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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsIMF admits: we failed to realise the damage austerity would do to Greece
The International Monetary Fund admitted it had failed to realise the damage austerity would do to Greece as the Washington-based organisation catalogued mistakes made during the bailout of the stricken eurozone country.
In an assessment of the rescue conducted jointly with the European Central Bank (ECB) and the European commission, the IMF said it had been forced to override its normal rules for providing financial assistance in order to put money into Greece.
Fund officials had severe doubts about whether Greece's debt would be sustainable even after the first bailout was provided in May 2010 and only agreed to the plan because of fears of contagion.
While it succeeded in keeping Greece in the eurozone, the report admitted the bailout included notable failures.
"Market confidence was not restored, the banking system lost 30% of its deposits and the economy encountered a much deeper than expected recession with exceptionally high unemployment."
In Athens, officials reacted with barely disguised glee to the report, saying it confirmed that the price exacted for the 110bn (£93bn) emergency package was too high for a country beset by massive debts, tax evasion and a large black economy."
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2013/jun/05/imf-underestimated-damage-austerity-would-do-to-greece?CMP=share_btn_tw
as John Perkins, the author of the best-selling book Confessions of An Economic Hitman, explains:
One of my jobs as an economic hit man was to identify countries that had resources like oil and arrange huge loans for those countries from the World Bank and sister organizations. But the money would never go to the actual country; instead it would go to our own corporations to build infrastructure projects in that country like power plants and industrial parks; things that would benefit a few very wealthy families.
So then the people of the country would be left holding this huge debt that they couldnt repay
Thats when the IMF comes in [saying] Well help you restructure your loan, but in order to do that you have to meet certain conditionalities. You have to sell your oil or whatever the coveted resource is at a cheap price, to the oil companies without restrictions. Or they would suggest the country sell electric utilities, water and sewage, maybe even its schools and jails to private multi-national corporations.
The tragic reality is that the IMFs ideologically-driven program of structural reforms and iron-clad conditionalities has left in its wake a vast trail of economic destruction, political instability, poverty, hunger and sickness. Once a country gets caught in its vice-like grip, economic decline and decay is all but guaranteed, as Greece, Portugal and Ireland are now learning.
Sherman A1
(38,958 posts)I believe they knew exactly what they were doing and did in anyway.
still_one
(92,479 posts)dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)And the history of Latin America proves.
And africa.
Having extracted almost everything of value from those places, leaving behind a succession of venal heads of state,
the IMF ( Central Banks) went a hunting in Europe.
amd thus we now have Greece and Spain and Italy and Ireland being sucked dry.
Even if Greece did not have its infamous tax dodge problem, there would not have been enough money to feed the IMF.
How is the IMF any different than organized mob racketeering?????
fasttense
(17,301 posts)The wealth has to come from somewhere. It does not magically arrive into the hands of multinationals corporations and their greedy owners. The "capital" is stolen from the "not as important countries" and funneled to the more important countries until the corporations realize cheap, cheap labor may be had at these devastated countries. Then the BAD of Capitalism comes to the the more important countries too.
And everywhere the very worse of the Bad of capitalism is on display.
ronnie624
(5,764 posts)There is no such thing as wealth, only resources and energy conversions, and by definition, there can never be profit or surplus. If someone is profiting, then others are not receiving an adequate return on their energy investment. In this case, it is the "cheap, cheap labor" who live in poverty, without access to basic goods and services like sufficient housing and healthcare.
You simply cannot have a capitalist system without the poor being exploited to protect the prosperity of the rich. It's a purely extractive economic structure
Ikonoklast
(23,973 posts)Any "excess" bled from the system is from a resulting draw from another area of the system.
Remove the Takers from the system and the end value remains the same, it is only distributed differently.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)problems?
Romeo.lima333
(1,127 posts)Or they would suggest the country sell electric utilities, water and sewage, maybe even its schools and jails to private multi-national corporations.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)break it first before you can fix it. We have a bunch of banks that need to be broken up. Elizabeth is right.
sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)to other nations, mostly third world countries, before taking their scam operation to the First World, for decades.
Finally Greece has a government that is not going to take any more of their bullying.
Bullies always back down when someone has the guts to stand up to them.
Hopefully now Ireland, Spain, Portugal and all the other nations they've been oppressing and robbing will take a lesson from the Greeks and throw out their IMF complicit, corrupt governments and start taking back their sovereignty.
