Investing in Greece...(3)

You're kidding, right?

Check this out:

* S&P's rating fell to BBB+
* The Greek Minister of Finance ), one Papaconstantinou, said: “There is a lot of will to do whatever it takes to bring down the deficit,” Mr Papaconstantinou told the Financial Times on Wednesday.” But he did NOT specify the way.
* “We are starting off with this huge credibility deficit and there’s not much we can do to change it immediately,” Mr Papaconstantinou said on Wednesday. “Our big concern is how we buy some time. The kind of things we’ve started doing are a significant departure from the past but they don’t produce results right away.” What kind of things??? For one, I know of three companies the fiscal authorities visited and left with some cash in pocket. Guess how many more there are.

Is this part of the things "we started"...


Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.


The Greece motto:

"Important measures are taken to ensure the rich become poor without fail, while unerringly retaining the poor in the their poverty."


Invest?
You crazy? In Greece we don't like investors.

Living, Investing... in Greece (2) Investing

For the official blurb go here.
The site contains the usual mish-mash of syncopated info and a host of unsubstantiated reasons to... bring your solar panels to Greece.

For a more serious, no nonsensical approach and (much) better advice, go here.


For the hands-on experience, here are a few pointers...

Living, Investing... in Greece: (2) {Don't} Invest In Greece

Fiscal legislation changes annually; so do rates for corporate and personal taxation;

In times of crisis, extra contributions are levied -- at whim and will of the powers that be;

In Greece figures are notoriously unreliable, whether they be official, published, etc...

In Greece, administrative and/or government commitments can be notoriously unreliable; all it takes is a change of gov and you have to renegotiate the deal and the contract (look at CosCo for example).

Bureaucratic barriers to entry are high: there is even an organisation set up to steer investors away from the uncooperative administration;

Greek administrative legislation and bureaucracy, both, protect the Greek administration at the expense of the people; don't expect to get your papers in order unless you believe in miracles (or a miracle actually took place!);

Allegedly (by all) Greek Government agencies are notoriously corrupt; building permits, sundry fiscal issues, etc, will boost your admin (or legal counsel) budget; interstingly Greece has an automatic tax settlement method: give me X and you've got a deal.

In a move typical of modern Greek politics, the new governments is promising to stimulate the market and foreign investment by... raising income tax and capital gains tax

Athens is in the bottom 50 of (un)welcoming cities; Athens is particularly unfriendly to toddlers, children, and the ageing population (no where to walk, the few pavements are full of murderous potholes, there are rarely damages awarded for any personal claims...); to be on the safe side, your family will have to live elsewhere -- or relatively secluded from everyday life.

Athenians do not like, nor do they welcome, foreigners; fortunately, they dislike Greeks more.

The current leading opinion on labour matters is that work is a form of slavery; "discussions " on Greek TV resound of 50's Soviet propagandist illustrations of the West: business is the bad guy, conspiracies abound and many global perpetrators thereof are out to get Greece and its inhabitants, ranting and raving is the key (in short: the Soviet "West").


Do invest if you are occasional; you do not expect to employ anyone; can go ahead with the help of legal counsel alone; if you are thinking of real estate.

Some things to be proud of...

"...Αλλά υπάρχουν στιγμές κατά τις οποίες ένας λαός οφείλει, αν θέλη να μείνη μεγάλος, να είναι ικανός να πολεμήση, έστω και χωρίς καμμίαν ελπίδα νίκης. Μόνον διότι πρέπει."
(There are moments when a nation, willing to remain a great nation, must be ready to fight, even if it means fighting a war without any hope of victory...)

Powerful words spoken by men with balls to men with balls**.

None of them owned a Porsche Cayenne and none spoke with a whiny mew.

That was Greece in the '40s and those were people to be proud of -- some of them at least.



Today's Greeks are much more comfortable and many have the ultimate symbol of success: the Porsche Cayenne.

They are less fortunate in other ways. Today's Greeks have less to be proud of. Indeed, in a "global world" they have very little to be proud of: check out the Minister of National Defence, * for example.







* to do him justice, the guy has some experience in urban militia: he spent some time studying at faco (Paris2) which used to be populated by right-wing activists.

