The Troika of the European Union-International Monetary Fund-European Central Bank (EU-IMF-ECB,) already pushing the uneasy coalition government led by Prime Minister Antonis Samaras to make another $14.16 billion in cuts, is insisting on even harsher measures for civil servants.
Greek Reporter
Troika Wants Six-Day Work Week for Greeks
By Andy Dabilis
(Dan Lynch via FB)
TPTB seem to be hell-bent on driving the Greek people to revolt. Or are they just testing the boundaries to see just how far they can cram down workers?
28 comments:
are they just testing the boundaries to see just how far they can cram down workers?
It's interesting. Back in the '90's, the two parties in the US conspired to pit the middle-class against the poor and passed that monstrous welfare law. Bill Clinton and his cohorts have been bragging for the last 17 years about how many people they have gotten off the "welfare roles." Now in 2012 and into the 4th year of "the Great Recession," poverty levels have risen precipitously and yet there are still fewer people getting TANF. Heckuva job, Bill! It will take maybe one more economic shock and then there will be no more middle class, just rich and poor. I wonder how they will try to cover their political butts then.
It makes you wonder how much of this Neoliberal BS is due to ignorance and how much is just deliberate class war ?
It’s easy to complain about the austerity imposed on Euro periphery countries, but what’s the alternative in a common currency area for a country which has become uncompetitive? The problem is inherent to common currencies.
I think this definition from Wikipedia is most appropriate:
"Troika (political ad), a controversial advertisement video released by presidential candidate Vladimir Zhirinovsky as a part of his campaign during the 2012 Russian presidential election, in the video Zhirinovsky whipped a donkey and claimed the animal was a symbol of Russia"
And the Triumvirate is STILL whipping the donkey...
Working more hours... doing what!? They are killing their own demand, and they are killing their own fixed capital by this induced depression.
Is the plan to work more hours for foreigners at slave labour wages? Insanity.
Tom -- Link not a link.
"It’s easy to complain about the austerity imposed on Euro periphery countries"
Austerity is a policy option, There are other options, as in changing how the currency union will fund itself.
Austerity can't possibly work, so why take use that option?
The complaining is just pointing out that "these f'kng people are nuts".
Ralph, MMT economists are not alone in holding that the EZ is not an optimal currency area due to the asymmetries involved and needs to be revised into something workable or dismantled entirely before Europe sinks itself.
Thanks, John. Fixed.
Leverage said...Working more hours... doing what!? They are killing their own demand, and they are killing their own fixed capital by this induced depression. Is the plan to work more hours for foreigners at slave labour wages? Insanity.
The answer is simpler than that. All all about cramming down workers socially, politically and economically to "their rightful place." It's feudal thinking. As Marx suggested, capitalism is feudalism with factories instead of fields. In the mind of the upper echelon, the lower echelons exist to serve them. Otherwise, they are useless "eaters."
This is all part of the great leveling as the workers of the developed world are forced to compete with the workers of emerging world by accepting lower wages, benefits, protections, and social support.
It's not difficult to see where this is headed.The fork in the road is increased authoritarianism and inequality or increasing socialism and greater equality. The authoritarians have the upper hand now, but history has a liberal bias. Expect increasing conflict and possibly war if this trend continues.
"history has a liberal bias"
you can still get decades or even centuries of tyranny, however.
"In the mind of the upper echelon, the lower echelons exist to serve them."
Not in the minds of all of them.
We need an economy which has all the good bits of capitalism/markets but that doesn't degenerate into blood-sucking vampire squids vs oppressed proles.
i.e. a 'good society' with an appropriately 'mixed economy'.
"We need an economy which has all the good bits of capitalism/markets"
Capitalism must be operated in a sandbox, firewalled from the greater economy. Capitalism depends upon the government creating the balances necessary to fund profits, therefore Capitalism is merely another subsidized enterprise at the expense of others.
Capitalism may be a necessary construct to encourage innovation, but it must be kept under control.
you can still get decades or even centuries of tyranny, however.
This is a very real downside that people living in a supposed democracy should be concerned about. "Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom."
Who said eternal vigilance is the price of freedom?
y "Not in the minds of all of them."
Thankfully. FDR was upper crust and of his own class he famously said, "They are unanimous in their hate for me--and I welcome their hatred."
Here's the audio. (1 min) Worth listening to every day when you get up.
Capitalism is based on risking investment in anticipation of a favorable risk/return ratio in the face of intense competition. This exists in pockets of a developed economy only. The majority is based on rent-seeking and jockeying for privilege. Calling this "capitalism" is a category error.
