and subsidizing production – Spain an…

Germany seems to be getting blamed for the economic problems in Spain and Greece, but when I read a line like this: > The strength of the German economy in recent years has largely to do with its export success. I think, well, at least Germany actually makes something. I'm not familiar with any major products or services coming out of Spain or Greece. Maybe it's the American in me, living a life inundated with advert…

It is the American in you; both Spain and Greece are known for agriculture and tourism. You won't see them advertise in the USA because they have plenty of people closer by to sell to.

Spain exports plenty of citrus fruits, wine, and olive oil and also somewhat is the Florida of the EU in that elderly people move there after retirement.

Greece is a bit similar. It has plenty of tourism, and exports wine and olive oil. It also has attractive rules for merchant shipping (Wikipedia claims the Greek merchant shipping fleet is the largest in the world).

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#97

Post by pfortuny »

Sevein wrote: post #70
tsotha wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Spain doesn't "just" need stimulus, it needs well guided and allocated stimulus or it will accomplish nothing. The last thing Spain needs is "stimulus". What they need to do is fix the labor market so it's possible to fire people. When employers can't fire people they only hire as an absolute last resort. That means companies can't exploit growth opportunities as easily and it means employers are unlikely to gamble…

It's not like that anymore. Some agressive reforms have been done in the last years and they didn't help much.

Nope. all those "reforms" were cosmetics. As long as public workers cannot be fired -which they cannot be, de facto (show me one)- there is NO reform in Spain. Really.

And firing people is as expensive as it used to be, more or less. This govt has done really nothing relevant in this area.

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#98

Post by adventured »

brazzy wrote: post #83
tomjen3 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No we have not fogotten him. We should, though because he was wrong. Stimulus doesn't work.

Except he was right and austerity works even less.

Except he was wrong and well managed austerity does work. When it's actually employed. Cutting government 1%, or holding spending the same, is not austerity.

The ideas of Keynes are responsible for the last decade of economic disaster around the planet.

Austerity has been proven to work over and over again.

Just ask Sweden, they're a proof case that managed austerity works exceptionally well.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-06-06/booming-sweden-s-fr...

Or ask Latvia, a recent case of successful austerity.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/02/world/europe/used-to-hards...

http://www.cnbc.com/id/100558455

However, Latvia employed REAL austerity. They cut deep. Not the slow motion - we don't really want to cut anything - train wreck that people like Krugman are claiming is austerity (see: Greece or Spain).

Over the last 30 years China has radically reduced its public to private spending ratio. It has been one long managed austerity process. No surprise it has boomed accordingly as private capital was left free to be invested to actually grow the economy, which is not something consumption based Keynesian policies can accomplish.

Most government spending doesn't create wealth, sustainable jobs, and it doesn't produce anything. It's consumption paid for by production. The more you tip the balance toward government consumption, the more disastrous the consequences. Greece, Italy, France, the US, Portugal, Spain, Japan, Britain, etc. are all obvious examples of following Keynes policies the last few decades. It has led to destruction.

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#99

Post by forgottenpaswrd »

robryan wrote: post #39
skylan_q wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What the is the precedent for austerity? To have enough money left behind to pay the bills. What countries have used it successfully to get out of recession and improve unemployment? This worked in the (now seemingly ancient) past. Governments were a much smaller portion of the economy and taxes were much lower to begin with. These days, up to 50% of people can be employed by the government. When governments get that…

How does declaring bankruptcy help creating more jobs? (Honest Question) Would seem to me that it would been even harder to get credit flowing once all your previous creditors have been wiped out. From an admittedly fairly uninformed position it appears to me that cutting spending is only going to further erode businesses positions and tax revenue, leading to an even worse position.

"How does declaring bankruptcy help creating more jobs?"

Iceland is the answer. Jobs are recovering superfast after they declared bankruptcy.

You start over again. You face your problems, instead of delaying it. There is a sense of relief when the storm is over and you survived. When all lies are clear by the (horrible)truth, when fraudsters are on everybody's eyes.

Credit is harder to get, and this IS GOOD, when you came from an over indebted economy. Interest rates grow, and savers are fairy compensated from their work.

"From an admittedly fairly uninformed position it appears to me that cutting spending is only going to further erode businesses positions and tax revenue, leading to an even worse position."

Cutting spending is going to erode government position, not business position. On the contrary, when governments prints money the Gov gets free money, and big business get free money, but small business and tax payers are taxed to death.

Inflation over the official levels is the biggest tax on society. If declared inflaction is 2% but real one is 10%, they are taxing 8% of the society's wealth. And you will have to pay taxes to the gobertment in the 8% of "benefit" you have if you manage to not lose your wealth.

Money is better spent by small business and people that by big governments and big corporations. We are lending those entities so they can get money at 0.2% interest rate while I have to pay 17%.

Re: Spain Is Beyond Doomed: Unemployment Charts

#100

Post by ropz »

auctiontheory wrote: post #29
lolcraft wrote: post #25

I don't know why journalists, when writing about economics, invariably pick the least adequate people to be interviewed. Some time ago, there was a feature about unemployment for college graduates in the US... which talked about a woman with a dance degree. Now it's about a fucking cani [1] whose major accomplishment in life is pasting some rubber and metal together, earning 1200 undeserved euros a month. Before that…

What, pray tell, is a "chav"?

Council House[1] And Violent

This is not the original etymology (see other replies) but I have heard it explained thus many times.

[1] Council House - A UK property owned by 'the council', a regional administrative and legislative body, and let to the disadvantaged.

Post reply on HN