Greek talks with lenders fraught as fears grow of default

[Takhisis]

Not just Greece but also Italy and Ireland and Cyprus, it says there.

 

[Yeekim]

Bulgaria occupation and then carried out extermination of all Greeks.

:glances at 10M Greeks:
"Never trust a Bulgarian to do a proper job at anything!"

 

[EnglishEdward]

Germany, which plays the dominant role in setting eurozone economic policy, has been unwilling to allow national governments to run larger deficits to stimulate their economies, while demanding that they enact policies that make it easier for employers to hire and fire. The result has been Continentwide austerity marinated in acrimony.

"The French and Italians have been shouting at the Germans, ‘You should expand and then we’ll all be better off,’” Mr. Begg said. “The Germans have been shouting back, ‘No, you should sort out your mess and then we’ll all grow together."

One of the reasons why I am voting for brexit.

 

[Agent327]

So not because economic recovery is happening. Just to be clear on that.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Greece happy enough to open its borders to refugees, but now it is facing housing these refugees, its is now becoming hostile to the idea of housing, ten of thousands of Muslims in refugee camps.
Now that the EU has announced it will enforce the Dublin rule, Greece is going to to be slated to receive refugees back, some 160,000 are slated to be distributed.

Refugee welcome begins to wear thin in Greece

Greece has stood apart from many European countries in welcoming refugees from the very beginning of the crisis. With borders now closed, Greeks' hospitality may be coming to an end. Omaira Gill reports from Athens

A complex history of oppression, forced population exchanges and Greek immigration overseas meant that the refugee situation was perceived differently in Greece than in other European countries. On that basis, Greeks were initially more welcoming

It has now become a socio-economic as well as a political issue. Small communities do not wish to see the establishment of camps in their neighborhoods/regions which have every chance of becoming permanent

His point was illustrated by incidents in Veria, northern Greece, where residents threw pigs heads into a new camp built there

Migration into Greece is a very recent phenomenon and hence alien to many Greeks

With the borders shut and Greece left to cope with a new reality, a sense of unease has descended as the country tries to fathom what lies ahead, combined with the added stress of a far from certain economic year.


http://www.dw.com/en/refugee-welcome-begins-to-wear-thin-in-greece/a-19222123

EU to announce changes to asylum policy

Brussels is setting itself up for a standoff with member states over plans to distribute new claimants across the bloc. Currently, the so-called Dublin rules cause most claims to be made in Greece and Italy.

 

[Bootstoots]

That might have something to do with being bankrupt and located right in the path of the largest refugee flow, so they have a huge number of refugees per capita and no resources with which to process them. At this point I'm thinking that the continued Greek embrace of the EU is some sort of especially severe Stockholm Syndrome. They've got a sunnier climate than Stockholm though, I'll give them that.

It was quite fortunate that the far-right party ended up being absurd neo-Nazis rather than a FN-type ultranationalist but Nazi-repudiating party, so that the alternative left-wing party ended up gaining power. Of course they turned out to have no balls, just like all democratic left parties that don't end up with a Chavez-like demagogue running the country into the ground by alternate means instead.

 

[FriendlyFire]

EU has promised Greece 700Mil in euromonies for to help with the Refugee problem. Most likely will be paid out once Greece bow down to EU Dublin rule and accepts a large numbers of Refugees back as all the other EU countries are resisting being allocated refugees. EU countries not accepting refugees are going to be pay for that 700Mil in Euromonies.

I doubt that the Golden Dawn would be any better / worse

IMF have grown wise to Greeks signing new laws with no political will to carry out implementation or enforcement. IMF estimates 35 Billion in uncollected taxes in 2015 with budget in deficit. Greek government lied about the budget being in surplus. At this point I cannot understand why Greek government dosnt have the political will to fight corruption or take on tax evaders which should have been done with the first bailout. This resistance against needed reforms especially when pushed to breaking point seems completely illogical.

