The troika report leaked by Reuteurs makes a valid judgement over the Greek government. That it is inept, doing the bare minimum and, in a word, useless. However, this does raise a pertinent question. Why are they then so gung ho on keeping Samaras in power? Why did they so unacceptably intervene in the Greek elections in Samaras’ favour last year? And finally, why did they not cut off further financing?
Which brings us to the second set of caveats. They may have continued financing, trimming the sum and making it conditional on carrying out further deflationary measures. They also singled out the government’s failure to collect taxes. Which, they maintain should be raised.
The measures demanded are designed to plunge the Greek economy further down the plughole. More austerity will lead to greater recession and… well yes, less tax revenue! Of course! How can these luminaries, mandarins, morons, what have you keep insisting on extracting more and more revenue from an economy in free fall?
As to tax evasion, that is another matter. Something that could and should be dealt with in itself and not by punishing the whole population and the whole economy and above all punishing the honest citizens of this country.
And with all this troika talk of shortfalls in financing which has to be covered by greater and greater taxation from an economy already sucked dry, ignores a simple fact. And that is that the only way Greece has a hope in hell of getting back onto its feet again is that all emphasis should be placed on stimulating production, helping the economy to start working again.
And the last thing one needs is more debilitating taxation.