**or women, insert as appropriate. In the quote above it was Ioannis Metaxas, a General)

Plus ca change, plus c'est... changé!!

I was in hospital for a week (not recommended) and spent some time talking to physios. Our short converastions took us to trips abroad; for the most part to Paris, France. That's where my home used to be. (Everyone in the hospital asked me where my home used to be.)

Well you know what we say about les Parisiens... unhospitable, unwelcoming, bad-tempered, etc.

The physios -- both -- as well as one of the nurses who spent part of her honeymoon there spoke to me about "how nice people were in Paris; hospitable, nice, helpful!"

Some things do change.

Maybe Athenians could follow suit.

Political Philandering... the extreme right meets the extreme left

Walking past the Greek Socialist Party's HQ in Athens the other day I heard a snippet of a conversation. As two persons entered the building, I heard one saying to the other "...a good position indeed! And he's not even one of ours" (in fact the person said, "...he isn't even a party subscriber"...!)

How many times have I heard this, both in France & in Greece! It is certainly not a uniquely Socialist matter, the incident above is fortuitous.

Nowadays I rarely hear this in France any more...

But anyway, it got me thinking.

Politics & personal gain is thicker than water. Appurtenance is everything: one must belong & thereby acquire a stronghold in order to survive -- or concede defeat. You can't fight them, join them. Tight-knit groups.

In non Anglo-Saxon democracies the most vociferous and staunch political fighters traditionally have been the (seriously) left wingers. In recent times, a new force, the (serious) right wing have surfaced. One only needs to look at French, Austrian, German elections and/ or political gatherings. In Greece, the "Official" exponent of the "official right wing is LAOS (the acronym read "people"). Laos is very soft core compared to its northern brethren; Greeks don't really like political hard core despite their rampant adolescent behaviour.

To a degree all of these parties tout a populist approach mixed with half baked nationalistic superiority.

There is, it seems, an interesting difference between the Greeks and the rest: the Greek right wing talk seems to echo the left-wing feeling. In fact the die-hard self-appointed left wing evangelists are just about as clear in their nationalistic-populist speech as the Right wingers are abroad.

I know one expects to hear bullshit bandied about in the political arena -- but this is overcooked.

It is also too bad, when the voice of moderation & down to earth common sense comes from a party like Laos. They rarely refer to "ours"; they, as all extreme right wing players always think in terms of inclusion rather than exclusion.

And their popularity rose 50% from 2007.

Ok, it's still only <6%.


Another unusual thing is that Greek TV is resolute in its support of anything left-ish: hard luck stories, the rich becoming richer at the expense of the poor who become poorer. There is a good measure of pseudo-populist content mixed with expensive looking ladies brandishing their designer wear or underwear, all served with a few twists:

* the TV propaganda does not touch the tax-free income of its stars. It is not quite clear why the presenters do not touch this issue...

* there is no escape from misery.


So far, only one TV persona /writer /political commentator turned politician, Ms L. Kanelli, makes any sense and is thereby worth listening to. Other than the wit value, she makes sense. She also knows her history and her grasp of the Greek language is refreshingly superior. Compared to her, other politicians are lukewarm at best.


*L. Kanelli is an MP with the local Communists. Amazingly, she is also one person who defended Milosevic.

Elections in Greece: Well, whaddya know, Socialists again! ND vs PASOK: 0-1

Greece voted Socialist yesterday, ending a 6 year tenure of the conservative New Democracy party.

Mr George Papandreou, leader of the Socialist party, a US-born male, not the wittiest boy in town, is to become the 3rd generation prime minister in Greece -- following his grandfather and father.
Sign of the times: Greece honours (nepotist) tradition!

In fine, however, these electoral results remind me of a singles tennis match; as it happens, it is not really the Socialists who won, but the Conservatives who lost.
Whatever.
Hopefully, people living in Greece will not have to suffer, yet again, the customary PASOK arrogance...


Further: digging deeper into electoral mechanics, there is no doubt that from an operational point of view one had to vote for one or the other of the major parties. Failure to do so could easily lead to a minority in parliament, in turn leading to complications, frail coalitions, and ultimately new elections... ad nauseam.

