Open Letter from Syriza Leader to German People

Wi88le

wotsthat wrote: »

Total Greek debt is just a few months of EU QE - peanuts.

Greek debt 240 billion euros,
Proposed QE upto September 2016 2.1 trillion euros,
19 countries in the eurozone to share that QE.
Circa 20%(guesstimate) of the currently proposed QE isn't peanuts

Generali

Wi88le wrote: »

Greek debt 240 billion euros,
Proposed QE upto September 2016 2.1 trillion euros,
19 countries in the eurozone to share that QE.
Circa 20%(guesthe currently proposed QE isn't peanuts

Greek debt doesn't come into the current QE scheme. French and German banks have divested themselves of Hellenic bonds now so it's pointless including them. If the Greeks continue to impoverish themselves for the clear gain of nobody then they might be allowed to take part at a later date.

N1AK

Graham_Devon wrote: »

What choice did the greek people actually have?

It's a bit like suggesting its the choice of the UK people to be in the EU.

Plenty of choice, and we have chosen to remain in the EU.

We don't have direct democracy, we have a representative democracy. There have been candidates available at every election who oppose EU membership and people have chosen not to vote for them.

If we haven't had a 'choice' on the EU by your odd definition then we haven't had a choice on anything including government spending, laws etc in that period, which would surely be a bigger issue (yet you're not constantly whinging about that).

DTDfanBoy

padington wrote: »

Great move by the Greek PM. Would be interesting to Merkel respond.

:D:D

wotsthat

Wi88le wrote: »

Greek debt 240 billion euros,
Proposed QE upto September 2016 2.1 trillion euros,
19 countries in the eurozone to share that QE.
Circa 20%(guesstimate) of the currently proposed QE isn't peanuts

It's just to put it in context. Peanuts is an exaggeration but it's not as massive as is made out. The EU QE is quite small compared to UK QE (VS GDP) so it's 20% of a small number anyway.

The Greek debt (like the UK's) will never be repaid so that's not the issue - we're just waiting to find out how it won't be repaid.

antrobus

Wi88le wrote: »

Greek debt 240 billion euros,
...

Greek debt is more like 300 bn Euros. The 240 bn was the size of the bailout.

Generali

DTDfanBoy wrote: »

:D:D

Very true and that is the final card the Troika can really play, effectively closing the Greek banking system (yes they could introduce sanctions etc but that wouldn't play well I think).

As Douglas Adams said:

This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movement of small green pieces of paper, which was odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.

If the Greek banking system is required to fail then what happens is that the Small Green Pieces of Paper become worth either a lot more or a lot less (deflation or inflation) but the productive capacity of the Greek economy remains the same.

Nobody burned down the factories, nobody ploughed salt into the ground. It's just become a lot hard for the Small Green Pieces of Paper to find their way from my pocket to yours.

People are quite ingenious when it comes to trade as we saw in 1945 Germany. Chocolate, chewing gum and cigarettes became everyday money, Small Green Pieces of Paper were replaced despite our fears of that happening.

antrobus

Generali wrote: »

.....People are quite ingenious when it comes to trade as we saw in 1945 Germany. Chocolate, chewing gum and cigarettes became everyday money, Small Green Pieces of Paper were replaced despite our fears of that happening.

People are indeed quite ingenious, on the other hand, the consequences of a currency collapse normally include a massive fall in GDP. Or austerity plus, if you like.

Rome fell, the currency disappeared, trade collapsed, and the result was a 1000 years of feudalism. I'm not sure I'd want to go there again.:)

Generali

antrobus wrote: »

People are indeed quite ingenious, on the other hand, the consequences of a currency collapse normally include a massive fall in GDP. Or austerity plus, if you like.

Rome fell, the currency disappeared, trade collapsed, and the result was a 1000 years of feudalism. I'm not sure I'd want to go there again.:)

But currencies collapse all the time. The pound collapsed in September 1931, the Aussie pound in 1929, the French Franc in 1936 (obstinate beggurs) and the US Dollar in 1933.

Then the Franc again in the 1960s, the US dollar in 1967 and 1971 (silver and gold convertibility 'suspended').

The silver standards of the US, UK and France all collapsed in the late C19th and the earlier Pound silver standard in the early C18th. If anything, the current fiat system lasting from 1971 to today has lasted quite a long time!

Thrugelmir

LydiaJ wrote: »

Imposing standardised retirement ages, VAT rates, minimum wages etc would be a huge loss of sovereignty for a collection of theoretically democratic nations whose peoples don't appear to want it and have given no mandate for such political and fiscal union to take place, however much the unelected "elite" may think it desirable.

I agree. The direction of the EU politically has always been this route though. Nothings changed since it's formation. The creation of the Eurozone was the step in fiscal unity. As is the case now. To stay in the club policies have to come into alignment. Germans who retire at say 65 aren't going to be happy subsidising Greeks who retire at 60. That's a catalyst for civil unrest. Along with the rise of extremism on both sides of the political divide.