It's been sickening to watch what these predators have been doing around the globe for far too long, and especially watching them install Goldman Sachs CEOS in leadership positions in Greece, foxes watching the hen houses, so they could continue their takeover of countries.
As someone said a while ago, they don't need military armies anymore, they march through countries imposing their Economic Terrorism on the populations and then buy up their national assets at bargain basement prices. This after forcing them into draconian debt to the World Bank/IMF, then stealing their assets as payment on debt no country can ever pay.
A world wide mafia is all they are.
To now lie and say they 'didn't know' is amazing.
People have been DYING, committing suicide, due to the financial terrorism imposed on them by these criminals.
Kudos to Greek's new Government for finally saying 'enough'!
As Bernie Sanders said, 'we need to support Greece's new government'.
trumad
(41,692 posts)malaise
(269,237 posts)They've done it over and over in country after country and Jamaica knows well.
Jeff Murdoch
(168 posts)malaise
(269,237 posts)<snip>
IMF History and Structural Adjustment Conditions
The International Monetary Fund was established, along with the World Bank, at a conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, USA, in the closing stages of World War II. The participants represented the governments soon to win the war against fascism. They were concerned about the rebuilding of Europe and of the global economic system after a devastating war.
The key debate at Bretton Woods was between the British and US delegations representing, respectively, liberal and conservative visions of global economic institutions. The British delegation, led by Maynard Keynes, imagined that the new IMF should be a cooperative fund which member states could draw upon to maintain economic activity and employment through periodic crises. This view suggested an IMF helping governments to act as the US government had during the New Deal in response to the great recession of the 1930s.
By contrast, the US delegation to Bretton Woods foresaw an IMF more like a bank, making sure that borrowing states could repay their debts on time. This more conservative view was less concerned to avoid recession and unemployment. The US view prevailed, and set the stage for how economic crises have been handled since World War II (Harris 1988).
Jeff Murdoch
(168 posts)almost all of the money ends up going to foreign banks, not to help the economy of the country receiving the "loans" from the IMF.
Loan sharks aren't that sadistic.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)the other guy. One way is to create wealth which was very easy when there were over abundance of natural resources and/or slave labor. But in the last 30 years, especially since regulations have been eased, it's far easier to steal wealth. Of course "steal" is such an unfriendly word, in the business world "it's not personal, it's just business."
Some may argue that controlled capitalism can help all (I don't agree) but I doubt that anyone but Alan "the Idiot" Greenspan, would argue that uncontrolled capitalism will implode.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)friends while the country has to pay for them.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)say that unless someone stopped them, they would do whatever they can to rape, rob, and steal from anyone that is vulnerable.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)G_j
(40,372 posts)pscot
(21,024 posts)Krugman, for one, has been harping on this for years.
closeupready
(29,503 posts)So this admission is a bit ridiculous, IMO.
sendero
(28,552 posts).... there are still a few people that think you are there to help.
peacebird
(14,195 posts)fredamae
(4,458 posts)Crap as I've heard yet from "the steal OPM" crowd.
Even the damn chipmunk in my backyard understands the consequences from Austerity...
Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)Hopefully no one buys this shit.
Response to Ichingcarpenter (Original post)
Name removed Message auto-removed
newthinking
(3,982 posts)Our own country is far less responsible, but because we can print the world currency and have lots of power in the world's financial systems we have (so far) escaped real consequences.
I love how everyone has bought into the popular versions of "us vs THEM". (THEM being the real irresponsible ones).
All western systems have allowed certain populations to escape paying taxes and have embraced their own forms of deficit economies. But somehow Greece is the real irresponsible one because the common people actually recieved the benefits. Unlike in other western economies where the more "responsible" formula meant "legalizing" the problems through crafty legislation and the benefits quietly going to the wealthiest and most powerful.
GeorgeGist
(25,326 posts)HereSince1628
(36,063 posts)then they want absolution and financial support to protect them from their own failure$
Dont call me Shirley
(10,998 posts)IMF = warehouse for big corporate purchases
Demeter
(85,373 posts)And by the way, IMF, Pottery Barn rules apply:
You broke it: You bought it. Pay up!
