Poor Greece – Rich Greeks and Romania follows…

Part 2

• to read part 1, click here
• to read part 3, click here
• to read part 4, click here

Why Greece ended like this?

Today we all read the problems of Greek economy. The World's top media cover the "Greek tragedy" every single day, presenting a country which is ready to bankrupt, doubting for the good intentions of the new Government, approaching the problem just by touching its surface. The same surface that "looked ok" during the previous years, while the country was heading fast to today's wreck. Let us try to identify the reality under the surface, always keeping in mind that Greeks and Romanians are 80% alike (in my opinion). And if Greece's tragedy does not wake up Romania, in one decade (instead of the Greek three) the situation here will become similar…

Greece entered in "European Common Market" in 1979…

It was the late '70s period (1979), when the ex Greek Prime Minister (and President later on) Konstantinos Karamanlis succeeded to include Greece in "European Common Market" (that was the – translated in Greek – European Union's name back then). The country had debts at the range of 25 – 30% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), but the level of life was very low. Millions of Greeks did not enjoy the basics of a normal

"Capitalistic" society and they were envying a small minority of some hundreds of thousands who were mainly merchants, "businessmen" of all kinds (mainly practicing what we call in Romanian "smecherie"). The Greek middle class was quite "thin" at that time.

Carrying syndromes from the past…

Greeks suffered a lot during the First and the Second World War. The Civil War which followed destroyed much more than the two wars against others. All these had installed several syndromes and fears in a society which had just exited from a painful Military Dictatorship, just in 1974. The feeling of injustice, the greed to spend (ideally buying imported goods), the need for each Greek to have his OWN home, the desire to travel, all these had grown in the hearts of people. In his way, everyone was right. While the problems were already present, people preferred the "absolute truth", which was expressed only by the leader of their political party. Anything else was wrong, it took them decades to realize that they had ended up "deaf"…

The biggest mistake of Greece: Freedom means "Do whatever you wish"

People tend to believe that the Greek problem has its foundation in the last 3 – 5 or 10 years. Well, not the Greeks who dare stating the truth though. The biggest mistake of Greece is that because of all the syndromes, all the things we missed, all the trouble we have been through, all the conquerors who wanted to rule us, we developed a conscience which reached the opposite result: We perceived "Freedom" as our right to "Do whatever, wherever, without to ask anyone's permission, without caring about the laws, it is our right to be free to act". This was soon transformed into:

"My rights"

"It is my right to work, so I want to work for the State. Or if I work in the private sector, it should not be easy for the boss to fire me, either I work good or not. I want to be hired either I have the qualifications or not… You are not supposed to control my work, if I work for the State. Don't violate my rights, I am free to work how and when I want. Also I want a lot of money, if not I will go on strike and block the whole system. Needless to say that if I work for the State noone should have the right to fire me, I need to feel secured. Last but not least, even when I am caught stealing or doing other illegal things, I should not be fired, because this is unfair, violates my rights and does not allow me to bring money to my family".

(Result: About 1.000.000 Greeks working for the State, having much higher salaries than the private segment. Their productivity is very low, but the rest of people pay endless billions of euro so as to maintain this "army" and their "rights". This is why everyone else wanted to enter in the State, to… join the party).

"How I pay taxes"

"I am not supposed to pay taxes, I will pay as much as I want, when you catch me". There are hundreds of thousands of Greeks who live very good, declaring almost nothing since decades. They claim that they do this, as a response to the approach of many tax collectors: "I will charge you as many taxes as I want, I know you are guilty by default". So, when a Greek was able to hide taxes, he proudly did this, because…

1. He knew he would be blackmailed anyway.
2. The Greek State never appreciated the fiscal honesty of someone.
3. The level of social services received by the State was always too low, not justifying high costs.

(Result: Greeks avoided paying taxes as much as possible and the whole system of tax collecting was built on completely wrong basis, which made tax payers upset once more).

Tomorrow, the… "Greek" way:

"How I build"

"We are all illegal, so noone can really complain"

"How I respect the State's money"

"How I deal with money from European Union"