 

[Bootstoots]

The reason Greece does this is that they were given expressly punitive terms for their new bailout, which if implemented entirely would result in the further contraction of the economy (below the roughly -1% it is already contracting at) and a consequent further inability to pay their debts. Varoufakis et al. proposed swapping Greek debt with growth-linked bonds to make the rest of Europe partners in their economic recovery and recover as much as possible for the European taxpayer, but these ideas were treated as ludicrous by the EU establishment. The best option available, given that they weren't going to voluntarily default and Grexit, ended up being to pretend to acquiesce to the deal while violating it in private. They were going to be caught, but I understand why they did it.

Of course some reforms, particularly in tax collection, are still needed and they should implement those. My criticism of EU policy should not be mistaken for the claim that Greece need not reform. But the program as presented is inconsistent with renewed growth in the country.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Greece economy is pretty much back to its pre-EZ days with its 30% youth unemployment, 600 stockmarket and low GDP per capita. Which is probably where Greece should be, a poor but stable economy.

Varoufakis proposed a lot of insane ideas including seizing German property, introducing a new IOU currency and asking for Millions of euromonies to rehire everyone they just fired for criminal reasons. The ECB is the only one buying worthless Greek Bonds at 0.3% interest with 30 year maturity already. Who is going to invest in Greece ? Who is going to buy Greek bonds linked to greek growth ? Who ?

The Bailout 3 conditions:
Most of it seem pretty reasonable, most seem to be bailout 1 conditions

The bailout aims to: put privatisation back on track, modernise and slim down the state administration, tackle tax evasion and fraud, open up regulated professions to competition, and cut pension costs to make the welfare system sustainable.

Plus EU dangled a large 32 Billion euromonies carrot in front of Greece. It could have access to once it implement everything and showed it could manage its economy.

I understand it would be politically difficult for many reforms, small subsistence farmers, fisherman and huge number of protected industries relay on huge subsidies, Broken public companies losing billions would need to be reformed before being sold off, bloated education system reformed, three tax departments made into one and modernized, Land register office, reform the insane pension system. more economic policies in line with all the other EU countries.

There just isnt the political and cultural will to do this, probably why of all the EuroZone countries Greece is such a basketcase.

 

[Oerdin]

Are the austerity measures really destroying their economy? I was under the impression that their economy was incredibly unbalanced and that austerity was needed no matter what, to make the economy more sustainable.

It is a combination of an incrediblely unbalanced and over regulated economy with an unsustainable debt load. Worse Greek voters still seem delusional about the fact that they will have to greatly liberalize their economy and that the old garrentees introduced during the dictatorship period simply cannot be afforded any more.

 

[El_Machinae]

I do intentionally buy Greek products, but there really isn't that much apart from feta, olives, olive oil, yoghurt, honey and Greek nougat and the occasional bottle of wine.
Honest question: what does Greece export besides food ?

Yeah, when I first posted, I was thinking 'exports' too. But then I was attending the Puerto Rico discussion, and I think I had an epiphany. Not sure if it would work in the EU, but I'll give it a shot.

I ear-mark 0.5% of my income towards charity that does disease research. Ostensibly, any money donated to local research orgs will be spent locally in the form of salary, though many of the supplies will be sourced from exports - but this might not be true with Puerto Rico, specifically.

It creates an interesting opportunity. People inevitably prefer to give locally, it's our instinct. But I wonder if my (already earmarked money) would be a double-whammy of beneficial if it went to the Greek Parkinson's Research Fund. Ostensibly, the amount of research being bought (which is my main goal) is going to be somewhat equal to if I spend it within my own region.

My earmarked money is already gone from my perspective, and I'm trying to create a cheaper future for myself (which is basically the same as growth). I get the local multiplier benefit if I give locally, I wonder if it's worth fighting that instinct?

All measured in hundreds of millions. You need to up it by a couple orders of magnitude to make repayment of Greece's sovereign debt work.

