Cyprus-Forum.com

[Gasman]

the nightlife is something else

Yes - and it's the lifestyle a lot of them cannot contemplate watering down.

Well my high life jet set night life is about to begin early today. Just going to capture that puppy and make her watch the movie with me!

I'm in with the 'OUT Crowd' lol!

[Paphitis]

the nightlife is something else

Yes - and it's the lifestyle a lot of them cannot contemplate watering down.

Well my high life jet set night life is about to begin early today. Just going to capture that puppy and make her watch the movie with me!

I'm in with the 'OUT Crowd' lol!

Firstly, you a free to make any comment about Greece, as long as the comments are based on fact and are not pure hysterical rants!

Secondly, it is not their lifestyles which are in question. Cypriots lead similar lifestyles as Greeks, and the Cypriot economy has always been far stronger. So Greeks can lead the same lifestyle as long as they have the money to fund it. You see, the wealth of Greeks is not in question.

What is in question and under the microscope is the immaturity of the Greek People. The previous administration did in actual fact make some attempts to reform Greece, and even raise taxes and close off tax law loop holes, but then paid the price. They lost the last election, and I have the feeling that Karamanlis did not mind so much because he knew that Greece was headed for disaster. So Papandreou was voted in instead, in the hope that nothing will be done. However, Papandreou was left with no choice, and so more draconian austerity measure were voted in, and anarchists take to the streets killing 3 bankers at Marfin Laiki.

I have been critical of Greece in the past, and I only do that because I like Greece so much and only wish that the Government can reform the entire country from the ground up, because that is the only way Greece will have a future. And in light of recent developments, I firmly believe that the EU has done Greece a massive disservice by bailing them out to the tune of some 80 Billion Euros. I firmly believe that the EU should have allowed Greece to default, creating much havoc upon the EURO and financial markets. This is the only way Greece will have a chance, because it will force the Government to take even more drastic measures, which will make Greece more competitive and viable in the future. This will also send the proper message to Portugal, Spain, and Italy!

[georgios100]

the nightlife is something else

Yes - and it's the lifestyle a lot of them cannot contemplate watering down.

Well my high life jet set night life is about to begin early today. Just going to capture that puppy and make her watch the movie with me!

I'm in with the 'OUT Crowd' lol!

Firstly, you a free to make any comment about Greece, as long as the comments are based on fact and are not pure hysterical rants!

Secondly, it is not their lifestyles which are in question. Cypriots lead similar lifestyles as Greeks, and the Cypriot economy has always been far stronger. So Greeks can lead the same lifestyle as long as they have the money to fund it. You see, the wealth of Greeks is not in question.

What is in question and under the microscope is the immaturity of the Greek People. The previous administration did in actual fact make some attempts to reform Greece, and even raise taxes and close of tax law loop holes, but then paid the price. He lost the last election, and I have the feeling that Karamanlis did not mind so much because he knew that Greece was headed for disaster. So Papandreou was voted in instead, in the hope that nothing will be done. However, Papandreou was left with no choice and so more draconian austerity measure were voted in, and anarchists take to the streets killing 3 Bankers at Marfin Laiki.

I have been critical of Greece in the past, and I only do that because I like Greece so much and only wish that the Government can reform the entire country from the ground up, because that is the only way Greece will have a future. And in light of recent developments, I firmly believe that the EU has done Greece a massive disservice by bailing them out to the tune of some 80 Billion Euros. I firmly believe that the EU should have allowed Greece to default, creating much havoc upon the EURO and financial markets. This is the only way Greece will have a chance, because it will force the Government to take even more drastic measures, which will make Greece more competitive and viable in the future. This will also send the proper message to Portugal, Spain, and Italy!

Excellent post Paphitis, thanks.

The red sentence I highlighted is the question of this thread. Across the pond, US & Canada experts concluded the EU & IMF measures and aid might not be enough to "save" Greece from defaulting. As a matter of fact, these experts are indeed convinced about it, beyond any doubt. Another propaganda perhaps? If this comes true, Greece is in for a very rough ride. I can't even begin to imagine the aftermath of default.

I moved to Athens, Greece, right after the 1974 hostilities and lived there for 8 years. I remember, Konstantinos Karamanlis (the old guy), was in favor of "LITOTIS", a form of austerity measures. He is proven correct today, although he lost the election to Andreas Papandreou, partly because of that. A wise man.

[Gasman]

Isn't Greece the only country so far that has got itself into such dire straits and do not have the option to devalue their currency (on account of them adopting the euro)?

