News Greece now want a second bailout?

[Embattle]

Iceland's people (300.000 residents somewhat) need to cough up 13.000 mil atm for a bank that fked up. Why on earth would the people need to pay for shit they don't have anything todo with.

Same goes for Greece. Why on earth would they have to suffer for mistakes and money grabbing bs they have nothing (or hardly anything) todo with.

The excuse about Iceland doesn't wash, in the end their economy benefited when it was doing well which meant that the general population would have benefited indirectly to some degree although naturally no where near as well as those at the top.

Greece has an incompetent government and a people who've generally been paid too well, work too short and seem to avoid paying tax as much as possible.

The reasons to further the bailout do exist but for me they are little more than delaying actions with a rather large amount of self interest being served but it'll still have effects for everyone.

 

[Job]

Anyone else want to join the Euro?
I thought not, well not unless you're broke and likey to get a lot broker, than we'll bail you out.
This has gone beyond 'who owes who', it is eating away at the very concept of currency and it's worth.
I'm not one to believe in conspiracys, but you've even got the leader of the opposition refusing to even consider holding a referendum for the UK to jump ship, when he knows we would vote about 80% yes, I mean we don't even have to change the coins.
It's falling to pieces in front of us and both sides of parliment are hanging on to the bits as the electorate look on in disbelief.

 

[Embattle]

The Euro was never going to work without proper European federalism.

 

[Tuthmes]

The excuse about Iceland doesn't wash, in the end their economy benefited when it was doing well which meant that the general population would have benefited indirectly to some degree although naturally no where near as well as those at the top.

As if "the people" have a choice. Perhaps they did benefit (some) from it, but if someone offers you a free beer in the pub you won't decline it.

In the end the money flows right back into the coöperation with the only purpose to make more money out of it. That is the core business of any coöperation in a capitalistic market. To make more money, else investors will get unhappy and punish you. For they also want to have more money.

Greece has an incompetent government and a people who've generally been paid too well, work too short and seem to avoid paying tax as much as possible.

Which is exactly what the rich and famous do in our countries. Beeing paid well and avoid paying tax as much as possible. The system in Greece whas and is corrupt for sure. Yet i doubt that the local sheep farmer hade anything todo with it.

Those that did prolly needed to aswell. If you needed surgery and went through it by the books, you'd be on a waiting list for 2 years. Pay €5000,- and you where due in 2 weeks. Same shit goes for a lot of other stuff there. That's capitalism for you right there.

Infact the system works quite the same way here in the Netherlands atm, not even too mention the USA. It's just legal here.

The whole EU idea is just dumb.

You can't let people in Greece pay the same for drinks, food and what not as you do in northern Europa (unless they get an equal pay). They don't have the money for it. You can't apply the same rules for farmers in Greece as you do for the a farmer in the Netherlands. Etc, etc.

Unless we all pay up and make it right for Greece and other countries that are in trouble. But if we did that, we might have unrest in the northern parts of Europa. Hell we aren't gonne pay for some shit that we don't have anything todo with!

 

[DocWolfe]

This is fucking retarded, because it's not Turkey that will buy these assets its Goldman Sachs, Deutschebank and so on - the very people fucking responsible for Greece's crash in the first place. The reasonable thing to do in this situation is allow them to default, or leave the eurozone and then let the banks trying to extort them eat the costs like they fucking should for doing what is clearly bad investments. Not to mention that any sellout of public assets is going to result in massive pain for the Greeks themselves, whose only real "fault" here is that they picked one corrupt piece of shit party instead of another to represent them.

Walking down the road of privatisation is NEVER good. Take a look at some of the examples in the US, Chicago parking meters comes to mind, prisons are another. It will cost the state MORE in the long run, and they'll be right back where they were - you cannot fix temporary holes in the budget by selling everything you own and then leasing it back.

I think we should nuke the shit out of Greece, that'll teach em. Land a massive A-Bomb on the Colosseum, and then invade Cyprus and sell it to the Turks.

 

[Job]

I think we should nuke the shit out of Greece, that'll teach em. Land a massive A-Bomb on the Colosseum, and then invade Cyprus and sell it to the Turks.

Docwolfe for foriegn minister!!

 

[Wij]

BBC News - Greece crisis: Not Europe's Lehman (it could be worse)

 

[DaGaffer]

Docwolfe for foriegn minister!!

Well he sure as shit won't be getting a job as a geography teacher anytime soon.

