The Grand Plan of the European North for the European South

It's very simple. The US has NAFTA with cheap resources from Canada and low labor from Mexico. China has an inhouse cheap market although how long that will last remains to be seen. Europe also needs a cheap labor market : the answer is the European South (which includes Ireland).

The so called PIGS together, once properly marinated, will indeed provide the cheap labor that the north is looking for. Because of low demographics, one country can't fulfill this cheap labor role; but the Balkans combined with Italy, Spain and Ireland are more than enough to provide the North with its required low cost labor. The big experiment is of course Greece but once that proves workable, the IMF etc... German pushed formula will be copied to the PIG countries.

The South differs from the North both nationally, culturally and racially since the North is comprised primarily by Germanic and Germanic related nations while the South is composed of Non Germanic and non Germanic related nations; nations which include Latins, Celts, Greeks, and the other Balkan powder lot.

If things go as planned, the Eurozone North will have its free lunch since it will get access to once expensive beach side real estate at a bargain price; not a bad way to come out of a crisis in addition to charging negative interest on ones bonds.

The Southern politicians seem to support this strategy...for now. It remains to be seen for how long the Southern peoples will accept to pay debts that there governments incurred and are now obliged to pass on to the populace.


Natural resources still remain a problem for Europe.

Leave Greece Alone !

By Dina Kyriakidou and Renee Maltezou
ATHENS Sat May 7, 2011 1:23pm EDT


(Reuters) - Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou on Saturday denied there was even unofficial discussion over Greece quitting the euro zone and asked that his troubled country be "left alone to finish its task."
Ministers from the euro zone's biggest economies met in Luxembourg to discuss Greece's debt crisis on Friday but Athens and senior EU officials denied a report by Germany's Spiegel Online that the Greek government had raised the prospect of leaving the 17-member euro zone.
"These scenarios are borderline criminal," Papandreou told a conference on the Ionian island of Meganisi. "No such scenario has been discussed even in our unofficial contacts...I call upon everyone in Greece and abroad, and especially in the EU, to leave Greece alone to do its job in peace."
European Central bank Governing Council member Erkki Liikanen on Saturday shot down reports of Greece exiting the euro and said restructuring its 327 billion euro ($470 billion) debt would offer no permanent solution to its problems.
"No euro zone country wants to leave the euro," Liikanen, who also heads the Bank of Finland, said in an interview at Finnish national broadcaster Yle.
Greek Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou attended the Luxembourg talks, his finance ministry said, adding Greece remained committed to repairing its finances and returning to economic growth.
"Markets continue to have doubts and we have scheduled our next steps for 2012," Papaconstantinou told reporters on Saturday when asked about what was discussed at the meeting.
"We (Greece) will either go out to markets or use the recent decision by the EU Council that allows the European fund (EFSF) to buy Greek bonds. That was what the discussion was about."
Sources close to the talks said on Saturday the meeting did not look at extending the repayment of Greece's bailout loans, or any new bailout deal terms for the country.
"There was an extensive debate on Greece's economic adjustment programme. The progress made was recognised but it was also recognised that the programme has not changed the situation (markets' confidence in Greece) as fast as expected," one source said.
EURO EXIT "STUPID"
Jean-Claude Juncker, head of the group of euro zone finance ministers who called the late Friday meeting, said there was a broad discussion of Greece and other international economic issues but said the idea of exiting the euro was stupid.
"We have not been discussing the exit of Greece from the euro area. This is a stupid idea. It is in no way -- it is an avenue we would never take," he told reporters after the meeting attended by ministers from Germany, France, Italy and Spain.
"We don't want to have the euro area exploding without reason. We were excluding the restructuring option, which is discussed heavily in certain quarters of the financial markets," he added.
But he said a meeting of all euro zone finance ministers on May 16 would discuss whether Greece needed a further economic plan. The EU is currently negotiating a bailout with Portugal, the third state it is rescuing after Greece and Ireland.
Despite a 110 billion euro international bailout, Greece, a euro zone member since 2001, has not cut its budget deficit as fast as it promised its lenders amid a deep recession. Gains from spending cuts and tax hikes have been partly erased by low revenues due to tax evasion and a deep recession.
SCEPTICAL MARKETS
Financial markets have been sceptical for months that Athens could manage its huge debt without eventually restructuring. As austerity bites, even some ruling socialist party politicians have been suggesting a "soft" restructuring which might involve lengthening maturities on the country's bonds.
On Friday, the euro fell nearly 1 percent against the dollar and the cost of insuring Greek debt against default was quoted at a record high in response to the Spiegel report.
The Luxembourg talks were also attended by European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet and Olli Rehn, the European commissioner for economic and monetary affairs

The Essence of the Greek Debt Crisis

The Greek crisis, which is now quickly becoming a Eurozone crisis was triggered by the American financial crisis which itself was triggered by the subprime crisis and the availability of low interest money, stemming from many places including Chinese savings.

The Greek crisis reflects aside from the weak Greek economy, the anomalies of the Eurozone.

So the Greek crisis is in essence a European crisis which is in essence a crisis of a financial system that basis itself more on speculation rather than production; note that many corporations in the past preferred to invest their profits in Wall Street, rather than in actual production lines.

Focusing on Greece, the Greek crisis reflects an ecosystem built on political favoritism; the electorate voted politicians in and in return was granted government jobs which translate to work for life without having to do anything regardless of education or actual competence.

The result is a monstrous bureaucracy that is now being called upon to produce and as any ecosystem which is called upon to change, is reacting adversely to the individuals (the politicians) it was designed for to support in the first place. This bureaucracy includes the core public sector, the different government agencies and professional associations (which are headed and staffed by party cronies), the revenue service and so forth.

A student once asked President Nixon why he was unable to stop the Vietnam War: Since the President could not reply the student understood that the President couldn’t; the system was working (ie. the American military industry and related interests) autonomously and would react violently to any opposition.

The same situation applies to the current Greek government bureaucracies, institutions, professional associations and so forth.

Since the private and public sectors are intertwined, as Galbraith points out in his final book, it goes without saying that a malfunctioning public system leads to a malfunctioning private sector since innovation is stifled and contracts are landed through bribes.
Therefore aside from consuming huge costs, the public sector leads to an incapacitated private sector as well as poor university research thus putting Greece in a precarious situation insofar as growth is concerned.

The only salvation is careful dismantling or bypassing of the existing public system in favor of a new improved, efficient and healthy government organization. This will only guarantee long term growth and prosperity for the country.