Maybe they should find a way to leave the EU, devalue and go from there. I believe the mechanism exists for them to do so (although it is considered 'unthinkable' and will no doubt cause a lot of damage anyway). I also believe it is nigh on impossible for them to get 'kicked out'.

Makes you wonder how any of their politicians and representatives can have any credence for the foreseeable future, when dealing with the other members of the EU.

[Paphitis]

Isn't Greece the only country so far that has got itself into such dire straits and do not have the option to devalue their currency (on account of them adopting the euro)?

Maybe they should find a way to leave the EU, devalue and go from there. I believe the mechanism exists for them to do so (although it is considered 'unthinkable' and will no doubt cause a lot of damage anyway). I also believe it is nigh on impossible for them to get 'kicked out'.

Makes you wonder how any of their politicians and representatives can have any credence for the foreseeable future, when dealing with the other members of the EU.

No Greece is just the first. Portugal, Spain, and Italy look like they will follow very soon, and behind them we have the UK!

The EU is basically up shit creek, and the day will come when everyone will forget about Greece because reality will hit hard when more and more EU countries become insolvent.

You see, Greece can solve these problems with ease. There are fundamental errors with the way the country is run, bought about by the very immature and irrational Greek people who really place their personal selfishness/greed ahead of the well being of the nation. Well guess what, the spoilt brats are now going to pay a huge price.

Greece has the potential to be one of the wealthiest of EU nations once this Government really reforms the country. That is all that is needed. I wish I could say the same thing about the UK!

And Greece leaving the EU is unthinkable, because if it were necessary for Greece to leave just because there are some economic issues, then surely Portugal, Spain, Italy, Ireland and also the UK must do the same, and that would be catastrophic for the EU.

[georgios100]

The events in Greece can relate to Argentina's 2001 crisis... items in bold already took place. The IMF was already funding Argentina but default was unavoidable...

I copy/paste some text from this page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentine_ ... %80%932002)

Argentina quickly lost the confidence of investors and the flight of money away from the country increased. In 2001, people fearing the worst began withdrawing large sums of money from their bank accounts, turning pesos into dollars and sending them abroad, causing a run on the banks. The government then enacted a set of measures (informally known as the corralito) that effectively froze all bank accounts for twelve months, allowing for only minor sums of cash to be withdrawn.
Because of this allowance limit and the serious problems it caused in certain cases, many Argentines became enraged and took to the streets of important cities, especially Buenos Aires. They engaged in a form of popular protest that became known as cacerolazo (banging pots and pans). These protests occurred especially in 2001 and 2002. At first the cacerolazos were simply noisy demonstrations, but soon they included property destruction, often directed at banks, foreign privatized companies, and especially big American and European companies. Many businesses installed metal barriers because windows and glass facades were being broken, and even fires being ignited at their doors. Billboards of such companies as Coca Cola and others were brought down by the masses of demonstrators.
Confrontations between the police and citizens became a common sight, and fires were also set on Buenos Aires avenues. Fernando de la Rúa declared a state of emergency but this only worsened the situation, precipitating the violent protests of 20 and 21 December 2001 in Plaza de Mayo, where demonstrators clashed with the police, ended with several dead, and precipitated the fall of the government. De la Rúa eventually fled the Casa Rosada in a helicopter on 21 December.

Visit the link to read how Argentina got into this mess, the crisis years and the recovery (approx 10 years).

Are the Greeks patient people...?

[Nikitas]

George mentions Argentina. Three years after the crisis Argentina had recovered and had to impose export taxes to prevent shortages caused by excessive eports It is interesting to compare the size of Argentina, several million square kilometers, population 40 million and GNP smaller than Greece with 133 000 sq. kilometers and 11 million people of Greece. So why should Greece not recover in the same length of time as Argentina?

Re posts about lifestyle, tax evasion etc. I have been living and working here for 35 years and those things sound totally dumb from the inside. Some professions and trades might be able to evade tax, as happens everywhere. There were more "no receipt no VAT" offers when I lived in the UK than in Greece. It is impossible for large corporations to cheat on taxes, especially those involved in imports, due to the details of the tax and accounting systems that are too boring to go into here.

The lifestyle is what exactly? People go out at night because our working day, for those in retail trades, ends at 9 pm. Going out and nursing a coffee for 3 hours is not exactly lavish.

The endemic problem of Greece has nothing to do with lifestyle or tax evasion. The problem is a civil service that is rooted deeply in Ottoman times and see their job as middlemen between the citizen and the politicians. This has to change fast.

It is interesting to see the table of leading Greek exports to the USA, UK, and Germany, they are oil drilling machinery, petrochemicals and chemicals and pharmaceuticals correspondingly. Yet the net and the blogs are clamouring about lazy sheep herders and tax evading feta cheese producers. The combined effect of such bullshit reporting is obvious.

