A couple of decades ago ten nations marshaled in Euro Core, which was to become the European Union.
Their currency was based on the euro, and as the European Union grew in
nations, the euro took on a life of its own, and at points in time,
rivaled and even surpassed the dollar in purchasing capacity. Greece was
one of the initial partners, but during 2007 they started to become the
weak link of the union and eventually a “Greek Crisis” began. Looking back, one can compare their economic model to that of other doomed countries, both in the European Union and outside of the union.
As an example, their retirement age is 62 years.
Compared to the United States,
who, traditionally, let workers receive full benefits at age was 65,
and early retirement benefits at age 62, with a permanent reduction in
80 percent of the full benefit amount. Now, the full benefit age is 66
for individuals born in 1943-1954, and ascends to 67 for those born in
1960 or later. A nation’s tax base comes from the income taxes paid by eligible workers, in addition to corporate taxes, and other tax generated income.
Greece’s dwindling tax base.
A large part of Greece’s financial erosion comes from a dwindling tax base,
because people over 62 are collecting pensions, the young unemployment
rate is at 30%, and movement of goods and services are stifled, because
of a depressed economy. Greece has acquired numerous economic bail out plans from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. Now in the past France
was the stepchild of the union, but Greece with its multiple debt
crises syndrome, constantly looks desperate, and has become ground zero
for EU government regulators, who constantly monitor their activities,
in relation to their past and current banking crises.
A
factor that is not discussed much, but is a contributing factor to
their depressed economy, happens to be the fact that a large percentage
of its citizens were born between 1945 and 1964. This is the baby Boomer
era. So you have a large segment of the population who are baby boomers
looking forward to retirement at 62, with high unemployment an a
marginal tax base. The citizens for the most part feel that their
government is not handling the economy very well, but before anything
can really change, there needs to be legislative restructuring that will raise the...
No comments:
Post a Comment