Yet, a good 20% of the voters chose one of the other parties -- i.e. the ones you have on the menu even though everyone knows that their cumulative contribution to day-to-day administration and their grasp of social matters, is nil. They are vociferous and stultifying of course.

So why do people choose them?
I believe it is a non-rational (as opposed to irrational) vote: it is an emotional choice. Nostalgia and the sadness for lost causes and broken dreams
E.g. why else, if not for die-hard emotional reasons, would one vote for Soviet-type communists? God (Lenin) Bless them, the Soviet Union does not exist any more!

And you get many others, too: mostly revolutionary of one ilk or another; not to be outdone, there are humorous choices too (ex: KOTES= HE. N.S.)


So, fortunately, for all those who have the guts to vote anything BUT utilitarian: in Greece there was choice -- 16 choices in fact.


How many countries are thus fortunate?

"DE-BAIT", in Greece

On Sept 21st 2009 the leaders of the two major political parties in Greece, Nea Democratia and Panhellenic Socialist Movement, met before the TV cameras for a show reminiscent of the Eurovision trash-song contest.
Minus the actual voting, of course. That comes on Oct 4th.
That's a shame because,

• it's the best part of the (any) Eurotrash show,

• it would save taxpayers in Greece an estimated (and mind-boggling) Euro 115-125 million in subsidies to politicians & their parties.

Not to be outdone by the leading role politicians, TV entertainers ensured their own full star billings by extending the event on either chronological side: Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we had pre and post debate discussions and shows. Free content.
The pre's analysing, and speculating on what the two leader were to say; the latter analysing and and speculating on what the leaders actually did say (or not, as the case may be).
Not to put a too fine point on it, little was exchanged that had political consequence.

May I dare propose the following brief but (I believe) no less accurate summary?

• New Demo: I've had it with all the bozos around me. Same old bull, plus ca change plus c'est la meme chose. Country's run by a bunch of lazy morons, anyway.
• Pan Socialist: "I've got a dream, I've got a vision: I'm riding the donkey and leading the country. It is my turn to ride the donkey. They're not the only ones with bills to pay..."

Allegedly, viewership was low in the <24 year olds.

Who said Greek voters are not choosy when it comes to TV entertainment?

"...votez corruption..." Will the Greeks hold out (and on?)?

During French elections two years ago, the slogan "vote for/ choose corruption over fascism..." was aired and heard quite often, urging voters to avoid falling for the extreme Right Wing's sweet siren song of paradise to come. The matter there was clear: choose the lesser evil
As some of us know, the electoral results were in line with the injunction: France chose a run of the mill gov ("corruption") -- rather than the Right Wing paradise.

I Greece, we are past democracy and related sentimentalist bullshit. Voting is a football match, only more expensive and even less fair.

To go back to the french paradigm, one of our problems in Greece is that voters are not faced with a similar choice between two or more evils -- or chosing between windfall solutions; it is all about making a quick buck -- 1.4bucks, to be precise, the Euro having clambered up the scale lately.

So the up and coming elections in Greece are really about choosing the party in which we are best connected, and hoping they will win. If we are connected to the winners , we too can hope for a small share of the spoils...

It is a pity.

Of course this is not a unique case... bemoaning the situation in Greece as if it were better elsewhere, because there is no evidence that politicians are better elsewhere.

It is just that things are so blatantly obvious and unrestrained in Greece, that public Administration enjoys writing the rules to its apparatchiks satisfaction at any junction, that rule of law is talked about more than it is applied, that living in Greece is best for people above the bog-standard law. And of course, Investing in Greece is best left to people who are well connected politically and otherwise, and can hope for serious government contracts -- and/or government influenced favours.


In light of the above, Greeks have held up pretty well. While people living in Athens are generally hostile, with psychopathological aggressive tendencies, they survive. Without proper political representation, un-empowered police (who are still the "bad guys"), iffy schools, expensive lifestyle and expensive real estate...
Only the country's representative Basket Ball team has something to say for itself. Indeed, in that respect it probably is unique in its partiotic duties.

So, the electoral motto no one voices out loud in Greece is, "Who cares about Democracy?
Who is it, who knows somebody, who knows the King, who holds the purse strings? That's who you vote for!"

On the Road to....

...nowhere.

