It's not nearly as black and white as you guys think it is.
Do you honestly think that Greece is bankrupt because of tax avoidance and corruption? Or do you think there might be some other factors that have contributed?
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You're dense, of course all economic problems are multi-faceted, economics is ridiculously complex with an enormous amount of possible variables (Which is why economists, outside of micro projections, are often "all things being equal" kind of people.). The issue is you don't illustrate this, you drop in and post something snarky and puke up a single article decrying how mean Germany is and then fling the poo poo. It makes your posts way way more on sided and myopic than you're supposedly decrying.
If you read Khorum's post between the dramatic flairs that are present in all forum discussion, you'll see he's often not talking about what's best--but rather how much bullshit austerity gets as a means of reducing debt load because the liberal media constantly reduces all economic problems to a subset of economic conflict theory. The reality is other countries have managed to recover with austerity (We can argue it wasn't the BEST method of recovery, sure, whatever--but it HAS happened, yeah maybe not as quickly as countries which prodded through short term purchases, but it did happen)--so there is obviously more variables at work in Greece. The fact that they have a HUGE problem with corruption that other countries, which are also facing record unemployment levels (Like Spain), do not have? Is probably a huge factor in why their economy continues it's cyclical growth and retraction, rather than steady growth like the other PIIGS. (Note: I'm talking about this debt cycle--the other PIIGS will run into severe problems eventually, but it's going to take a lot longer....it's easier to manage a disease when you don't have cancer already.)
I say this all as someone who agrees with the latest studies that pure austerity isn't the most effective economic fix (It is a leaver that needs context). So I'm not some Austrian-Chicago-School Neo-liberal austerity zealot. But the fact is, what some of these countries need IS a
doseof austerity (Again, maybe not alone, but a dose) to wake them up to the reality of their economic situations, and a need to balance their social programs. So constantly trying to vilify or distract from austerity is ridiculous. Yes, these countries need to trim some fat, yes their social programs are too generous--no that doesn't mean radical austerity is the only thing that works. HOWEVER, consistently using Greece as an example of how austerity can only have a negative effect, while fucking ignoring the enormous amount of extraneous variables at play outside of austerity; and then subsequently ignoring economic recoveries which have employed said tactic? Is just propaganda at this point. It's extremism dressed up as news, meant to push an agenda, rather than a middle ground, that illustrates some degree of government spending and social programs, combined with common sense economic belt tightening would be the best method.
That belt tightening? That shit isn't going to happen if we continually ignore the elephant in the room. And guess what? Since it is the Greeks asking for money, and not the rest of the world? They need to make the first moves--yet every fucking anti-corruption measure they have ever instituted has failed, including literally releasing names of the worst offenders. Again, this is all coming from someone who thinks the Eurozone is misguided, and weaker economic systems do need wealth transfers--it is what happens in the U.S. and it is the only way to maintain a single currency across disparate economies. But until the Eurozone accepts the logistics of countries accepting roles more like states (U.S.) in terms of economies (And thus a reduction on sovereignty)? It is doomed to failure. But Greece is going down in such an epic manner not because of that, but because of the corruptions and poor institutional efficiency within their country.
