The video on debtocracy seeking to explain how did we get there – ‘we’ Greeks and ‘we’ Europeans
But I think there is something that is not said clearly enough: Greece, in unanimity almost among elites and citizens, went into the Euro zone – marginally meeting the necessary standards – with the promise that it would reform its economy, in particular its pension system (that was not sustainable), its welfare system and labour market (not necessarily cutting rights but fighting corruption and the informal economy), investing in education and in producing high technology goods and services (as Greek workers cannot compete in terms of low cost with workers from the emerging world economies).
However this did not happen. It did not happen not only because the Greek elites were irresponsible and corrupt in their vast majority – which they were! – but also because the citizens-workers would not accept ANY reasonable compromise and ANY painful reform.
Women kept going to pension at age 50 if they had one child under the age of 18 (at the same time we kept NOT having any decent childcare facilities for when the children are young and women work).
The public sector kept fucntioning as a place where to put people to ‘work’ (almost in the ‘Communist’ sense of working where you did not have to work but you had a ‘job’). in some sectors there were severe shortages of workers (e.g. schools, front desk services) and in other places there were not even enough chairs for employees to sit (e.g. the adminsitration of the Hellenic Parliament). The public sector kept NOT having any meritocracy but kept completely responding to party favours and clientelism.
Women in the public sector kept declaring all their pregnancies as ‘in danger’ thus prolonging their 12 month maternity leave to an 18-month pre- and post-maternity leave.
Whenever there was a need for a painful reform – e.g. selling or closing down Olympic Airways – there was public outcry! how could the state put at the door so many workers? what would happen to them? in the end OA was sold and thanks to the strong trade unions (which also partly led the ship to sink together with party favouritism and irrational management) all their employees were ‘absorbed’ by civil aviation – i.e. paid by the taxpayers money for work that is not needed. The OA debt is also part of the big black hole.
So if the above (which are just a few examples) and many other reforms were NOT pushed through had both to do with corrupt and irresponsible governments but also with irresponsible citizens that could not see that you can not be a Free Rider in Wonderland FOR EVER! There comes a time that you have to pay.
Actually the over-debting of Greek households largely to pay for consumer goods is an interesting metaphor. There was a time when many low salaried people went on a shopping spree, got their credit cards with 4,000 or 5,000 debts (and then another credit card and another… as the banks were luring you into getting more small loans and more credit cards at the time) that they could not pay back. They then would keep hiding from the bankers and their phone calls as they did not know how to handle the situation. Well something similar happened to the Greek state only that the state cannot hide…
We, citizens of Greece, did not share in the big pie of corruption and bribes that the Greek elites and many people next to them ‘ate’ (we did not ‘eat’ the money together as the former vice president of the Greek government Pangalos said). But we did participate in this system, we put up with it, never bothered to change it, and when our individual or family interest was touched, we REFUSED to see the BARE TRUTH. That this was not a viable situation: there is no such thing as a free lunch. In the end, at some point, you have to pay.
What is probably deplorable is THE WAY in which one has to pay. The citizens of Greece should well embark into a road of more ‘rationality’ and more ‘responsibility’ but they certainly cannot correct errors of the past 60 years (if not 1.5 century) in a year or two.
Some people say that today we have no democracy in Greece and that we are now at the mercy of our creditors. This is probably true. But how would the Greek citizens felt if Romania and Bulgaria went bankrupt 4-5 years ago (at the heyday of Greek banks’ expansion in the Balkans) and led the Greek banks to collapse and then Greek citizens lost their savings? one has to put oneself into the other’s shoes (same goes for Germans and French and others too of course). Would the Greeks then care about their neighbours’ democracy or about their own savings?
Also to be democratic you have to have already your main needs covered. You cannot vote in a referendum (as the one proposed by the Greek PM two days ago) if the sub text behind the referendum question will be: do you want the state to have money to pay pensions and salaries and hospitals and schools next month or not? This is not democracy this is a parody of democracy! This is not democracy this is political blackmail.
I think there is a difficult, painful path ahead but what is most important is that we do not waste this opportunity to overturn the current political system in Greece and to start with a new political culture and a new civil ethos. For ourselves, and for our children…
In the meantime of course we have a duty as intellectuals and as elites in the country to raise our voice and contest the neoliberal policies reigning in Europe today. The reason why the European Union is not going very far is that it fails to LISTEN to its citizens. Everything is patched at the last moment, to find an institutionally viable solution, without wondering WHAT direction is Europe taking? is this what the citizens want?