Response to Demeter (Reply #15)
Name removed Message auto-removed
randome
(34,845 posts)The IMF can be faulted but it would be useful if Greece admitted its own shortcomings. For those who say to abolish the IMF, no one forced Greece to accept the bailout.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Precision and concision. That's the game.[/center][/font][hr]
U4ikLefty
(4,012 posts)Stay true to your masters randome.
barbtries
(28,815 posts)including me, and i'm just an american worker bee who reads the news.
it reminds me of the war in iraq. i find it so hard to believe that anyone in government believed the bullshit that was being spewed. how could i know what they didn't? but i think it's starting to dawn on me that these people live in a bubble and actually choose to believe the bullshit. they don't put themselves in positions to learn the truth because it makes them uncomfortable. i don't know. there's gotta be a lot of cynicism and dishonesty at play in these people who make decisions that affect millions of other people so harshly, and then they come back after all the damage and say, we didn't know. we didn't realize. i mean, fuck that! then go live in poverty you motherfuckers.
sendero
(28,552 posts).... as for the Iraq war, I doubt if a single politician DIDN'T know it was all lies and deflection. How could they not? It was freaking obvious from the get go.
barbtries
(28,815 posts)i think a couple of things have made me wonder. one is pence's apparent shock at the outrage following his signing of a very bad law. how could he not know that people would react? the other is a man i work with - he really believed romney was going to win. he's not a stupid person otherwise, but he is a self-proclaimed libertarian (i.e., will only vote republican) who watches fox. obviously he was not paying attention to the actual news. anyone who did knew that Obama was going to win. but this guy really didn't. so i wonder. certainly at the time that gw started the war in iraq i could not believe that anyone in congress could possibly not know that it was all bullshit. it's only recently i begin to wonder.
stillwaiting
(3,795 posts)The IMF knows EXACTLY what they are doing and the consequences of their actions.
valerief
(53,235 posts)standard as Divide and Conquer.
LeftishBrit
(41,212 posts)djean111
(14,255 posts)to everyone joining the new Chinese bank. Doesn't mean the Chinese bank will be any nicer, but the concern that the Chinese bank might not be as good for workers as the IMF was horribly hilarious. No wonder there was a stampede to sign up.
Obama might want to re-think that proposal to partially privatize our infrastructure, too. With all this pesky Peace stuff breaking out, maybe we can use that massive amount of money right here in the United States.
DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)Cal Carpenter
(4,959 posts)IMF admits the sky is blue.
Duh.
MrMickeysMom
(20,453 posts)(which I know you know) This is such bullshit coming from them
The supply (borrowed money) to leverage gross national products is going DOWN, while the acquisition of the capital it takes to make any business sustain the middle class happens to be going up. This is a DIRECT result of the international bankers
You can't have capitalism without capital, and all these central banks are continuously removing (buying back) capital from the system. So, by using bank reserves to acquire government and agency securities, there will surely be no growth
ON PURPOSE
Give me 5 minutes alone in a closed room with these Fed and ECB fuckers
.
Fumesucker
(45,851 posts)dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)Condi Rice..."I don't think anyone could have predicted......"
hobbit709
(41,694 posts)torches and pitchforks are too good for these bastards.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)appalachiablue
(41,184 posts)magical thyme
(14,881 posts)failed to give a flying fuck is more like it. More like deliberately killing off the local population so they can take over a beautiful vacationland.
Fearless
(18,421 posts)jwirr
(39,215 posts)kind of exorbitant loans described in Perkin's book followed by poverty and more wealth for the rich. Beginning with South America and moving across the world from there.
IF this organization is continued to exist it needs to change its trickle down philosophy to something more like that of FDR.
I am glad that finally some country has made them admit that they are wrong.
Ichingcarpenter
(36,988 posts)The veiled threat to the Greek Parliament was in a December memo from investment bank Goldman Sachs the same bank that was earlier blamed for inducing the Greek crisis. Rolling Stone journalist Matt Taibbi wrote colorfully of it:
The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that its everywhere. The worlds most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money. In fact, the history of the recent financial crisis, which doubles as a history of the rapid decline and fall of the suddenly swindled dry American empire, reads like a Whos Who of Goldman Sachs graduates.
Goldman has spawned an unusual number of EU and US officials with dictatorial power to promote and protect big-bank interests. They include .....................
