If we were to be very charitable (and extremely naive) and accept the supposed reason behind The Frau’s brutal (and undemocratic) imposition of her austerity panacea, austerity with no growth, austerity where the funds saved through this policy are not plowed back into the economy, but siphoned off into the black hole of Godzilla… I mean The Banks, which is the long term restructuring of the economy.
Again, if we by pass this idea of restructuring, which means nothing other than imposing a neo liberal dogma on Europe, of destroying all and any welfare or social structures, reducing all wages to a pittance and of course completely abolishing all and any labour rights (aka a “flexible” labour market), and take it as being a desirable outcome, can we even then see any successful outcome of this project, even in the so called long run?
With all efforts focused on this long term project of turning Greece into a little China, say, where footballs can be manufactured cheaply (because the workers will not be paid), where there will not be a deficit problem say, because the state will not have expenses to meet such as healthcare and certainly no pensions, because everyone will die off before reaching a pensionable age, aren’t we forgetting something?
For an economy to develop at all, in any direction, even in such a brutal and despicable one, it has to be on going. The “policies” imposed on Greece have only led to its rapidly increasing rate of destruction. So, in the long run, there will not be an economy left to do anything. Even manufacturing footballs with child labour, because there will not be any children left to exploit, for instance.
In fact there will be nothing left at all. Just a barren waste land of where there was once, way back in history, some crazy and exotic civilization that taught… what? Funny, mysterious, metaphysical, mumbo jumbo ideas called philosophy, ethics, democracy….? I think. Anyway a whole lot of obsolete and irrelevant pipe dream ideas that have nothing at all to do with our brave new world (apologies to Aldus Huxley… or perhaps not. A vindication of Aldus Huxley).
Greece will have gone to join Carthage and the Phoenicians. And Keynes will have been completely vindicated.
“In the long run we are all dead.” Because here in Greece we will be. Literally.