We’ve been hearing about how Greece and Portugal are in a world of shit economically.
The EU is concerned about their level of debt and is demanding they do something about it.
So when Greece tried, the people there revolted and are going on strikes across the whole country, basically putting it in a stranglehold.
Greek customs and tax officials yesterday launched a 48-hour strike that shut down ports and border crossing points amid signs of a growing union backlash against the government’s austerity programme.
The country’s largest union, the General Confederation of Greek Workers (GSEE), which represents private sector employees, announced a one-day strike on February 24 in solidarity with public sector workers.
The European Commission approved on Wednesday Greece’s three-year economic rescue plan after George Papandreou, prime minister, announced an across-the-board wage freeze for public sector workers and a 10 per cent reduction in allowances – equivalent to a pay cut of 4 per cent.
Mr Papandreou also signalled his commitment to implementing key pension reforms by announcing that the retirement age would be raised, although he gave no further details.
GSEE would also withdraw from a “social dialogue” between unions and the government over reform of the state pension system, Yannis Panagopoulos, its president, said.
Until now unions have reacted mildly to the government’s austerity plans, reflecting a mood of willingness to make sacrifices to overcome the economic crisis.
However, the walk-out by tax and customs officials, which is due to be repeated on February 11 and 17, marked a hardening stance that other unions are likely to match, analysts said.
Adedy, the civil servants’ union, plans a 24-hour strike on Wednesday and a march to parliament in protest against pension reform, followed the next day by Pame, a militant communist-led union.
Portugal is no better off.
Portuguese opposition parties defeated a government austerity plan on Friday and passed their own bill that lets the country’s autonomous regions rack up even more debt. The move raised new questions about European countries’ ability to control their swollen budget deficits.
The vote was also likely to rattle the world’s financial markets, which are already concerned that the financial troubles gripping Greece may spread to other vulnerable eurozone countries such as Portugal and Spain.
Portugal’s minority Socialist government had fiercely opposed the opposition bill, since it contradicted earlier promises to crack down on ballooning debt. Yet the bill passed 127 to 87, appearing to show that Portugal, western Europe’s poorest country, has little appetite for painful austerity measures.
Later Friday, some 30,000 civil servants marched through downtown Lisbon to protest a public sector pay freeze — another unpopular debt-reducing measure. Unions say they will also organize strikes.
The government’s defeat in Parliament came after senior officials spent hours in closed-door meetings trying to hammer out a compromise. The government says the opposition bill punches a euro400 million ($550 million) hole in its budget over the next four years by allowing the regions to go deeper into debt.
This, dear reader, is what happens when you have over 50% of your electorate either not paying taxes or wholly dependent upon government for their well-being.
We are headed in that direction, too! heaven help us if it happens.
