Reading newspaper websites it seems like a lot of Germans and British have a superior attitude to Greece. Like they are being forced to bail them out.
I have news for any British and German people who think that they are giving their tax money to prop up Greek government.
Greek taxpayers are actually propping up British and German governments.
Let me get straight to the point.
Greek banks have made bad loans to the Greek government.
British banks and German banks have made bad loans to Greek banks
British banks and German banks have bought toxic assets from Greek banks
British and German banks have loaned the Greek government money
Greek taxpayers are now having to pay crippling short term taxes to prop up the Greek government who is in no position to be able to honour the loans to their lenders which includes Greek, German and British banks.
And in the news we here about “contagion”, the final piece of the puzzle.
When you see Greeks in the street protesting, they are protesting at having to bail out British and German governments just as much as they are protesting against the taxes themselves.
Let me summarise the responsibilities that the Greek government has passed on to the Greek taxpayer.
1. The Greek taxpayer is being asked to pay the Greek govenrment’s loan repayments to Greek banks
2. The Greek taxpayer is being asked to pay the Greek government’s loan repayments to German and British banks
3. The Greek taxpayer is be asked to keep the toxic assets sold by Greek banks liquid
4. The Greek taxpayer is being asked to pay the Greek banks loan repayments to German and British banks
Make no mistake, the Greek taxpayer is the one at the thin end of the wedge and it is the Greek taxpayer that is having the burden of having to support, British banks, German banks, Greek banks and the Greek government.
So the next time you think about having a go at those lazy Greek taxpayers just remember who is supposedely keeping your financial system afloat.
As always, your comments are welcome.
Amazing . The greeks are just being asked to pay their taxes and stop relying on handouts. Corruption exists to some degree in all countries but it’s endemic in Greece. No one ever wants to work harder or pay more tax but the Greeks are acting like spoilt children who’s parents have threatened to take away their allowance. Mainly because that’s what they are. Its time we all said no more to greek greed.
I am not trying to be rude but you are making a fundamental mistake with your argument.
The Greeks who are being asked to pay exorbitant taxes are not the one receiving the state handouts.
The Greeks that want to get bailed out are not the ones who are paying for the bail out.
Assuming you work in the private sector, how would you feel if the public sector in the UK was bankrupt but instead of the UK cutting down public sector spending to balance the books they doubled the price of petrol, asked you to pay around a 1000GBP extra a year property tax, increased VAT by 4%, did nothing to combat tax evasion, increased tax to 600GBP a year for a 2litre car and charged you 500GBP for the privileged of running a business. To name a few of the new taxes.
How would you feel about that? And would you class your emotions as childish?
I am not having a go but people seem to forget that the private sector in Greece is just as innocent as the private sector in the UK but the Greek private sector is being asked to bail everyone out
You are making a fundamental mistake with your argument.
The Greeks who are being asked to pay exorbitant taxes are not the one receiving the state handouts.
The Greeks that want to get bailed out are not the ones who are paying for the bail out.
Assuming you work in the private sector, how would you feel if the public sector in the UK was bankrupt but instead of the UK cutting down public sector spending to balance the books they doubled the price of petrol, asked you to pay around a 1000GBP extra a year property tax, increased VAT by 4%, did nothing to combat tax evasion, increased tax to 600GBP a year for a 2litre car and charged you 500GBP for the privileged of running a business. To name a few of the new taxes.
How would you feel about that? And would you class your emotions as childish?
I am not having a go, but people seem to forget that the private sector in Greece is just as innocent as the private sector in the UK but the Greek private sector is being asked to bail everyone out
Feel free to be more specific
I see the greek people and debt by the greek government as the same thing. In other words, if the greek government borrowed money, who were the beneficiaries? Obviously, the money ended up in Greece somewhere. Beyond that, it is a civil matter for the greek courts to work out. If there was theft within greece, the money still ended up there, so they are responsible. How can they believe anything else?
Cjohnson
You make an excellent point. But the Greeks that benefited from the government debt were the public sector workers.
The issue is that the public sector workers are not the ones expected to make up the government deficit. The private sector is being hit with the cost of the governments borrowing.
the greeks themselves (per recent documentory) admit they don;t like to pay tax and would rather laze around all day
Hi, and they also do not expect anything from government so why force them to pay taxes?
Richard, you sound almost alright. But don’t mistake anyone!
1) If it is goverment to blame, WHY did greeks vote for such government? Ant it is not the only ONE government! Greece’s debt was accumulating during a long time!
2) It is well known that public sector’s salaries cost far less than social security, health care, education and other programmes. It’s EVERYBODY that should be blamed for schools, roads, doctors, teachers, firemen, policemen, pensions… for everything. If you do not expect anything from government, go to a wild region, build a tiny house and live there without schools for your children, doctors for you, roads.. anything.