 

[Embattle]

Colosseum - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Acropolis of Athens - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Ctuchik]

It's an attractive media narrative to blame Greece's problems on its lazy population. It's just obfuscating who is really responsible, just like the right-wing in the US is blaming teachers for budget deficits.

The Greek people is partly responsible tho.

But for a different reason.

Privately, the general population of Greeks are quite wealthy, but only because they are are moonlighting and not being honest with their taxes.

I read an article a while back about people taxing for luxury swimming pools in an area, 300 odd were taxed for but satellite photos showed almost 17.000 in the area that weren't taxed for.

Satellite photos catch Greek tax-evaders - Boing Boing

That's how freaking bad it really is.

Hell, even their bosses apparently tell them to tax evade and report less days at work. So they can have full time jobs but only report 50% on their taxes.

Everyone benefits from that, except the Greek government...

That said, they don't tax evade for no reason, or maybe they are now when they know there is a minimal chance to get busted for it.

Tax evasion in Greece has kind of become an institution, almost a civil right from their point of view.

And as almost everybody does it, it's quite the task to make people change.

Just to bad they were to preoccupied using those swimming pools to see what every other country saw coming....

 

[Gumbo]

I think we should nuke the shit out of Greece, that'll teach em. Land a massive A-Bomb on the Colosseum, and then invade Cyprus and sell it to the Turks.

And we were worried about the dumbing down of the place when General and Off Topic merged...

 

[Mabs]

surely its easy.
they need money, ok they can have it
however, the people in charge obviously cant spend it right, so fuck them off, and have someone competant take it over
i vote we expand the british empire ... prince phillip could go home

 

[Helme]

lol like anyone in the British government is even remotely competent.

 

[Ctuchik]

surely its easy.
they need money, ok they can have it
however, the people in charge obviously cant spend it right, so fuck them off, and have someone competant take it over

They are not getting the money just like that, at least not yet.

There are some insanely harsh demands attached to those billions, and those demands are what the Greek population are rioting over.

And right now the majority of the Greek government won't accept those demands, so they are also not getting the latest batch they should have gotten i think a month ago.

Greece are probably trying to play hazard with the IMF, hoping to make them so nervous that they will release the money with no strings attached...

 

[Helme]

Ctuchik, I'd argue that it's a failure of the state to collect taxes not a failure of the public to use tax loopholes that the government keeps open, when you get to this point of widespread corruption it's almost impossible to actually do things the right way, because the right way doesn't really work anymore.

Are the Greek people responsible? To some extent, but going by how it's being reported in the news they are the only ones responsible which is far from the truth. Bad investments, corruption and outright fraud is the major causes here and losing sight of that means that the people really responsible will once again get away free of any charges while most likely owning half the country.

 

[Wij]

To be honest the Greek people have done quite nicely out of the EU until now. Because of EU membership banks have splashed billions into their economy and many of the people have benefited from cushy state non-jobs. Also, as mentioned everywhere, many more have benefited from not paying any tax for years. Admittedly these two things don't apply to every Greek citizen but a hell of a lot of them have been living off the vast amounts of money coming in for decades.

 

[DaGaffer]

Ctuchik, I'd argue that it's a failure of the state to collect taxes not a failure of the public to use tax loopholes that the government keeps open, when you get to this point of widespread corruption it's almost impossible to actually do things the right way, because the right way doesn't really work anymore.

Are the Greek people responsible? To some extent, but going by how it's being reported in the news they are the only ones responsible which is far from the truth. Bad investments, corruption and outright fraud is the major causes here and losing sight of that means that the people really responsible will once again get away free of any charges while most likely owning half the country.

Spoken like a true northern European liberal. There's a underlying trend amongst the PIIGS that they are the countries that have been the quickest to take take EU largesse, have the highest levels of social welfare relative to their GDPs, and are...well, less than squeaky clean when it comes to financial ethics and paying tax. In Ireland they call it "brown envelope culture" and its an endemic level of graft and mutual back scratching that's at the heart of a lot of the problems. And yes, the people are as much to blame as the bankers, politicians and property developers, because even if they thought the banks were trustworthy, they knew damn well the property developers were bent and the politicians were riddled with cronyism. The number of people I know here who are up to their eyeballs in debt because they bought three houses during the boom is incredible (its like, everyone), and now they're all blaming the banks for giving them the money in the first place. Same situation in the other PIIGS (and I'd add Cyprus to that list as well - I saw exactly the same kind of thinking when my parents lived there, and I bet Cyprus is about a week away from titsupland as well).