Yeah, true. But don't forget the multiplier effect. As well, don't forget that this is a problem of pure investment as well. They need to grow themselves out of the debt as well as selectively default. And to grow, they need money. Money is a stand-in for 'stuff' and it's going to be used to buy growth in real terms before the money is vacuumed into paying back a debt held out-of-country. When it comes to entrepreneurial efforts, they mainly need time to rearrange their assets. It's not as simple as 'get money equal to their debts'. It's 'get enough money to pay this month's debts ' without draining their productive capital.

 

[Takhisis]

Yes, yes, I've unfortunately been subjected to a course on bankruptcy procedures for some reason. Weird curricula… but these EU idiots appear to be forgetting that bankruptcy is supposed to allow people, if possible, to carry on doing business.

I'm reposting Nightinggale's comment from the Repnom thread.

The problem with Greece is that they came in a bad situation and the right thing to do was to increase inflation. They had done so before and it worked ok, or at least way better than the current situation. However they had joined the Euro since last incident, which meant inflation was no longer an option. Instead they were forced to borrow money. Whenever they talked about borrowing too much money, EU told them to stick to the plan. They ended up borrowing from banks in Germany and France at an interest of 25%. This mean today they have to borrow money just to pay interest.

France and Germany would get major problems if Greece stopped paying the banks. In fact they risk they would go bankrupt, which is horrible with major banks (or any banks). Because of this EU sticks to the plan with borrowing money to Greece so they can pay the banks. The Greek population are furious and they elected anti-EU politicians for their parliament. The people generally compare Merkel to Hitler and declare that they are exploited. The new government have successfully negotiated a much better deal. Not paying and just letting the banks go bankrupt is a powerful negotiation tool. It doesn't mean all is well in Greece, but it's financially better after they got rid of the pro EU politicians.

 

[Bootstoots]

I have one quibble with that argument, which is that private lenders don't hold much of Greece's debt since the 2012 bailout, which bailed the banks out at a haircut. From that point on, nearly all their debt has been owed to the ECB, the IMF, and Eurozone member governments, at a fairly low interest rate. It's still unpayable, but that's because the quantity of debt is so large that even the low interest rates (2-3% IIRC) don't help enough. Even if everything went absolutely perfectly, which would require Greece to start growing at like 3% again on average for decades, it would take something like 40-60 years to pay off the whole sum.

The fact that all the other Eurozone countries own Greek debt helped to make it a big political issue and unite all of the other EU countries against Greece, as Tsipras and Varoufakis found out when went around Europe and tried to make their case last year. It was a genius move, in a Machiavellian way, to transfer some of the debt to all the EU sovereign governments. Or rather it would be, except that creditor countries don't have any endgame planned, so the whole circus will just keep going and going and going until they finally somehow muster the political will to write off a large chunk of the debt.

 

[Agent327]

Or they could simply just stop supporting Greece economically. I fear that's a big no-no though. Once you start pumping money into something it's very hard to stop - whether it turns out to be a fail or no. So yes, it is a bit of a circus, if you look at it that way. The no Greek euro exit doctrine is also not really helping. The problem with the EU, of course, is that tough decisions are hard to make, as they tend to be unpopular. Which applies to the EU as much as it does to Greece.

 

[Lexicus]

They are not 'supporting Greece economically.' The bailouts are essentially a way of making payoffs to Greece's creditors without it looking like they're making payoffs to Greece's creditors.

 

[classical_hero]

Greece happy enough to open its borders to refugees, but now it is facing housing these refugees, its is now becoming hostile to the idea of housing, ten of thousands of Muslims in refugee camps.
Now that the EU has announced it will enforce the Dublin rule, Greece is going to to be slated to receive refugees back, some 160,000 are slated to be distributed.

Who knew that housing so many undocumented illegal aliens would be so expensive?

 

[Bootstoots]

Or they could simply just stop supporting Greece economically. I fear that's a big no-no though. Once you start pumping money into something it's very hard to stop - whether it turns out to be a fail or no. So yes, it is a bit of a circus, if you look at it that way. The no Greek euro exit doctrine is also not really helping. The problem with the EU, of course, is that tough decisions are hard to make, as they tend to be unpopular. Which applies to the EU as much as it does to Greece.

