Tag Archives: Greece

Incentives

Posted on August 12, 2013 | Leave a comment

Money

Life is about the incentive.  For instance:

Philkeram Johnson declared bankruptcy in 2011. VIO.ME’s 70 employees stopped getting paychecks the same year. But they still came to work and continued making glue and tile-cleaning products. For a time, they also received unemployment checks, Mokas says.

“Unemployment benefits finished last September,” he says. “We said, ‘what can we do now? Stay only here and be guards here? We have to eat, we have to do something.’ Because we want to have work.”

Indeed.  Benefits ended some time ago and so now they wonder, “What can we do now?”

Don’t get me wrong, I wish the Greek workers luck.  But I wonder why they didn’t look for this life sooner.

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Posted in Economics, Politics: International

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Greece And Germany

Posted on June 23, 2012 | 1 comment

How must it suck to be Greece in everything Germany?

(Reuters) – Germany humiliated Greece in the Euro 2012 soccer tournament on Friday, rubbing salt in the wounds of a nation reeling from a dire economic crisis which many blame on Berlin.

Greeks were aching for at least a measure of revenge against their euro zone tormentor in the needle match of the tournament’s quarter-finals, but it ended as yet another dashed dream with Germany rolling over their underdog rivals 4-2.

The euro zone paymaster gave what many Germans see as a profligate and lazy state yet another lesson, this time on the pitch – perhaps revenge for political headache after headache in a regional debt crisis unleashed by Athens in 2009 that now threatens the survival of the entire common European currency.

Not only is Greece in the middle of a financial catastrophe, but they even have to lose to the Germans in soccer.

I love it!

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Posted in Fun, Life

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United States Debt Higher Than United States GDP

Posted on January 12, 2012 | 5 comments

Everyone knows that the problem America faces is a spending problem.  We simply are spending more money than we have a hope of bringing in.  Since the end of WWII, the United States has remained steady with tax receipts coming in around 18% of GDP.  More in the good years, less during recessionary periods.  The whole of that time our spending has been a little more.  Not now.  Now our spending has dramatically increased.

The result is a debt to GDP level that is unprecedented:

The nation’s debt has reached a symbolic milestone. With gross domestic product of roughly $15 trillion and total debt of $15.23 trillion, our total debt is now bigger than our economy, as USA Today noted Monday.

What’s more, the Obama administration’s projections put our debt at more than $23 trillion by 2020, well in excess of the projected $22.5 trillion GDP.

Indeed, this is bad news.  But how bad?  Let’s look at other nations in the debt club that we find ourselves in:

Zimbabwe 233.2
Japan 199.7
Saint Kitts and Nevis 185
Greece 142.7
Lebanon 133.8
Iceland 126.3
Jamaica 126.2
Italy 119.1
Singapore 105.8
Barbados 102.1
Belgium 100.7

Not very good company at all.  And it’s only going to get worse.

Some commentators are claiming that we are going to end up like Greece.  Our debt and our #Occupiers seem to indicate that we very well could.

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Posted in Economy, Politics: International, Politics: National

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Greece: How Long Until You Visit Our Shores?

Posted on June 29, 2011 | 5 comments

Greece is in trouble.

Big trouble.

Of course, this is what happens when you tax and tax and tax all the while believing that government won’t spend and spend and spend.

In the end, people don’t see the expenditures as a method to deal with a short-term crisis or as a stimulus; they see it as an entitlement.  These people literally feel it is their ‘effin birthright to be be born, work a little while, and then retire to a life of luxury at the ripe old age of 52.

Vacations and wine for everyone!

Well, when the excess of the Leftist rears its ugly hangover, this is what you get:

(Reuters) – Greek riot police with teargas and batons fought hooded youths near parliament on Tuesday as violence broke out at a rally against anti-austerity measures international lenders have demanded from the Athens government.

With Greece on the edge of bankruptcy, parliament is due to vote this week on a package of spending cuts, tax increases and privatizations agreed as part of a massive bailout aimed at averting the euro zone’s first default.

In the face of massive default, they can’t let go the concept that they don’t own what they didn’t earn.

Lord help us!

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Posted in Economics, Economy, Idiots on Parade, Politics: International

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Dirty Rotten No Good Unions

Posted on May 10, 2010 | 2 comments

And I don’t like ’em very much either.

Greece and California aren’t the only governments in a world of hurt because of the power of Unions.  New York is getting hammered too.

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Posted in Lobby/PAC, States Behaving Badly

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