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Tears from Greece

26 novembre 2015, 09:23

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You don’t have to be an economist to start freaking out.  The figures are simple and disquieting.

We have for many years now been living above our means. Many economists started sounding alarm bells last December when our national debt reached 60.7%, crossing the psychological mark of 60%, representing a sum of Rs228 billion. Although there were massive infrastructural projects being implemented, that did not appease fears that we had stepped into the danger zone. We all went wild about the light rail system which was going to cost us Rs25 billion and the then-opposition rightly used the extravagance of the then-government as a campaign theme.

It would seem that we had not yet seen the worst. Between January and September this year (latest statistics available), public debt has been spinning out of control. It went up by a staggering Rs28 billion to reach over Rs256 billion, amounting to – hold your breath – 64.1%!

We did not acquire the light rail system and we are not travelling in any better conditions than before. We do not have any big infrastructural projects, no more roads, bridges, schools, social housing or hospitals in the pipeline. Indeed, Economist Pierre Dinan states in this week’s edition of Weekly, “We wonder all the more what is really making this debt go up since we did not have big public investments!”

If economists don’t understand why the situation is so dire, neither perhaps do government ministers and members of parliament who are competing to make it even worse. They are clambering over each other to jet around the world, trying to beat each other’s record in who visits the greatest number of countries, stays in the best hotels and accumulates the biggest per diem at the taxpayers’ expense.

They have also been very generous in appointing a disproportionate number of advisers and other nominees to share in the milking of the cow, with even higher salaries – at times double – and more scrumptious fringe benefits. To allow more cronies to take part in the bonanza, new institutions have been created such as the Financial Services Promotion Agency to compete with the Board of Investment while poaching its employees and the Integrity Reporting Services Agency and the Integrity Reporting Board are on the way, so smile if you are on the right side.

Other more important ministers and MPs have gone a step further: in addition to the duty-free cars they were quick to acquire, they also thought it might be a good idea to have an office car as well – what the heck! – and even security detail of the top calibre. It must feel great to overtake the lesser mortals on the motorway. What a treat!

What did the rest of us get out of this?ZilchNadaNish! Yes, there was an increase in the old age pension. That must have cost about Rs3 billion out of the Rs28 billion newly spent. Much less than the obscene amount of money creamed off motorists every time they go to the petrol pump and less than the indecent profits of the Central Electricity Board – due to the drop in the price of oil , the benefit of which was not passed on to the consumers.

To distract us from all this, we are served the usual smorgasbord of crowd-pleasing sound bites about good governance. Great governance indeed! At this rate, Greece will soon start shedding a few tears for us!