In what way are they supporting Greece economically? A bailout package whereby money is disbursed as new loans and then goes directly to the country's creditors to make payments on old loans isn't economic support - quite the opposite. A large investment scheme in Southern Europe or something along those lines certainly would be, though. I don't think there's anything of that nature going on, though.

I do agree that Grexit needs to be on the table. Ideally, an option in which most of their debt is written off in exchange for Grexit would be considered, so that their uncompetitive currency can devalue against the Euro as it clearly needs to. But yep, EU politicians (including Tsipras, who revealed to the world that he has no balls) seem to prefer endless crisis meetings ending in can-kicking to actual hard decisions.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Greece reformed are all time delayed, the pension cuts demanded delayed for 3 years time.
Even the early retirement reformed delayed, so that today 1 in 3 Greeks will retire early using the same loop holes that were suppose to be closed up in the first bailout.
I think it is hilarous that the Bailout 3 ends in 2019 which is when the pension cuts will be phased into effect.

Greece braces for new austerity-induced pension cuts

Greece's government is set to pass controversial pension cuts on Sunday. Retirees are livid, and unions are on strike, Jannis Papadimitriou reports from Athens.

Greece's international creditors disapprove of anything that exceeds a barebones retirement payment and have ordered such funds partially or, better still, completely cut.

Creditors have been able to pressure many changes into Greece's pension system in recent years: Retirement age has been raised to 67 for insured people who entered the labor market after 1993

One in three Greeks still take early retirement, rendering the system not financially viable and placing an unfair burden on workers who still pay into it. The economist said the proposed cuts would not solve this fundamental problem.

In April, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras presented his proposed pension cuts to parliament. The plan calls for increasing individual social security contributions, as well as a total reduction of about 3 billion euros in disbursements to pensioners by 2019. Parliaments appears likely to pass the cuts on Sunday - in time for Monday's meeting of EU financial ministers. where Greece's cost-cutting efforts are to be evaluated. Unions responded with a two-day strike

Parliament will likely raise taxes on gasoline, tobacco, cable television and gambling on Sunday. There is talk of an internet tax and a special levy on bank transactions, and value-added tax is to be raised to 24 percent, too. Media are warning of a brewing "tax storm." The government is expected to take in 1.8 billion euros in additional annual income.

What disgusts him even more, though, is that parliamentarians would be spared from future pension cuts. Parliamentary pensions are paid out by the state and not financed by social security contributions.

http://www.dw.com/en/greece-braces-for-new-austerity-induced-pension-cuts/a-19241953

 

[Lexicus]

But yep, EU politicians (including Tsipras, who revealed to the world that he has no balls)

Ahh, he gets a lot of heat but really what could he have done? He had no democratic mandate for a Grexit.

 

[FriendlyFire]

I played a multiplayer games long time ago ( i can't tell you what it is, since i want to avoid to give that game free publication. but you can send me private message if you really want to see it yourself if my point is right). Just like much games nowadays, there are special item that can be bought with euros. Many people play that game because it divide people based on countries and each country will try it's best to reach their goal. Some just trying to be free even just one region, some conquer other nations regions for resources, etc.

After some people play that game long enough, they feel ambiguous between real life and games. Some country attack other country just because of real life hatred. For example Greece vs Turkey, Serbia vs Croatia, etc.

I had watched each countries and their unique people, goal and culture. And i could tell you this, Greece people spent a lot of money on that game to buy "imaginary" gold to attacked other countries. Most of the gold was spent in order to wipe (conquer whole regions) Turkey from map.

Even just days before Tzipras and Merkel showdown for last bailout and after that, they kept spending money to virtual game for the name of honour...

It made me speechless, they argue that that was their money to begin with. They freed to spend it whatever they liked.

Yes, other countries should and must helped Greece, but none will work if Greece didn't help themselves. They must fixed their corruption and tax loophole which gave the riches get away with their money.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/20...mine-how-to-ease-greeces-debt-burden#comments