(May 2, 2010 at 2:35 pm)bozo Wrote: Greece is all but bankrupt and has had to beg for money from richer European countries to bale it out.
The money will be made available, but only on the understanding that a severe austerity package will be meted out to the country.
Unsurprisingly you may think, ordinary Greeks don't relish the idea of massive job losses, pay freezes for those not sacked and cuts in public services that may well put lives at risk.
So, ordinary Greeks have taken to the streets in protest. Their message is a simple one...simple but true.
They say, quite rightly, that they are not responsible for the crisis. The Capitalist class of speculators, bankers, financiers and compliant politicians are.
It is estimated that HALF THE POPULATION will be engaged in violent protests nationwide over the coming weeks and months.
A proportionate response given the circumstances.
Progressives everywhere send them their support
Are you serious?
1. Greece is NOT a capitalist nation, they are left of centre on the economic spectrum. They got into their problems in the usual ways a state faces bankruptcy; mismanagement, malinvestment, elitism, debt and corruption on the part of elected officials, unwarranted exuberance and excessive borrowing by the people and a stilted flow of capital and unchecked greed and power in the private sector which adds up to a picture where the amount of capital borrowed and the way it is used is unable to increase productivity and create wealth in a manner necessary to manage the debts - The whole point of borrowing is to invest capital into productive industry, public or private, to see an increase in productivity that results in a profitable enterprise, generating revenue to manage the debt incurred to make the investment worth while.
2. The EU bailouts will largely kill what is left of their 'democratic capitalism', it all but eliminates any incentive for investment on the part of Greece or foreign capitalists, without incentive to build, grow and invest the state is going to have more control over more of the system, the same state that so blatantly squandered the wealth of the people of Greece to begin with - What you will see is more largely secret deals between the state and the private sector with ultimately far less benefit (or a greater cost) to the people of Greece.
3. The people are pissed off because they are paying the price for something that was largely not their fault, decisions that were made for them by the elites, decisions that they would not have made were they in charge of their own finances. The state was allowed to gamble with their assets and wealth on extraordinary scales, giving cool deals to their cronies and friends in industry and foreign interests, something that the people of Greece, if allowed to use their own money would never have done.
4. The EU is not doing anything at all like capitalism in their bailouts, they are lending money to avoid loosing all of their investments in Greece (investments they made through entirely official channels in an entirely uncapitalistic way) because should Greece default on their loans a large portion of the wealth of the largely socialist EU will be gone, *poof* nowhere to be seen - This will damage the Euro lowering the purchasing power of member states seeing a rise in the cost of living for everyone and damaging industry resulting in job losses and the need for even more welfare. It's far more akin to the US bailouts of corporate entities (which is also entirely uncapitalistic) than it is any capitalist transaction.
It's not just the "progressives" that feel for the people of Greece, it's anyone who feels sorry for the people who were conned or forced into financial schemes beyond their control, who have their own financial decisions largely removed from them, who are forced to sit back and watch as the state and their favourite industries get to reap all the benefits of a subservient population, borrowing against their assets, ruining their credit rating and then forcing all the liabilities off on people who had no say or responsibility over the matter.
If Greece were a capitalist nation the debt incurred would have been allocated via market signals, such as supply and demand, productivity, profit and price to industries which could have used the debt to invest in infrastructure that would create more wealth than it took in - That is quite plainly not what happened in Greece.
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