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posted by martyb on Monday July 06 2015, @08:57AM   Printer-friendly
from the getting-what-you-asked-for-may-not-be-getting-what-you-want dept.

The Greeks voted no to the European Union's terms, despite warnings from the EU that rejecting new austerity terms would set their country on a path out of the Eurozone. 62% voted "No" while 38% voted "Yes".


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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by bradley13 on Monday July 06 2015, @09:45AM

    by bradley13 (3053) on Monday July 06 2015, @09:45AM (#205537) Homepage Journal

    Ok, maybe I am just naive, but: hasn't it been obvious for years that Greece was going to default on its debts and leave the Euro? All of the "aid" in the past few years has basically given them loans that let them make payments on other loans. This is not helpful. Meanwhile, all of the uncertainty has driven ever more of the Greek economy underground (or killed it entirely), reducing tax revenues and making the financial situation even worse.

    The band aid should have been ripped off years ago. Now it's grown into the wound, and it is going to hurt. Even so, better now than in another year, when things will be even worse.

    But just watch: The Eurocrats won't be able to stand it: they will offer Greece another bailout. I just hope - for everyone's sake - that Greece has the courage to tell them where to stuff it.

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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by threedigits on Monday July 06 2015, @10:33AM

    by threedigits (607) on Monday July 06 2015, @10:33AM (#205545)

    All of the "aid" in the past few years has basically given them loans that let them make payments on other loans.

    Quite. In fact, said "aid" has only been a subtle way of rescuing private French and German banks (which had exposed themselves to Greek debt after "rocking the boat" to bargain for greater interests. See this, for a good understanding: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_government-debt_crisis#Analysis_of_the_Greek_rescue [wikipedia.org].

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @01:20PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @01:20PM (#205609)

      If you're up to your ears in debt, and you come to me for help, do you think I can help you without paying off your creditors? Who is at fault here, me for giving you money to pay lenders you don't like, or you for entering into debt that you couldn't pay back?

      • (Score: 1, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @01:29PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @01:29PM (#205613)

        It's pretty clear: if you step in to help me, you have made that voluntary choice. It's now you're problem that you're not getting paid back. Especially because you stepped in to help me only because of an anticipated interest you'd be getting by helping me. You're not helping me out of the goodness of your heart. You're helping me because you're about to make a buck.
        Don't come crying to me about a bet you made to make a buck which didn't pan out!

        • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @01:51PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @01:51PM (#205619)

          See, that's the problem. You make absurd comments about my motivation, insult me, and the very next day you're on my doorstep again to ask for more money. What do you think I am going to do?

          To make clear what I mean by "absurd comments about my motivation": The one thing you're right about is that bailing out Greece was not done out of the good of our hearts, at least not primarily. Absurd is that you think it was meant to make us a quick buck. The interest paid on those loans is minimal considering the risk, and still the interest from the loans was in fact planned to go back to Greece, until Greece failed to hold up its end of the deal. The main motivation was to prevent the collapse of the European financial system and of several countries in similar problems as Greece in the wake of the global banking crisis. Do you not agree that preventing a situation with bankrupt banks for 300 million people or more was a good enough reason to pay for Greece's debt with EU backed loans? It is bitter irony that Greece still threatens the very collapse that Europe sought to prevent by bailing out Greece at tremendous risk and, as it appears now, cost to its tax payers.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @03:38PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @03:38PM (#205669)

            The bailout money is not going to Greece, it is going to the banks that lend money to it. It is the member states of Europe bailing out their own banks and making Greece pay for it.
            I think my assumptions about 'your' motivation is accurate, you (the banks) wanted to make a nice buck from someone else misery.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @04:19PM

              by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2015, @04:19PM (#205709)

              *sigh* You're walking in circles. Good luck with your bankruptcy.

              • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @12:05AM

                by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @12:05AM (#205911)

                Not the GP. Let me quote from Wikipedia:

                With regard to Germany in particular, a Bloomberg editorial noted that, before its banks reduced its exposure to Greece, "they stood to lose a ton of money if Greece left the euro. Now any losses will be shared with the taxpayers of the entire euro area."

                That appears to have been the whole damned point of the exercise: privatise the profits, socialise the losses, and have someone to blame.

                You're happily accepting that line.

                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @06:17AM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @06:17AM (#206001)

                  Again, that is not and was not the motivation of the taxpayers who are currently saddled with Greece's debt and from whom Greece asks another bailout. Why would the taxpayers want to privatize profits and socialize losses? I am fully aware that this was an effect of the bailout, but the motivation was something else: To prevent a situation like we're seeing in Greece now, with banks closed and bankrupt, but for all of Europe and possibly more. Without the bailout, Greece's bankruptcy would also, without a doubt and no delay, have crashed several other countries. As regrettable as the socialization of losses is, the taxpayer couldn't really let that happen just to spite the private investors.

