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Originally Posted by Hugh
extremely generous and early pensions?
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http://news.sky.com/story/1504923/gr...a-too-generous
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According to Eurostat's most recent 2012 data, pensions spending as a percentage of its output or GDP is 30% more generous in Greece than it is in the UK. Greece spends 14.3% of its GDP on old age pensions whilst the UK spends 11.0%
However, because Greek GDP came under sustained pressure during the recession, falling by a whopping 8.9% in 2011 alone, this has the effect of increasing the apparent generosity of Greek pensions.
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Give our GDP the kind of drop the Greek economy has had and our pension spend as a proportion of the economy would be similarly large, not to mention:
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How does this compare to our pensions?
UK pensions are not only far more generous than in Greece in absolute terms but they also benefit from the Chancellor's 'triple lock' protection.
This means that in any given year the amount that a pensioner receives will rise by whichever is highest out of inflation, the increase in average earnings or 2.5%.
The security of such a guarantee is no such luxury in Greece. Earlier this week I spoke to a Greek pensioner who had seen her pension shrink by nearly 25% since January 2012.
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---------- Post added at 16:49 ---------- Previous post was at 16:43 ----------
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Originally Posted by Pierre
It's well known that across all of Greece, and there are many many islands of course. That tax collection, and administration thereof, is very poor.
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As I understand it reform of this is a big part of Syriza's offer, however the troika would prefer them to tax essentials like electricity and food more heavily, alongside cutting pensions that have already dropped by a quarter.
I can't blame Syriza for telling the troika where to go. Their demands will further harm the Greeks' ability to generate wealth. Greek debt isn't sustainable, the troika screwed up by bailing out banks and putting taxpayers' money on the line, now they should have to explain their actions in the case of the Eurozone nations to the electorate.
Greece hasn't been bailed out of anything. Deutsche Bank and others have in an attempt to preserve Germany's mercantilism in the Eurozone.