News and Spews

Greece has a 50:50 chance of defaulting on its debt:

The cost of insuring Greek government bonds rose on Thursday after ratings agency Moody's said there was now a 50% chance of the country defaulting on its debts.

The warning came as Moody's cut Greece's credit rating to Caa1, almost the lowest rating assigned to any country. The move intensified the pressure on European leaders as negotiations over a second rescue package for Greece continued in Vienna.

This "troika review", involving the European Union, the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank, is also considering what additional measures Greece must take in return for the next instalment of its original bailout plan.

Moody's being a democratically elected body of... it's a privately owned corporation? No way! They have, however, revised Greece economy's credit rating downward, which will make it generally more difficult for the Greek government to borrow money or issue bonds.

Greece is understood to have agreed to €6.4bn (£3.9bn) of fresh austerity measures, including tax increases and accelerated privatisations.

Hold on, "Greece is understood to have agreed..."? The whole of Greece? Surely not. The austerity measures forced on Greece, so much for functioning democracy, have directly contributed to its current predicament. As far as global capitalism is concerned there is no other pill to take, so swallow the one that made you ill. Default will make for a short-term solution. The trouble is defaulting will put the Euro at wider risk. It will also take down the billions of Euros of bailout money, lost forever, from the hat passed around the Union last year. The British government contributed to this bailout as well. By spreading the risk, as the banks did in the run up to the 2008 crisis, Europe's governments are spreading the liability. This will increase the pressure to abrogate democracy in Greece, extend the protectorate, in the name of financial orthodoxy, a dangerous precedent.

The answer? A shift, across the continent, in economic priorities, from profit accumulation to general wellbeing, from a market driven society to a democratically driven society. The mass movement of strikes and occupations on the continent can make this a reality. It must be brought to Britain.