                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @02:53PM

                    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @02:53PM (#206129)

                    the taxpayers currently holding the bag had nothing to do with the decision for the bailout, that was made by the top EU politicians and bankers, the public had no say

                    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @03:28PM

                      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @03:28PM (#206140)

                      OK, you got me. We're evil slave drivers and seek to subjugate the proud Greek people to pay for our lavish lifestyles. Good luck with your bankruptcy. Maybe seeing how life is without Germany "exploiting" you will sober you up. In all of history, that has never happened though. It always takes at least two generations before people understand what went wrong.

                      Reminder: A big majority in Greece wants to stay in the Eurozone. Ask those people why, maybe they can explain it to you better than I can.

  • (Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Monday July 06 2015, @10:40AM

    by shrewdsheep (5215) on Monday July 06 2015, @10:40AM (#205548)

    It was clear from the outset. Enough FUD was spread in the beginning to delay the inevitable (alleged infectiousness of the greek situation, domino effect to other southern countries). Still politicians fear to be blamed of not showing solidarity. The vote for Szyriza was a vote for stepping out of the Euro but still politicians were in denial in the last four month. This vote can now potentially help everyone if only politicians realize that Greece will stay in default and needs its own currency back (it does not evean have to step out of the Euro).

  • (Score: 3, Informative) by geb on Monday July 06 2015, @10:51AM

    by geb (529) on Monday July 06 2015, @10:51AM (#205550)

    It wasn't a foregone conclusion until this year. Under the previous governments, Greece was (with a lot of hardship and resentment) starting to return to growth. That was enough to signal to the other EU governments that they deserved a bit of slack, and the ESM funds, aka the bailout, were there to bridge a period when their debt repayments would be higher than the long term.

    They'd got a pretty sweet deal on their long term debt and over a period of decades, it was going to be very very cheap to maintain. With some assistance in the short term they absolutely could have paid it back, though admittedly, not at a rate high enough for anybody to make a profit on it.

    The problems came when Syriza indicated that they weren't interested in growth or reforms, but instead wanted to play politics.

    They've got the idea firmly lodged in their head that stimulus spending was the one and only way to fix Greece, but that only works when an otherwise functional and healthy economy needs to mitigate some temporary damage. It's like the equivalent of bed rest to recover from a cold. They weren't willing to see that Greece's economy didn't have a mild cold, it was in late stage rabies.

    Syriza's increased spending firmly put an end to any hopes for repayment, and it was at that point, just a few months ago, when it became actually inevitable that they'd default.

    Now Greece's creditors are unlikely to offer them anything except advice and deliveries of food and medicine.

  • (Score: 3, Touché) by c0lo on Monday July 06 2015, @12:08PM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Monday July 06 2015, @12:08PM (#205580) Journal
    On the same lack of surprises... the IndieGoGo Greek bailout fund reached... hold for it... over 0.1% of the amount looked for [indiegogo.com]
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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by Thexalon on Monday July 06 2015, @01:34PM

    by Thexalon (636) on Monday July 06 2015, @01:34PM (#205615)

    All of the "aid" in the past few years has basically given them loans that let them make payments on other loans.

    The reason why the Greeks rejected it had to do with the conditions placed on the aid.

    In addition, the creditors all but admitted that the purpose of all of their deals with Greece was to force them to cut back on the size of their government, despite the fact that at least the IMF (one of their creditors) knew that policy was counterproductive if the goal was to get them to repay the loan: Every time the Greeks met those conditions, the Greek economy got worse, tax revenue fell, and the Greeks were less able to repay than they were before.

    Once Syriza came to power with the plan of refusing to continue down the road that wasn't working, the relatively conservative governments of Sarkozy and Merkel had an additional goal of ensuring that Syriza could not keep its political promises. That was because if Syriza's policies worked, then that was going to call into question the policies of their own governments (as well as their political ally David Cameron), which would threaten their own electoral chances going forward.

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    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by curunir_wolf on Monday July 06 2015, @02:26PM

      by curunir_wolf (4772) on Monday July 06 2015, @02:26PM (#205632)

      In addition, the creditors all but admitted that the purpose of all of their deals with Greece was to force them to cut back on the size of their government

      ... which was just a polite way to say that the Greece needed to hand over all of their productive natural resources and means of production to the banks (to ensure all the Greek people were working for non-Greeks). Greek airports, shipping ports, power utilities (and other utilities) were all up for grabs. That also includes Greek cultural landmarks like the Acropolis and other tourist attractions - meaning Greek tour guides would be working in one of the major Greek industries - with all the profits going to foreign banks. Of course this also allows the new owners to tear up all the employment contracts, get rid of the unions, and hire folks to work for slave wages.

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