tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post8904541961164828905..comments2023-12-31T13:47:05.758+00:00Comments on Fat Man on a Keyboard: RacismThe Plumphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09244528534476387323noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-2958852082466624902011-11-11T15:39:32.228+00:002011-11-11T15:39:32.228+00:00You weren't wrong to give the programme a miss...You weren't wrong to give the programme a miss George. It is just that I take a perverse pleasure out of being irritated.<br /><br />Your question is more suited to a long night over a bottle of Jameson's than a comment or a blog post. I think that it is worth remembering that Greece has always been a low wage economy. It has also had relatively low levels of private debt. This is a sovereign debt crisis with two main causes. The first is a chronically inefficient state with high levels of clientilism and petty corruption that has been spending unsustainably for decades. The second, and this is what is making the situation so intractable, is the poor design of monetary union meaning that the only policy to enhance competitiveness is 'internal devaluation' - a deliberate policy of lowering living standards. Arguably, this hinders reform as people fight to maintain whatever can keep them going.<br /><br />For those reliant on salaried posts and pensions in both the private and public sector living standards are collapsing.<br /><br />Here are three stories:<br /><br /><a href="http://redesigning-the-foot.blogspot.com/2011/10/on-brink.html" rel="nofollow">The first</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.keeptalkinggreece.com/2011/11/04/greeks-queue-for-a-charity-free-meal/" rel="nofollow">The second</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.keeptalkinggreece.com/2011/09/17/thessaloniki-debt-ridden-greek-sets-himself-on-fire/" rel="nofollow">The third</a><br /><br />And one from me. A good friend of mine was taken ill 18 months ago. Every other patient who had presented to the hospital with that disease before had died. The surgeon saved his life. On the hospital wall there was a sign saying, "the doctor who is treating you has not been paid for three months". No bribes were necessary, there was no tax fiddle. They did their job and were proud and delighted by his survival. <br /><br />But life continues, people manage, families are strong, independent and small traders work the system as people do the world over. They survive. The rich send their money overseas and avoid tax.<br /><br />The problem with austerity is that it does not just make people poorer, it collapses perfectly viable businesses, induces severe recession, reduces government earnings and actually makes the debt get ever higher.<br /><br />But, just as you suggest, things are more complex than a war of stereotypes and <a href="http://www.opendemocracy.net/aristos-doxiadis/owners-rentiers-opportunists" rel="nofollow">this article</a> gives the best analysis I have seen.<br /><br />And in <a href="http://lolgreece.blogspot.com/2011/06/conscience-of-libertarian.html" rel="nofollow">another post</a> the author makes the following point, <br /><br /><i>"What do I think of the Greek people? We are no better or worse than the Swedes, the Germans, the British or the Zimbabweans. We respond to incentives and when incentives are skewed we act in ways that are harmful to ourselves and others."</i><br /><br />This is so obvious it is a truism and it is certain that perverse incentives exist. However, what this programme did was pander to a popular stereotype by implying that some = all, utterly infuriating to those who face the imposition of a policy that was reluctantly accepted as a painful necessity until the moment it became apparent that it was a complete failure.The Plumphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09244528534476387323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-52837048103155941442011-11-10T18:46:51.780+00:002011-11-10T18:46:51.780+00:00I didn't see the programme, having read the bl...I didn't see the programme, having read the blurb, deciding it would be sensationalised and pointless. I might have been wrong on that.<br /><br />However, the picture so far is extremely muddled. We don't really know how the various strata of Greek society were living before 2008 and what the difference is now. What happened to the lives of the fisherman, the industrial worker, the low grade clerk, the shopkeeper, the skilled tradesman, the middle-management figure, the academic, the professional, the financier, the politician, the child, the pensioner, the very old etc? What were the economic factors that dominated and dominate their lives.<br /><br />The verbal battle between those who cry: <i>Greeks corrupt spendthrifts, parasites on the European purse, early retirement, fat pensions, cooked books! </i>and <i>Greeks honest hardworking folk exploited by the EU, normal retirement, standard pensions, pretty straight dealing apart from at the very top!</i> is so stark it makes little sense to me except as crisis talk.<br /><br />Peter, you are there quite often. I know I am asking for far too much detail, but maybe you could offer some insight into the above. I am already aware of the temptations of borrowing and the pressure to borrow exerted by the very people who now won't lend, but I'd like to get a little beyond that.George Shttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08889600788146987089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-83736729281553537242011-11-09T10:50:47.130+00:002011-11-09T10:50:47.130+00:00totally agree with your analysis, found it also an...totally agree with your analysis, found it also annoying that the surgeons wife was complaining about how things were, im not saying what was done was right, far from it but her husband earns over 10 times the wage of his Greek counterpart, perhaps they should have asked him to live on 25000 instead of 300000, would have liked to see the look on his wifes face then! also the way they portrayed the country was so racist, using stereotypes to put down a whole nation that is really struggling is disgusting. Was actually surprised how racist it was, could you imagine the uproar if they targeted another race or religion so unfairly?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com