Massive strike in Greece paralyzes Athens

[Joanne98]

Run time: 02:07 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Syn-OzmOUro   Posted on YouTube: May 05, 2010 By YouTube Member: v3riTaSs Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: May 05, 2010 By DU Member: Joanne98 Views on DU: 980

 
May 05, 2010 — Athens, Greece (CNN) -- Planes stood still and train services ground to a halt Wednesday as thousands of transport workers in Greece joined other public and private sector workers in a massive general strike.

Police estimated that up to 25,000 workers were on the streets of Athens. Among them were teachers, bank employees and doctors.

The marchers made their way to the parliament where police fired tear gas at protesters trying to climb the building's steps. Throughout the capital, about 1,700 officers stood guard to maintain order.

The workers are protesting cuts in spending that the government says is needed to pull the country out of debt.

The country's parliament is expected to vote on the measures -- which include wage freezes and higher taxes -- by the end of Thursday.

The finance ministry said the austerity bill goes before a parliamentary committee Wednesday and will be up for debate by the whole body the following day.

On Tuesday, about 2,000 protesters representing teachers from the public sector marched past the finance ministry and parliament.

In central Athens, protesters threw plastic bottles and sticks at riot police.

At another demonstration, members of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) erected large banners near the Parthenon. "People of Europe Rise Up," said one.

A €110 billion ($145 billion) aid package for Greece was announced Sunday. Soon after, Greek Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou announced the tough cost-cutting measures to meet European Union and International Monetary Fund conditions on the deal.

The package includes a promise by Greece to cut its budget deficit to 3 percent of gross domestic product, as required by European Union rules, by 2014, according to Papaconstantinou.

The measures, he said, were needed for Greece to secure its financial lifeline.

Greece has a choice between "destruction" and survival, and "we have chosen of course to save the country," Papaconstantinou said.

[On the Road]

1. Whatever Financial Shenanigans Greece Pulled

they were done in order to hide a very real increase in debt. Greece has to cut their deficit. It's not clear what the protesters want done that would resolve the situation.

[dotymed]

4. I am sure

that they do not want to allow the IMF to "privatize" (give to the wealthy) everything they have left. Capitalism is not the "answer." It is the problem. It is Feudalism with a name change. With our debt, even though we have already been seized by the elites, the IMF will be here too. We "hide" our actual debt much more than any other country. The Whitehouse is against auditing the Federal Reserve bank. "Our money." Be realistic, what is your reaction going to be to the IMF, when the (maybe 10%) have all they'll ever need and they stole it from us. They will prosper more, while we suffer more. Unregulated Capitalism.....their God. Yea....for them.

[On the Road]

7. This is What I'm Asking

I didn't get the idea the protests were over privatization, but over the austerity measures.

Greece's deficit is 13% of GDP, and that may be rising.¹. That's above even the swollen US deficit. Keynesian stimulus aside, they badly need cutbacks in spending, if only to stay within the EU and keep the Euro.

There are lots of places to do this. Greece has "at least 580 job categories <Note: such as hairdresser> deemed to be hazardous enough to merit retiring early — at age 50 for women and 55 for men."² Those are prime target for reexamination.

Greece might decide to drop out of the EU and reintroduce the drachma instead. That would mean a devalued currency, which would help exports like tourism. But leaving the EU would most likely mean a net drop in exports, since trade and other barriers with the EU would rise. It would also likely mean significant and sustained inflation if they try to keep the current structure in place.

Greece was stupid to try to hide their debt problem, but not taking steps to bring the deficit under control is just compounding it.

Bailing out the banks is good if it's done the US way which has forced institutions to repay their obligations with interest. It would be bad if it were a giveaway to banks. Likewise, selling off state assets for pennies on the dollar is bad, but there might be ways to spin off some things that get much better value for the government and the people. I don't know the specifics of what's being proposed.

People get used to whatever compensation and state benefits they have, and when they are cut they protest. That's my sense of what the general strike is about. And that is not helping the country at all IMO.

[JDPriestly]

10. In my experience, European countries in general have lower retirement

ages than we do. A low retirement age, that is an early pension-eligibility age helps to prevent high unemployment among the young.

In general, the average European with a full-time job works fewer hours per week and fewer weeks per year than the average American with a similar job. More jobs for more people. And more leisure time for everyone.

Right now, American employers, even schools, are laying off all kinds of employees. Our job market is improving, but at a frustratingly slow pace.

Maybe we should encourage people to retire earlier rather than criticize Europeans for retiring so early.

If there are jobs, people will choose to work rather than retire. But when there are no jobs, people retire early.

The early retirement age is not the cause of Greece's problems. If the people retiring early were not retired, they would be unemployed.

The Greek economy would be worse off, not better off. The people on the streets are ordinary and poor people. They rely on state benefits for their basic necessities.

Everywhere in the world, a few wealthy people have enjoyed increased wealth in the last 20-30 years while the rest of us have seen very little real increase in our net wealth.