And even now, here in Ireland people have fought tooth and nail to have no new taxes (despite Ireland taking 10% less tax per capita than the European average) and no real cuts in social welfare (which is 3-4 times higher than the UK per capita). Same in Greece. "Don't tax me, don't cut my benefits, oh and by the way, here are the keys to that third holiday home I bought".

 

[Zenith.UK]

I think we should nuke the shit out of Greece, that'll teach em. Land a massive A-Bomb on the Colosseum, and then invade Cyprus and sell it to the Turks.

"I say we take off and nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."

 

[Vasconcelos]

"I say we take off and nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."

 

[Tom]

Spoken like a true northern European liberal. There's a underlying trend amongst the PIIGS that they are the countries that have been the quickest to take take EU largesse, have the highest levels of social welfare relative to their GDPs, and are...well, less than squeaky clean when it comes to financial ethics and paying tax. In Ireland they call it "brown envelope culture" and its an endemic level of graft and mutual back scratching that's at the heart of a lot of the problems. And yes, the people are as much to blame as the bankers, politicians and property developers, because even if they thought the banks were trustworthy, they knew damn well the property developers were bent and the politicians were riddled with cronyism. The number of people I know here who are up to their eyeballs in debt because they bought three houses during the boom is incredible (its like, everyone), and now they're all blaming the banks for giving them the money in the first place. Same situation in the other PIIGS (and I'd add Cyprus to that list as well - I saw exactly the same kind of thinking when my parents lived there, and I bet Cyprus is about a week away from titsupland as well).

And even now, here in Ireland people have fought tooth and nail to have no new taxes (despite Ireland taking 10% less tax per capita than the European average) and no real cuts in social welfare (which is 3-4 times higher than the UK per capita). Same in Greece. "Don't tax me, don't cut my benefits, oh and by the way, here are the keys to that third holiday home I bought".

Ireland always strikes me as a slightly tragic place. It has the same weather as the UK, the same gorgeous scenery, and generally, the same "good old" people. And yet, practically nobody lives there.

There should be a bridge or tunnel.

 

[cHodAX]

Ireland always strikes me as a slightly tragic place. It has the same weather as the UK, the same gorgeous scenery, and generally, the same "good old" people. And yet, practically nobody lives there.

There should be a bridge or tunnel.

I would vote for that!

 

[DaGaffer]

Ireland always strikes me as a slightly tragic place. It has the same weather as the UK, the same gorgeous scenery, and generally, the same "good old" people. And yet, practically nobody lives there.

There should be a bridge or tunnel.

Never happen in our lifetimes; the catch 22 is that very lack of people; you can't make an economic case for it. There have been feasability studies done though, covering 4-5 different routes. The only way it could happen logically is if the low cost airline business ceases to exist for environmental/oil cost reasons (not beyond the bounds of possibility).

 

[Ormorof]

the regulations in greece means its almost impossible to start a new business without buying a licence for that market first, and you can usually only get them of someone who has a licence already or if someone dies...

or the markets have really specific rules attached... i read that for newspaper stands you must either have 7+ children or be an army veteran or disabled (or some combination of the three)

bloody greeks...mooching off us hard working northerners...sell off their islands... stupid...<angry Daily Mail mumbling continues>

truth is they borrowed lots to buy our products, we were happy to lend them money to buy our products, a nice little bubble of joy, until it burst and now everyone is fucked

 

[Embattle]

The Big Fat Greek Gravy Train: A special investigation into the EU-funded culture of greed, tax evasion and scandalous waste | Mail Online

 

[Tom]

Never happen in our lifetimes; the catch 22 is that very lack of people; you can't make an economic case for it. There have been feasability studies done though, covering 4-5 different routes. The only way it could happen logically is if the low cost airline business ceases to exist for environmental/oil cost reasons (not beyond the bounds of possibility).

I know, it's a bit sad really. Just imagine a bridge from Anglesey to Dublin, leading straight to the M6 and M7. I'd be off like a shot, I'd love to tour around Ireland.

 

[old.user4556]

Scotland fs?

 

[Wij]

Scotland fs?

fucking shit ?

 

[old.user4556]

*points*

Oi, I'm just back from Yorkshire, we both know what it's like there ; don't make me say it !

 

[Tom]

Scotland fs?

Full of jocks.

 

[old.user4556]

Good, lets keep is that way.