3) Why don’t you have a good accounting for taxes? You don’t even know how much taxes SHOULD be paid! In Lithuania we know EVERY F*ING CENT that was paid, is being paid and should be paid. We account every cent and if it is late, fines are added. Every single business transaction is inspected and every tax declaration line must be covered by official documents, check’s and etc.
We also have problems of corruption due to 50 years under soviet occupation, but we are improving fullspeed now. +3 % VAT? Ok. No VAT exemptions – OK. Decreased social benefits – OK. Decreased pensions. Cash registers in marketplaces. Heavy accounting of PS spending. Every cent must be approved by higher institutions. Decreased PS salaries. Removed privileges. We’ve done all of that and we will go further if we need to. By the way, our GDP grew 6.6 % despite of all cuts and taxes. WHY DON’T YOU FOLLOW OUR PATH?
Why don’t greeks go rioting with demands “More Taxmans, less PS employees and social benefits”? “Hey Goverment, don’t increase pensions!” “No more spending!”?
I know it’s too late, but WHY DIDN’T YOU FIGHT GOVERMENT when they were spending more and more money, increasing PS, social benefits, pensions, salaries, holidays, privileges? Don’t blame government – it represents YOU. All of you, greeks. As your government borrowed money, you APPROVED that by not stopping them. So… PAY YOUR LOAN.
I have to agree with you. Either the tax evasion is a fallacy created by the government and people actually do pay taxes OR the government is deliberately not collecting taxes. Either way the government is 100% in the wrong.
About the people, you could be right, a lot of Greeks say you get the government you deserve….
Hi.
I am a Spanish Software Engineer. I’ve been working in Greece for two years.
– As a software Engineer, I can state that my greek co-workers and myself worked with the same pressure, tight deadlines, non paid overtime work that you can expect in most of private IT companies in Europe.
– The ones who were extremely greedy and keen after easy money were NOT the Greek workers. The greek workers are just citizens looking for a proper job and a house to build a family in, just like the Spanish or British are. Some of them are entrepreneurs looking for founding a business, most of them just want to be employed by a private company. They speak a different language and cook a different style of food, thought.
– The money borrowed by the Greek government did not go, in any case, to the common web application programmer, not the guy who repairs your car.
– Apart from the money borrowed by the Greek government, also private banks borrowed money for financial speculation purposes.
– The money borrowed for the Greek was given by other banks, keen on making easy money. They did a bad business, and they now they are expecting the Greek waiter, the Greek web applications developer, and the Greek taxi driver to pay them back the money they lent.
– Bail outs are not going neither to the Greek team manager working in a private company nor to the Greek cook working in a fast food store. The bail outs are going to the banks that did a bad business buying crappy financial assets.
Anyone can argue that if that money is not given back to the banks which lent it, it would produce a financial collapse to the Euro. That point is technically right, although the solution proposed in morally reusable. The Greek web developer did good its job. The bankers did not. Now is the Greek worker who needs to pay.
In any case, if this solution is approved, it may save the banks who lent the money, but it would transform Greece in a third country world.
The problem is not with the lazy Greeks themselves, who are not lazy at all, but with the financial-based capitalism itself.
So, technically, where did the borrowed money go? Web developer does not need to get that money directly to benefit from it. The same applies to everybody else.
Greek economy’s growth was fuelled by borrowed money and… now greeks can’t get off recession for 4 years. This means a lot. Both technically and morally this means that WHOLE greek economy must pay back. Web developers, team managers, bankers – everybody.
You make a good point, but if someone gives you a job and pays you with money you will have to pay back in the future, would you take the job? If you knew you were going to have to pay back part of your wages to the government would you have taken the job in the first place?
Certainly YES. Why? Because SOME job is better than NO job.
By the way, this is the very same reason why social benefits should be decreased to such a minimum that they only cover basic food prices. Living off social benefits should be so hard that people would rather clean toilets or do other “dirty” jobs instead.
Duhh the “lazy greeks” borrowed all this money so that they can retire at 50, and get paid for less work hours. Maybe if they worked like the british and french worker from the start they would be in a position to pay the debts of their country.
Hi, what you say is correct but giving the amount of money Greeks and Brits pay in pensions contributions I don’t think it is unreasonable for people to retire at 50. If the UK government invested people’s pension contributions rather than using the money to keep the lights on, Brits could probably retire at 50 or at least earlier than 65.
It comes down to government dishonesty, the Greek government said people could retire at 50 without a problem, the mistake the Greeks made was to believe the government was competent enough to manage their money. The same can be said for Brits