Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2011/07/19
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Spot on Nathan. Scary to think the only taxpayers are the public employees since that means nobody is topping up the pot at all, since tax paid by public employees goes straight into their next pay packet to be topped up by money paid in by non-paid-out-of-the-same-pot taxpayers. Greece really is a millstone. FD On 19 Jul, 2011, at 09:18, Nathan Wajsman wrote: > First of all, Greece has by far the highest debt, 160% of GDP or so, about > twice as much as the US. Secondly, the economy is backwards, dysfunctional > (basically, only public sector employees pay taxes, the rest cheat and get > away with it, at least until now). Spain has some world-class companies, > like Zara, Santander (yes, I know it is a bank, but banks are still > needed), Telefonica, bits of Airbus, high-speed train expertise, good > medical research etc. Greece has none of those things, just some ruins and > ouzo. In the old days it could compete on costs by devaluing its > currency, the drachma, from time to time, but that option is not open to > it inside the Euro zone. > > Finally, Greek politicians are simply crooks. They actually falsified > national accounts--think Enron on a country scale. > > Aside from its geographic location, I have a hard time thinking of Greece > as a proper European country. They had their glory days, but that was > about 2500 years ago. > > Cheers, > Nathan > > Nathan Wajsman > Alicante, Spain > http://www.frozenlight.eu > http://www.greatpix.eu > http://www.nathanfoto.com > PICTURE OF THE WEEK: http://www.fotocycle.dk/paws > Blog: http://www.fotocycle.dk/blog