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-12-12/goldman-warns-greeks-cyprus-style-prolonged-bank-holiday-if-they-vote-wrong
The Noose Around Greece: How Central Banks Harness Governments
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/03/12/noose-around-greece-how-central-banks-harness-governments
And now for a good Easter Message
malaise
(269,237 posts)+1,000
DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)2naSalit
(86,872 posts)that is highly recommended viewing along with The Shock Doctrine...
http://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/apology_of_an_economic_hitman/
betterdemsonly
(1,967 posts)three other continents. How long does it take them to friggen learn?
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)Dawson Leery
(19,348 posts)The IMF knew exactly what they were doing.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)Krugman described exactly what would happen on the opinion page of the goddamn NYT. Anyone with a lick of sense and who is not blinded by corporatist/neoliberal ideology was able to figure it out well in advance. Fuck the economic royalist assholes.
Perkins and Naomi Klein have described this in exhaustive detail as well.
Rex
(65,616 posts)Said no major news outlet.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)by any "major media." It directly contradicts the corporatist propaganda, therefore it is an un-fact.
Oilwellian
(12,647 posts)as partial payment on their debt? Does anyone know if it happened? This article implies they did give up some real estate to these vultures.
Greece's cultural gems have become the focus of renewed protest on the streets of Athens following the cash-strapped government's announcement of plans to include prime properties around the Acropolis, and other landmark buildings, in its privatisation programme.
Furious opponents marched through the city centre at the weekend to denounce the "illegal sale" of the country's heritage. More than four years into debt-stricken Greece's prolonged economic crisis, many described the step as the height of humiliation for a nation already hit by excoriating austerity and record levels of poverty and unemployment.
"The government is constantly trying to convey the message that the economy is a success story but in reality that is not the case at all," said prominent leftwing campaigner Petros Constantinou. "The decision to put public buildings up for sale is not just proof that they are nowhere near reaching targets but plain wrong when they could be exploited for public benefit."
(snip)
Under immense pressure to enact reforms for the release of a long overdue 10.1bn (£8.5bn) aid instalment from international creditors, prime minister Antonis Samaras' fragile two-party coalition handed the real estate to the fund overseeing the sale of state assets (Taiped) last week. Among the properties are refugee tenement blocks built to put up Greeks fleeing the Asia Minor disaster in 1922 and culture ministry offices housed in neo-classical buildings in the picturesque Plaka district at the foot of the Acropolis that were erected shortly after the establishment of the modern Greek state. Both are widely viewed as architectural gems.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/16/greece-protests-sell-off-historic-buildings
Rex
(65,616 posts)Goldman Sachs, BOA, etc.. all realized two things - there is gold in those third world countries (and diamonds) and that nobody can stop them as far as laws go - they write them and have them enforced.
But hey, let's make sure the TPP passes so there will never again be fuss about little shit - like bankrupting a country on purpose or starting a war on purpose...all based on lies and criminal activity.
And the best part, they don't ever have to worry about the Feds busting in or a rival gang showing up or the worst fear...the IRS peeking into the ledger.
Legalized crime seems to be all the rage now.
randome
(34,845 posts)Greece is not without responsibility for their situation.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]All things in moderation, including moderation.[/center][/font][hr]
Aerows
(39,961 posts)never ceases to amaze me. You suddenly don't know anything - when it suits you. And no, I'm not going to waste time educating someone that is already very well educated on the situation.
Look up "IMF+Greece+Austerity". It will tell you everything you pretend to not already know because you support this kind of heavy handed approach. If there is a heavy handed approach, you are always the first to be on the front lines cheering for it.
I wonder why that is?
randome
(34,845 posts)The IMF may have onerous terms but what is the alternative? No one else is stepping up to give away money to a country that can't manage its own affairs. Bankruptcy is the alternative.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]All things in moderation, including moderation.[/center][/font][hr]
Aerows
(39,961 posts)IMF in this thread?
If I rationalized discrimination against gay people, would I not be "cheering on" discrimination against them?
You seem to think that rationalizing how an entity isn't culpable of harm because the person or entity they harmed couldn't say no, didn't say no due to pressure, were unaware of the repercussions of saying yes, or were just ignorant that they could say no is the same as being innocent of wrongdoing.
Seems to be your MO.