And finally just ponder that this year Greece will post a deficit of 8 per cent versus the UKs 12 per cent. Does that justify the view that there are lazy tax evading feta producers in the UK causing the deficit?

[georgios100]

George mentions Argentina. Three years after the crisis Argentina had recovered and had to impose export taxes to prevent shortages caused by excessive eports It is interesting to compare the size of Argentina, several million square kilometers, population 40 million and GNP smaller than Greece with 133 000 sq. kilometers and 11 million people of Greece. So why should Greece not recover in the same length of time as Argentina?

Re posts about lifestyle, tax evasion etc. I have been living and working here for 35 years and those things sound totally dumb from the inside. Some professions and trades might be able to evade tax, as happens everywhere. There were more "no receipt no VAT" offers when I lived in the UK than in Greece. It is impossible for large corporations to cheat on taxes, especially those involved in imports, due to the details of the tax and accounting systems that are too boring to go into here.

The lifestyle is what exactly? People go out at night because our working day, for those in retail trades, ends at 9 pm. Going out and nursing a coffee for 3 hours is not exactly lavish.

The endemic problem of Greece has nothing to do with lifestyle or tax evasion. The problem is a civil service that is rooted deeply in Ottoman times and see their job as middlemen between the citizen and the politicians. This has to change fast.

It is interesting to see the table of leading Greek exports to the USA, UK, and Germany, they are oil drilling machinery, petrochemicals and chemicals and pharmaceuticals correspondingly. Yet the net and the blogs are clamouring about lazy sheep herders and tax evading feta cheese producers. The combined effect of such bullshit reporting is obvious.

And finally just ponder that this year Greece will post a deficit of 8 per cent versus the UKs 12 per cent. Does that justify the view that there are lazy tax evading feta producers in the UK causing the deficit?

Interesting points Nikitas,

Argentina is a large country with incredible resources. If you don't remember, it was Argentina supplying meat to the world during WWII, when Europe was under German rule... How can a country like Argentina go bust? The answer is corruption, dictatorships and bad debt management. In other words, blame whoever was practicing "government" at the time.

The symptoms with Greece are the same, no doubt. The dictators surrendered Greece to Karamanlis, Papandreou... with a large debt already c/w empty state treasury chests. The political leadership did little to rectify the situation as they were too busy gorging themselves.

The Greek taxation system is a joke. Was never enforced to the letter. Tax evasion was/is rampant. It is said, out of 2 Greeks, one pays no tax and the other pays half of what he should.

As you mentioned, the public service become a monster at 900,000 strong, of which many are invisible (but get paid monthly), others are totally unqualified (rousfetia) and so on. IMF targeted this force and wants to reduce it by 350,000 by the end of 2012.

BLAME THE GOVERNMENT/S, NOT THE PEOPLE.

Put all that together, multiply by 36 years and, voila!

[Svetlana]

We now have 'SPIG' (Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Greece) as the major € defaulters. While I believe the UK's debt is greater than Greece's, it represents a slightly lower %age of their relative GDP's and I suspect its recovery will be easier; though I doubt the politicians have any clue how to resolve it.

[Nikitas]

"The Greek taxation system is a joke. Was never enforced to the letter. Tax evasion was/is rampant. It is said, out of 2 Greeks, one pays no tax and the other pays half of what he should."

This is a categorical statement, and does not reflect my experience as one who is self employed in Greece for 35 years. What you do not realise is that our annual tax return is burdened with a 55 per cent surcharge as prepayment for the following year. Regardless of whether in the following year we make a loss and not a profit.

Additionally, every five years we undergo a tax "concordance" (synafia) levy. An arbitrary formula is applied to your tax returns and you are given a choice: pay a lump sum or undergo a full audit. This occurs rgadless of whether your tax returns were honest or not.

Small businesses are taxed by applying a profit factor on their purchases. It is almost impossible for a periptero, for instance, to faslify their purchases from larger suppliers. So their issuing receipts etc is totally irrelevant to their tax burden.

Now to the above add the "standard of living" criteria, like your car, boat, size of your house, which are applied to determine your income regrdless of its declared level. And you arrive a tax system which is penalising and not what you read in the media. So when you read that a doctor declares income of 10 000 Euro , bear in mind that he is taxed according to the size of his house, car, boat, swimming pool etc, and his actual tax payment might in fact be 50 000 Euro.

Things are not as they seem in the media. And it might be ironic that the adoption of a proper tax system like that in the USA, might in fact lower the tax received by the state becaue it will do away with arbitrary Ottoman style precalculated taxes.