The German invasion of Europe resumes

[liberty]

We are so USA-centric!

USA! USA! USA!



Honestly, I think if Greece wants bailed out by Germany, Greece needs to accept some conditions. I keep following the story on NPR and it seems like the Greeks are a bit . . . challenged as to financial acumen.

NOT that I'm one to judge.

I guess I am just very anxious about the whole European financial situation because we seem to just be seeing a glimmer of improvement here and now talk is that the European mess could drag the whole world economy back into depression.

I've quit reading The Economist and The Nation, so I admit to not 'getting' all the nuances of all this.

Are the MOTU going to inherit the Earth?

My impression of Greece based on intermittent BBC and NPR reports is that they are a nation tax cheats and liars. The people won’t pay taxes and the government lies about its income and expenses.

A lender that lends money to a sovereign is a fool.

[BoSoxGal]

I've heard the same; it's considered stupid to pay taxes in Greece, and evading them is the norm.

I know some folks in the USA think the same, but I for one am proud to pay my fair share.

Stupid, I guess I am.

[Sean]

I did read somewhere a while ago that many Greeks who claimed to be low-earners to get out of paying taxes were buying netting to cover up their swimming pools. The Greek government were apparently using helicopters to photograph their pools and houses so that they could be done for fraud. I'll try to find a link...

[Scooter]

The same ethic exists in Italy, people found to be owning homes they could never possibly afford on their reported incomes, students claiming tuition subsidies while riding around in luxury cars, business people who openly ring up purchases for far less than their value, etc.

Treasury police did a blitz inspection of hundreds of businesses in Cortina, a ski resort town near the Austria border, over Christmas. On the day they were in the establishments (hotels, restaurants, high end stores, etc.) and able to keep a watchful eye over what went on, sales seemed to miraculously multiply by three, four or five times what had been recorded in the books on the corresponding day of the previous year.

I suspect the situation in Greece is similar to that in Italy - people earning a salary or wage or on a pension are largely paying taxes on what they earn (unless they are working for a pittance under the table), while the self-employed find ways to grossly understate their reported earnings. It is so bad that, for example, last year the Italian statistical agency reported that the average earnings of owners of jewelry stores were lower than the sales clerks they employed. And there does not seem to be the political will to get as serious about tax evasion as in other countries.

[liberty]

I did read somewhere a while ago that many Greeks who claimed to be low-earners to get out of paying taxes were buying netting to cover up their swimming pools. The Greek government were apparently using helicopters to photograph their pools and houses so that they could be done for fraud. I'll try to find a link...

I heard it on BBC. It sounded like a nation were many professionals demand cash payment for services.

[Scooter]

Oh yeah, that was one of the measures the new Italian government put into its fiscal reform package - they made it illegal to use cash for any transaction greater than 1000 euros. Better if they had made it 100, but it's a step towards shining some light on the underground economy.

[Guinevere]

What a bunch of selfish, self-centered idiots. No one thinks about the long term consequences of their actions, do they? Sounds like the nutto libertarian/Ayn Rand devotees.

[rubato]

That's libertarianism all right.

yrs,
rubato

[liberty]

When I first heard this, I thought it was some kind of April fool’s joke. But, then it was not April, there was no punch line and I started thinking about how serious an organization is the BBC. I couldn’t believe it; how does something like that get started and how do they pay to maintain a decent society?
This is the kind of thing one would expect in a third world country not Europe and the EU.

[Scooter]

Greece has been paying for it, initially, by repeated currency devaluations which allowed its economy to expand enough to generate the taxes to pay for it, and later, when adopting the euro made that impossible, by running structural deficits which institutional investors were willing to fund so long as the economy continued to grow.