Would you apply those same principles to the victim of all crimes? You sure seem to like to whip them out when it is in defense of federal entities like the NSA, FBI, LEO's of all types, now we have the IMF and I am just shaking my head to see what is next on your list of organizations/entities that have no responsibility to ethics, the spirit of the law, or the letter of the law if said letter can be warped effectively.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Rex
(65,616 posts)he means the labor force that had zero to do with Greece making those kind of decisions. I guess in some weird world, someone will buy into the corporate apologist garbage that doesn't know anything about current events.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)idea that the "system" is fucked-up and therefore they blame victims of the system. Forgive the bad analogy, but if a person gets raped, it's easier to blame them for what they were wearing or how they were acting, than blame our fucked-up culture.
LeftOfWest
(482 posts)not even close. all over this thread and more.
Rex
(65,616 posts)money to bail them out for free! This is just sad to watch.
randome
(34,845 posts)Not sure if it would fix anything long-term, but why hasn't that been tendered as a possibility? Maybe because it would exacerbate long-standing grievances between countries?
[hr][font color="blue"][center]You have to play the game to find out why you're playing the game. -Existenz[/center][/font][hr]
Rex
(65,616 posts)Nice try.
Response to Aerows (Reply #61)
Rex This message was self-deleted by its author.
Rex
(65,616 posts)make more money (they have a huge love for the TPP and it will bring about global harmony...surprise!). Clearly they just meant to play with our heads this entire time.
Rex
(65,616 posts)Sorry, but I am not buying your usual PR nonsense today.
LeftishBrit
(41,212 posts)Why did the UK in 1976? - many people including myself think that was instrumental in putting us on the road to Thatcherism.
Out of desperation, that's why. In fact, the UK had alternatives which it should have tried first; Greece didn't.
The people most responsible for the recent recent disaster that engulfed Greece are the irresponsible and greedy bankers that wrecked the global economy. Greece does bear some responsibility for its problems: not because it is too left-wing or has too generous a social safety net, but because it allowed a culture of tax evasion. Progressive taxation only works if people actually pay their taxes!
Nevertheless, the typical IMF attitude that the best way to improve an economy is to pursue cuts while ignoring the need for growth, and thus to destroy the social safety net and pursue policies that cause massive unemployment, is very dangerous. It is damaging when applied to fundamentally stable countries with good existing resources, such as the UK in the 1970s; and it amounts to a form of economic terrorism when applied to a country in the position of Greece.
randome
(34,845 posts)Last edited Mon Apr 6, 2015, 09:07 AM - Edit history (1)
Maybe the IMF -and institutions like it- need to have a mandated court review regarding the social implications of their terms.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]All things in moderation, including moderation.[/center][/font][hr]
Rex
(65,616 posts)LOL! Sorry but all have been reasonable responses, you just never can accept anything told to you as reasonable if the culprits are bankers. Why do you love bankers so much?
Aerows
(39,961 posts)to anyone that got uppity like Greece did.
They had the audacity to get angry about it. Italy shut up and took it, but they have the Vatican so the IMF couldn't screw with them TOO hard.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)arikara
(5,562 posts)lying assholes who even project riots in their "restructuring" plans.
Binkie The Clown
(7,911 posts)Economists are full of shit and don't have a clue what they are doing or talking about.
DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)The reason economists are full of shit regarding the economy is because the economy as such is BULLSHIT wrapped up in jargon, and illustrated with nice graphs and pie-charts that don't mean a goddamned thing. The ''economy'' is nothing more than modern slavery, pure and simple. It uses debt contracts and mortgages and lines-of-credit in-place of chains and shackles.
- We are self-kept slaves. Which if you're gonna have slaves, those are the best kind.
ronnie624
(5,764 posts)Mainstream economic theory is pure rubbish, directly at odds with the Laws of Thermodynamics. This alone renders it nonsense.
Modern human economic activity, by its very nature, is nothing more than a massive, complex series of energy conversions, whereby stored energy in the form of resources, and available energy in the form of human labor, are converted into usable energy in the form of machinery, housing, transportation, electricity, fuel and so forth. Every last bit of it, top to bottom, must conform to the fundamental universal laws that govern energy conversions. They are unbending and insurmountable. Those who embrace the economic orthodoxy, believe in magic, and demonstrate the abysmal ignorance of the general population, with regard to basic scientific principles.
DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)djean111
(14,255 posts)privatizing our infrastructure has been put on the table.
annabanana
(52,791 posts)designed to affect a bloodless coup over the entire globe.
turbinetree
(24,735 posts)forget that Goldman Sachs and there cronies had a lot to do with this stuff, and the IMF provided cover