How many of your friends own their homes outright? How many of them even own their cars outright? How many of them feel really secure about the likelihood that they will still be employed five years from now? How many of them are already unemployed? How many of your friends have lost their businesses or their jobs or their homes in the last two or three years?

How many of your friends are on Food Stamps? Do you really know who is and who isn't?

We need to be less smug and more honest about the situation in Greece.

Have you ever been to Greece? If not, how can you judge that situation?

[On the Road]

13. The Country is Going Down the Tubes Financially

Unlike the crises in the late 90s (South Korea, Indonesia, etc), Greece has an unsustainable structural deficit. They were unable to borrow without external assistance and will be forced out of the EU if they can't bring their deficit under control. They have put off tough choices for years and badly need to make some now. All the measures that have been mentioned are probably necessary, along with raising taxes, making the rate somewhat more progressive, and clamping down on evasion. None of these things by themselves is enough.

The point about the retirement age is that there is room to move in certain areas without being too draconian. From perusing some of the articles, it looks like public pressure has convinced Greece not to change the basic retirement age. This is only compounding matters.

The alternative for Greece is dropping the Euro, devaluing the currency, probably incurring long-term double-digit inflation, and steadily raising the portion of GDP devoted to servicing interest. It is a state of affairs that countries typically try hard to get out of, not into. And it's not only Greece's problem -- as the market response shows, it threatens the EU and the world economy as well.

The US is not there yet, but it eventually will be without a determined anti-deficit program. I'm glad Obama is starting to pay attention to that, too.

[JDPriestly]

14. Greece, like us, suffers and has suffered for a long time from

huge differences between the incomes of working people and incomes of the "investor and ownership classes."

It is hard to tax investors and owners. If they don't want to pay a tax, they find a way to avoid paying it.

Working people are easy to tax. They get paychecks. And you can deduct taxes from the paychecks before the worker receives the check.

So, as working people have received less and less of the proverbial income pie and wealthy people have received more of that same pie, the slice that governments can easily tax has gotten progressively smaller.

Meanwhile, thanks to low incomes for working people, the need for social services has grown in many countries.

All of this is complicated by the fact that the post-war baby boomers are starting to age. And as the baby boom becomes a senior boom, funding social security systems in all industrialized nations will be a serious problem. There really are two choices on this issue: let old people die destitute and homeless or adequately fund social security systems.

A larger portion of national income needs to go to working people -- so that it can be taxed more readily.

I know that sounds awful, but that the best way to solve the problem of government deficits.

Tax the rich. And you can do that by increasing the share of the nation's income that goes to working people and reducing the share the rich grab.

[On the Road]

18. Yes, Even Though the EU is Often Held up as an Example

of fairer taxation, I don't doubt that there are places that the system could be made more equitable. I have heard that tax evasion is worse in Greece than a lot of the rest of Europe, but don't know specifically what would be effective in improving those things.

The point that I was trying to make is that the prospect of default is an emergency. If you're faced with your house being foreclosed in two weeks, rethinking your choice of living arrangements and criticizing bank practices is not the right approach. You have to come up with the money now or lose your house. Greece got caught trying to hide their debts and now they have to take drastic action. A government's expenses can exceed its revenue by 35% only until the credit runs out. At that point the structural deficit stops being an option. They backed themselves into a corner and have to make some tough choices.

This isn't to single out Greece, but they're the ones teetering on the edge right now. It just seemed like a lot of the original responses were ignoring this and taking a more casual and philosophical approach.

The next few weeks matter a lot. If Greece defaults, it can have a domino effect on Europe and the rest of the world. It could be 4Q08 all over again.

[dotymed]

16. Agreed.

These people are fed the corporate line from the corporate media. Thinking outside that box is difficult for many. When America, under FDR helped rebuild Europe and Japan, he incorporated many of his "second bill of rights" that he wanted to get passed in America. He was visionary and these countries have Universal health care and strong Unions, in part, because of FDR. He did this as a protection against the destruction of unfettered capitalism. Most of Europe has held up better than America, because of these inclusions. Of course, with the advent of globalized, unregulated capitalism (the most destructive system for the majority), "Austerity" measures will be forced on most if not all of them (and us) eventually. The citizens were not responsible for "hiding the debt." Yet, they will suffer while the elite profit.
Older age does have some perks. I was raised while THE FAIRNESS DOCTRINE was still in effect. Then, we were exposed to many differing points of view, nightly. You could believe what "news" people were reporting, they investigated and were responsible for being honest (truthful). While they may not have been able to glean the truth out of all stories, they tried.
If it were not for the greed that is capitalism, especially when it is not regulated. most of the worlds economic troubles would not exist. Between the banksters, CEO pay that has risen 1000 times what it was 30 years ago, privatization of what should be "not-for-profit" services, etc..This world would not be in such an economic and moral mess.
Of course, corporate media will not report this. They used to be required to. Since we are globalized, and the elites are winning the class war that they started, our only recourse is to unite the citizens of the world and beat back these forces of evil and the unbearable Feudalism they have imposed on us.
Unfortunately, so many people (as evidenced in these posts) do not see farther than what the MSM has told them. I wish that eyes would be opened sooner rather than later. It would save so much unnecessary suffering, just so the elites can have more wealth than they can ever spend.