Paul,
you could also say that the statist tendency towards control needs to be kept in check. In either case it's about maintaining an optimum balance.
y "you could also say that the statist tendency towards control needs to be kept in check. In either case it's about maintaining an optimum balance."
In the US, the problem has been state capture by private interests to promote privilege, favors (crony capitalism), and rent-seeking. The US has gone through several rounds of this cycle already, addressed previously by Andrew Jackson, Abe Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, and FDR, and we are at the apex of another round of it. Neither Obama and Romney are the next guy, so this round of neoliberal domination has a way to run yet. My projection now is 2020-2024.
"you could also say that the statist tendency towards control needs to be kept in check. In either case it's about maintaining an optimum balance."
y: Agreed. Balance is imperative, thus the tug-of-war, and the equilibrium is badly skewed towards crony capitalism.
Unfortunately, for now the narrative does not allow any discussion where the world of Capitalism is held in check in any way.
Any alternative to pure Capitalism is branded as "evil" even though all we have ever had is a hybrid system.
great FDR clip.
How to get 'big money' out of politics? That's what needs to happen if 'democracy' is to be saved. Practical, concrete suggestions?
Thanks for the audio clip, Tom. It restored my faith in humanity . . . for a few minutes, anyway.
Capitalism is defined by who owns and controls the means of production.
This is only one aspect (even if important) of human societies functioning, which is subsidiary to other relations and links.
When political power is used to secure income for a subset of the population (wealthy or poor) we are not talking about damaging capitalism but controlling its output. Corporatism will use political force to secure the output and production for a minority, socialism (not "pure" socialism, which is theorically the contrary of capitalism) will secure output and production for other subset of the population.
All this has nothing to do with ownership of the means of production, but a discussion on how we use the output produced by these means. A mixed economy is one where there is public ownership of some of these means (public does not mean equal sharing, for example public credit institutions do not guarantee you will have equal access to credit), but if there is no such thing we are just distributing flows and outputs and still are in a capitalist system.
Freemarketers simply hate government, but there is no real case that socializing (part of) output destroys capitalism in any significant way. Off course this is even more clear if you think about it in real production terms and not in financial monetary terms, it would make no sense for wealthy people to hoard millions of cars being produced just because they own car factories.
But by mixing-up output and ownership you can confuse people and create this false dilemma where you can advocate for free-rider captialism and social darwinism (which is what this all is about, hating other people).
P.S: And this does not even deny that some public ownership is more efficient and effective than pure capitalism in some cases.
Tom,
" The authoritarians have the upper hand now,"
You have to be kidding.
These morons immediately surrender ANY authority they have immediately when they say "we're out of money", or "we have to borrow from the Chinese"; this is an immediate surrender of authority.
They all from both parties want to leave all of this up to the "invisible hand", how Libertarian can you get?
If they do not believe they have any fiscal authority, then what authority do they really have?
I guess someone like Bloomberg can get goons to go beat up children in a "park" which I suppose could be interpreted as authoritarianism; but only for a while as they literally can "run out of money" to pay their goons if their moron policies really pass ("balanced budget", etc..)
To me they are not authoritarian they are corrupt.
BTW, speaking of corruption, I have CNBC on and they are grilling the Teamsters head on why that Trade Union has bazillions invested in their pension funds in Private Equity schemes.....
rsp,
Matt,
TPTB are imposing their authority on us when they say "we're out of money". We know they are full of shit but it's their way or the highway.
But Paul we can vote them out of their positions of authority.
They are interlopers into, or usurpers of, positions of authority, but they are not "authorities" in their own right imo.
I'm looking at "authority" as the basic abstract concept itself and not any human being as an "authority"...
They deny 'authority' and dispense brainwashing falsehoods about the 'authority' that is inherent in our civil laws that we can pass via our representative government.
Very dark. rsp,
But Paul we can vote them out of their positions of authority."
Matt,
I don't believe voting makes a difference. The choices presented to us on election day are people that have already sold their souls to moneyed interests.
As the saying goes "if voting made a difference they would make it illegal."
Change now will require a movement that understands what makes an economy work, runs it's own candidates in the election and has the ability to reach millions of voters without spending hundreds of millions of dollars on TV advertising.
Paul,
Agree this is going to take a long time...
But again wrt "authority"; MMT talks of a "job guaranty".
How do you enforce the guaranty without a designated authority to enforce the guaranty? Just think people will "do the right thing" by free will? Let it up to the Libertarian "free market"?
We already have that chaos and it doesnt work.
rsp,
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