Is this a Greek or European Tragedy?
Posted by AdminKALYMNOS, GREECE: As a Brit sitting on a small Greek island during this slow motion economic car crash, I can feel how little sympathy the people of Europe have despite most of them having little or no understanding of how the typical Greek is being impacted by current events.
On TV every day Greece is being portrayed as the country that has derailed the European elite's dream for an "ever closer union" and gets the blame for the very real threat now casting its shadow over the Euro. Even Obama in the White House appears to have abandoned his hopeful messages to nervously warn how Greece could represent a danger to the entire world. Add to that a healthy dose of stereotyping being broadcast about the lazy and feckless Greeks and you start to get the picture being seen here.
From where I sit readers in the UK and northern Europe would do well to rethink their opinions of the mess Greece is in and the willingness and efforts of its people to salvage a future. Do they really expect normal men and women in the street to be capable of paying the price being extracted by European politicians and bankers? Who gave Greece membership to the European Club and, perhaps more importantly, who turned blind eyes to the criteria in place in order to say Greece was eligible to adopt the Euro? Does any responsibility lay with the negligent eurocrats that looked through rose tinted glasses at the unified currency and ignored the bleedin' obvious? How can any independent economy ride the economic waves without the ability to devalue its currency if it gets in to trouble? Plenty of people are asking this question now in Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Italy - oh, and Greece of course - but why wasn't it asked before? Is Greece entirely to blame?
As it dawns on European leaders what problems are coming their way, instinctively they ratchet up the threats against their southern friends who they will soon likely cut adrift with all the blame. They pompously declare the Greek government must meet its commitments to reduce its structural deficit and, if it doesn't, the next tranche of bail-out money won’t be given. The blame game has started. The exposure of French and German banks is about to be realised and politicians will blatantly rewrite the context of recent history to make sure little or no blame is attached to them.
But what hope has Greece got under the relentless pressure to punish its own people for buying in to this luxury European timeshare complex? Can we blame Greece for signing up to the salesman's promises of the Euro when it was barely ever mentioned just how inherently inflexible a single currency is bound to be when shared with major economies like Germany and France? A population of 10 Million people - around one sixth of that in the UK - cannot hope to absorb the full impact of this crisis. Did anyone mention mis-selling?
Despite the recent 20% wage cut for public service workers, it's rumoured loudly that a further 30% raid on income is planned. No ifs or buts, such a move will tip many more Greeks in to real poverty in addition to those already there. I mean the kind of poverty where children's bellies go empty for days - not the theoretical poverty measured by TVs and free school meals that UK politicians like to refer to when seeking power.
In addition to these punishing cuts in pay, new taxes are arriving at a moment’s notice. Following on from the so called "Solidarity Tax" which meant most middle class families had to stump up around 1,000 Euros, they have now been given a month before they must pay a new property tax which will cost the same people around 700 Euros. As this tax will be collected via the electricity bill the threat has already been made that failure to pay will get your power turned off despite 15% of customers already being in arrears on their utility bills. Squeezing blood from a stone?
Here in real Greece it's not unusual for a full week's adult wage to be little more than 200 Euros with no top up benefits to speak of. Food prices in the supermarkets make my British eyes bulge and who in the UK would enjoy living with a VAT rate of 23% with few exemptions? A good friend of mine dutifully turns up to his postman's job at 7am five days a week delivering mail and pension payments until 3pm. After a few hours rest with the family he starts a second job cooking in a taverna until 11pm. This job is seven days a week and don't even think about going sick, paid holidays or the meaning of the Working Time Directive! Yet he's grateful for the second job, he couldn't feed his family without it.
So how interesting it was that a German tourist recently pointed him out to me as being a prime example of the lazy Greeks the Germans now have to support. My friend had made the silly mistake of playing with his daughter in a swimming pool between jobs in the presence of this tourist. He didn't know what job was being done just an hour earlier or where my friend would be in a few hours. Where did this man get that thought? I'm certain it wasn't in Greece and, sadly, I'm equally certain people will lap up the lazy Greek story back in Munich, Berlin or wherever he's returned to. Meanwhile my Greek friend continues on with his 68 hour working week wondering where this 700 Euros will come from to avoid having his power cut off.
Put the EU to one side a moment and realise that many Greeks now openly question whether the democracy they only gained in 1974 has really delivered on its promise. While in Britain we call it democracy when we get a choice between two parties and the least unpopular of them wins, in Greece they've done even better than us and made government largely a popularity contest between two families! Cynicism and political detachment now wins out among the regular folk here as it does in many democracies. The politicians in power, while speaking about the virtues of democratic rule, relentlessly conspire to build ivory towers that openly transfer publicly funded status, jobs and wealth to unelected people. Look no further than the current president of the European Union for example. I can't even recall his name but I know for a fact that no European citizen in any member country voted to put him in that job! As one wise person once said, you can't fool all of the people all of the time, so some might soon be asking if European democracy needs a cleanup?
Fortunately there are plenty of examples to see around the world that proves democracy is easily the lesser evil when it comes to systems for running a country but, with that said, put yourself in the position of a typical Greek today and try to think that way. Give up 20% of your income and pay two new taxes that demand a four figure payment from you at short notice. Switch on TV every day to hear how lazy you are when you're working 68 hours a week without a day off and see if you feel the same admiration as the bankers and politicians do toward the German economy.
The myth that the Greeks won't pay taxes needs to be quashed although it's true to say the Greek government has proved incapable of running a credible income tax system. Undoubtedly the political elite in Greece have been lacking in talent at best or corrupt at worst in their never ending quest to gain and retain power. But Greece didn't admit itself in to the European Union and Greece didn't allow itself in to the single European currency. However you play the blame game with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, one thing is very obvious here. The working age population of Greece is fast evaporating to Australia, Canada, the US and elsewhere leaving fewer productive people to pay for the elderly, the kids and, of course, the current European nightmare. The pot to plunder is shrinking fast.
Is this the moment the European dream ends and we wake up to realise we aren't at all unified and we Europeans aren't willing to support each other in times of need? Are we all willing to tighten our belts or would we prefer to see Greece become a third world nation? Is this the moment the reality of human nature blows away the idealistic foundations of the EU? Is this the moment we realise the EU would be better run as a club that you're not allowed to fight in but operates as a free trade area for the benefit of all the members?
In my view it is time for Europe to accept reality and deal with the Eurozone problem we have ALL combined to create. If the larger economies still want to keep the Euro then they should pay much of the current cost and treat Greece as a friend in need rather than a parasite. Otherwise, if the Euro does survive and Greece does remains in the EU what will happen when Greeks start migrating in large numbers to other EU countries in order to get jobs, homes and food they can afford?
20.09.2011. 13:35
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