[Joanne98]

5. The rich tranferred wealth from the sovereigns to the top 1%...

Central banks and goverments saved the banksters, the bondholders, the stock markets, the corporations, the wealthy and NOW the want to balance the budget on the banks of the very same people they stole the money from!

We may have morans in this country but I don't think anyone with a brain is going to buy the BS!

Raise the taxes on ther rich! Fuck the bondholders!

[girl gone mad]

6. The South American solution resulted in over a decade of horrible stagnation..

Of course the average Greek worker does not want that!

[dotymed]

2. No conspiracy theory here

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Subject: Our only chance
Message:
is for the citizens of the world to unite. "They" wanted globalization so They could enslave and use the workers of the world against each other, to exponentially increase Their wealth. They have. Capitalism (especially unregulated) has proven itself to be the most unfair system in the world. We must globally unite with the other disenfranchised citizens. A few, mainly Latin American, countries have bravely fought against this enslavement. Venezuela, so far, has survived multiple American backed military coups. Honduras was not as successful. The military coup, which has been praised by Secretary Clinton, has killed, "disappeared", stolen and mostly silenced its citizens through force. The military is on every street corner. They have stolen power from a democratically elected, sovereign nation. All for the elite capitalists. The REAL President, Zelaya, had given land to the impoverished. They are now seizing it and turning it over to the wealthy. Greece is being "privatized" by the illegal and immoral IMF, all formerly public utilities will be privatized, even the water. The American coup was won by the elites without a shot. It (re)started with reagan and still continues. FDR had been able to postpone "them" for a while. The greed however, was never stopped. They found a different way. Deregulation. Especially of our media, now pure propaganda. The global enslavement is almost done. America is the greatest debtor nation in the world. Soon, the IMF will have to step in. Most of our country is already privatized, thanks to the silent coup. But not all, yet. Our only hope is to unite with the citizens of the world and build a world economy and governance based on freedom and fairness. I have been disconnected and lost this post three different times. That never happens. I will post what I have, if I can.

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[dotymed]

3. I rewrote this post 4 times

The others were better. Every time I was close to finishing, my computer was switched to "work offline." I "saved" the posts, but when I opened them, they were gone. I apologize for the probable misspellings and the brevity. I wanted to at least get some major thoughts across. We Must Unite Globally. "They" have globalized our economy for their purposes. Our only chance is to use this in our favor. We greatly outnumber them (the elite rulers) and we cannot stand by while the rest of our countries are "picked off" one at a time. Our time will come for the IMF, if we do.

[JDPriestly]

11. Dotymed, I have this problem too. Do you have a Toshiba?

I use Google Chrome most of the time. What are you using?

I notice that this happens most often when the topic of my post might be somewhat controversial. I wonder whether DU has its server set so as to clock people out if they are not posting quickly.


Do any computer experts have any ideas on this?

[dotymed]

15. No, I have a Dell

and I use I.E.7 . I often take awhile to write a post. This was one of the few times this has ever happened.

[LongTomH]

8. One way or another - this is a turning point!

Either the workers and the progressive forces that support them will successfully stand against the continue "Shock Doctrine" drive to destroy public sector safety nets and impoverish working people, or the regressive forces will again transfer another country's wealth to the upper 1%. If the strikes fail, Europe will go from being an egalitarian society to being a plutonomy like the United States. England, despite its welfare state, is already well on the way to be another 'plutonomy.'

Excellent post, Joanne98! Excellent reply Dotymed!

[JDPriestly]

12. Greece is a tourist attraction. It has it all.

Wonderful coasts, wine, culture, islands, quaint villages, city life, colorful markets, beautiful people, inspiring churches and if the Parthenon isn't enough, Delphi and the island of Delos are literally divine.

Greece will hold its own. The IMF has taken on a live one.

The history of Greece after WWII is quite interesting. Truman was absolutely determined to prevent Greece from falling under Soviet or Yugoslavian influence. He succeeded.

It is absolutely foolish to push the Greek people like this.

In the beginning it may appear that the IMF wins the upper hand, but the Greek people are stubborn beyond belief. You have to be stubborn to live on their land in their climate. This may be the beginning of the end of the IMF. They are fools to try to take on Greece.

[dotymed]

17. I hope you're right.

Greece sounds beautiful. Thanks for the tour. People should be able to travel the world and enjoy its beauty. I spent some time in Eleuthra (in the Bahamas) once, for work, but I enjoyed it so much. Paid vacations are (were?) the norm for the citizens of Europe. Oh well,we can always imagine what the lives of the wealthy are like. Just think, in 1970, America had a top income tax rate of 75% for the wealthiest citizens and corporations. In 1939 it was 90%. Now it is 35% and 0 for most corporations. Did America used to be a "socialist country?" I know we used to have a middle class and protections against monopolies and corporations...

[Lars77]

9. France 24 reports the cops are throwing stones back at the protestors nt