Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Just wanted some first hand information about the financial climate for any of you that live with the Euro.

I don't always trust the news here in the US, especially when dealing with worldwide affairs.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

I thought Rupert Murdoch owned media in Europe also?

-Sorry couldn't resist ;)

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Will probably depend on who you talk to: businessmen, consumers, people who read 3 daily newspapers during breakfast, people who never even watch the evening news....

From what hear around me here in Vienna, a lot of people are aware of the problem and are simply flabbergasted by the huge amounts of money politicians are talking about. I also hear somewhat angry comments about Greece and the ongoing protests there, like "Were supposed to pay for them and they go on strike."

OTOH, I don't see any fear or even nervousness about possible economic consequences or the stability of the currency. Maybe this is because the crisis 2009 was talked about everywhere and dominated the news for months, but in the end nobody suffered from it in real life. No losses, nothing. It may have influenced how people react to economic disasters.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

not just Greece,

Spain, Portugal and Ireland are on the brink of going the same way

Greece could loose their credit rating and cant borrow money leaving them in deep poop.

Im kinda happy England aren't part of the EURO

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

This thread is propably against the no discussion about politics rule.


We* willl never get the money back. Greece will still default on it loans, after the bailout money is used. It's not too big price to pay for european integration and keeping the European Union stable.




*we as in central- and north europeans that end up paying most of the aid and EU's budget.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

is the least you can do. After all, you central and northern european still come on summer to our coasts and enjoy our sun, but also our Public Health System, which pays what you don't want to pay in your homecountry. If you don't get it is just because you're not retired yet. They'll explain, don't you worry.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Thanks for the great responses. I suppose it is close to the politics, but I think it's more about economics. (always a fine line).

@benny: Interesting information, because here in the US, we're terrified of news like this as many of us found our dollars not going as far.

Really interesting perspectives!

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

It's very political issue in europe.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

I have heard that some people in Germany are rejecting Greek Euros (With Serial number starting with Y) and that key politicians want to force Greece out of teh Euro.

But then again I'm English and we love to gossip so I'm unsure if this is true!

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

bbc website is always good for a bit of info

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8660633.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8659912.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/news/business/...data/overview/

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

This about sums up my feelings too. First they vote for virtually communist welfare policies while cheating on taxes as much as they can, and then start protesting when they have to face the obvious consequences. All while the EU picks up the bill!

The "loan" is probably still worth it, though. But there had better be some very harsh terms.

And I'm wondering why nothing was done about this earlier. Surely the EU must have realized Greece was destabilizing the euro years before anything happened. Why didn't anyone act?

Us northern countries don't get away with breaking a single directive without it being a huge scandal. Any crap that comes our way is excused with "the EU says so, nothing we can do". We even have a "president" and "foreign minister" no one voted for!

Meanwhile the southern countries get away with murder. People are getting increasingly frustrated with the EU, and this kind of favoritism isn't helping.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Is this some kind of a joke?

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Sad very sad issue. Specially for regular greeks who have to pay the largest price for the stupidity of former government's and banks.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Say WHAT?? You must be joking with this comment... You really think this all subsidizes? :D

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Oh it's easy to blame the banks and capitalists, but the truth is that the voting public was perfectly happy with the corruption as long as it benefited them. This is nothing like Iceland and its insane risk-taking bankers. I have little sympathy.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

You think it is just okay to give a loan to a totally bankrupt government without good guarantee's? Spare me. This is what happens when loan and markets aren't controlled.

Privatizing profits and socializing losses... The public has to pay also, but fairnes would be a nice gesture for once in these things.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

No one asked for any kind of sympathy. Greeks are going to pay for the sins of the past, even those who are not to blame for the situation. But this is a chance for all European people (and for all the western economies) to think that something is wrong with the system. It just leads to an unequal distribution of wealth, which will in turn lead to collapse of all the fragile economies out there. No European country lacks of deficit, it is just a matter of time for the next crisis to come up.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

We are planning to spend our honeymoon in Greece so I hope these strikes will be over soon.
The question is, which kind of EU do we want to have? If we think of it as a community of states working together I think it's our duty to help out. But of course there have to be rules equal to each and everyone, and a system of corruption and people not paying taxes doesn't fit in.
Not much talk about that here in Sweden anyway.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

I'm all for critisising the state of global capitalism, but the Greece crisis is more about a totally corrupt political system than global economics. The greek economy might be fragile, but most of Greece's current problems stem from decisions made by greek politicians, not bankers.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Indeed.The problem is the corrupt political system but also the mentality of Greek people.Massive lying when filing taxes and always trying to find ways to avoid paying the state.Obviously this doesn't apply to everybody, but a huge number of people were and still are acting like that.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

The thing that irritates me the most about this whole matter is that Greece should have not even gotten the whole euro in the first place.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

To anybody accusing bankers on making risky loans to Greece:

1. Greece is a member of the European Monetary Union (euro)
2. Greece had good credit ratings.

1+2 meant that greek goverment bonds were guaranteed by ECB's (European Central Bank) repo window. This made Greek goverment bonds look like extremly safe investments.

1 and 2 were possible only because greek goverment kept forgering and engineering information about Greece's financial data.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Yup.....thats certainly some kind've joke ;)

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

It seems that more important than any implied Greek mentality, is the fact that the Euro is, and does rest on Greece as one of it's contributors (for better or worse).

Is helping Greece, helping the rest of the Euro bearing nations?

How would a scenario where Greece withdrew (somehow), from the Euro play out?

How about a scenario where Greece received a bailout and continued alleged improper behavior?

More importantly, when should I invest in the Euro after it hits a low price! :D

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

This is certainly the perception in some parts of northern Europe but its not true. Most countries break directives habitually when it suits them. In terms of scale I imagine the poorer countries are the worst offenders but this is more to do with opportunity rather than character.

I can only speak about countries I know well but of all northern and central European countries I have lived in in (France, England and Ireland) the corruption is clear to see, even if it has occasionally been legalised and partly legitimised.

I would imagine the nature and visibility of this changes according to culture but I have never seen a country that was not run for the benefit of a small ruling class. I cannot imagine Germany is different to Greece in this respect.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

i'm appalled that they have the cheek of going on strike

look at the irish and learn

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

This.

Greece invented democracy. That was great, but the thing has evolved a bit during the past 2000 years. Get on with the program.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Well, if you are living on 700 Euros for the rest of your life without the prosper of a raise in the near future, that`s what makes an individual not go to work everyday....he/she becomes passive.....that`s what happened to the Greek people; total ignorance for the future.....that, and the tax evasion doctors and laywers, a poor job managment combined with the economic crisis that Mr Bush created....1+1=2

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Im curious. What exactly should they learn from the Irish?

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Estonia is very good example. While of course small nation they have done remarkable job at not increasing their depth at all in these hard times.
They have done some very hard cuts, but i believe they got bright future ahead.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

public sector got pay cuts of 10%, barristers opted for voluntary paycuts, were imposed the heaviest emergency budget for 30 years, they moaned of course they moaned but i didnt see anyone going on strike...

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

just call berlin. They have some serious money.

The problem is that not only EUR countries have to pay. But not as much as the greek themself.

seeking loan for $55 billion...how do you do that?

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Actually there were strikes. And as far as I know the public sector paycuts are more than 10%.

On the other hand the small minority who got very rich during the boom have gotten their enourmous debts effectively paid off by the state at a much higher cost than the savings made by reducing the salaries of those who did little to cause the bust. This will ultimately be paid off by Europe too I would imagine.

I would not recommend following Irelands example. I am glad I no longer pay taxes there.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

No free bailouts EVER. If you can't pay your bills and nobody will loan you money YOUR BUSINESS FAILS. End of story.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Oh, really?

2009 public debt:
Spain: 53.2 (% of GDP)
UK: 68.1 (% of GDP)

2009 budget balance:
Spain: -8.9 (% of GDP)
UK: -9.5 (% of GDP)

Read a little bit and learn:

UK budget deficit 'to surpass Greece's as worst in EU'

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2...se-than-greece

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

We're in the same situation - we need honesty, competence, and innovation, both us and our polititians (which is the most difficult part). We also need solidarity, otherwise EU is bound to die.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

if I must be honest:

fcuk you Greece. I really pity Germany now.

I hope IMF screws you so badly you will cry for next 100 years.

Yes this is rough but hey, who has the right and duty to vote there?!?

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

what about replacing the fckers that made your public health system so bad? it is not the abusers fault if abusing is practically permitted.

when people come to your coasts, they bring money. €€€, $$$$$

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

Don't blame this on Bush alone. Both parties in the US are completely under the control of the financial "industry". People move back and forth between Goldman Sachs and the Federal government regardless of which party controls the White House. It goes back at least as far as Reagan.
Obama is not one iota better than Bush in this regard.

Re: Greece financial bailout, and the mood of other Euro users.
 

saying that Mr Bush created the crisis only tells a lot from the guy saying things like that... (mainly tells about lack of understanding anything except knowing who is in the highest position)