An news entertainment channel, "CNN", has been posting an "On the road to recovery" logo for some time now. Presumably the idea is that some of the optimism will rub off on people -- and things will be hunky-dory yet again. Wishful thinking?

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, as people flock off to (the) sea and summer respite from all worries, the Greek government is paying lip-service to what happens when September comes. After all, history has it that, left alone, problems are apt to resolve themselves.

Well, not to put too fine a point on it, but the present stock of Greek politicians is no better speculating on a fledgling economy than the transport authority is in planning trolley schedules -- and that ain't saying much.

For a country with low industrial activity and a very small proletariat, i.e. lower vulnerability to the crisis, Greece has made an amazing mess of its finances; GDP is dropping slightly (check out OECD for interesting figures) while debt is flirting with 13%. Official unemployment is 10%. By the way, the good thing about unemployment statistics Greek style is, they do not account for people not registered with the unemployment agency. Thus, statistically at least, the country is doing better than it actually is...

The problem is not the actual mess -- but that this mess now shows. For years, Greece has survived on cooking reports or, simply, looking better than she actually was; after all, paraitre rather than etre is something of a cornerstone of for contemporary "grecity".

The problem here is that a crisis is real life as opposed to socio-impressionist comedies that are played in a social context...

We expect the crisis to be perpetuated in Greece due to the government's immediate need for cash -- thereby pulling money out of the market and starving the economy of cash... Hopefully, and by divine intervention, this will go away magically by October. If it does not, then only the global economy recovery (or Chinese lackey money) will save the day.


For those of us who have children, lets stop whining and consider the following very brief stories:
a) a 34yr old woman and mother of one, a marketer by trade, suddenly dissapeared from the Greek job market. The reason? Her husband, a MD, was offered a position by NHS and moved to Scotland. She quickly followed suit. I spoke to her in Aberdeen and she said in no uncertain terms, "excepting the sun factor, life is far better here: we have good schools, nice people, mothers take turns in baby sitting the children, we go out during the week (!), and the incmoe is more than enough for us to live on. We may not be rich, but we are peaceful and quiet. I'll be back for 10 days' holiday mext year..."

b) A businessman, active in the hi-tech defense sector, is aiming his company toward international sales. These now account for 25% of his company's turn-over. His sector is certainly not hit by this (or any other) crisis. Last week we met over a coffee and he declared "45% is the magical number". "For what", I asked. "At 45% income from abroad, I'm moving out". "Where to?" "I don't know yet. But with my wife we are preparing our move putting money aside and studying countries. With two small children to raise, Greece seems too complicated a country; no planning ahead is possible, governments constantly change their minds and the rules, schools are either too expensive or too shoddy, brain-drain seems to be on the rise..." But you've never lived abroad before!" "So what. I'll learn. I'll start again, it's not the end of the world..."


Ανδρών επιφανών πάσα γη... οίκος

Self Importance or Total Lack of Self-Confidence?

Yesterday I attended the Commencement at the College(s)*. This is the annual graduation event at my old school which is also my son's new school!

As a graduate and a parent (of a student, that is), I have the standing invitation to attend and parade. It is, of course, an event of some import, and Greece being what it is not (i.e. a country honouring institutions, decency, and self-respect), such happenings are all the more noteworthy and attend-worthy.

A man walked passed me, late (which in & of itself does not matter) and demanded to be seated. A lady rushed to help; she works at the college, part of the admin staff for 20 odd years and volunteers as many others, to make this event happy & memorable every year. She asked, "may I see your invitation, please" and received the gruff answer "Deputy minister of education here".

Eh what? Your parents give you a name, mite? Or is it that everyone should recognise you, because that is a school and you work temporarily at the ministry? To which one may ask, "what have you done to deserve recognition? Obviously not much, because no-one does recognise you." And finally, would it not be nicer if you simply gave your name?


You may have noticed His Beatitude spoke clearly, briefly and humbly, with imagery and friendliness. Remember, He, is an Archbishop. He does not flaunt it.


I am dismayed at this objectionable person representing, in his own way, the country of Socrates & others (for your benefit, that's a philosopher, lived a long time ago, now dead. Not the Socrates who has the Taverna).
Either too full of himself or too self-effacing, dismayed at not being recognised and angry at himself for being a nonentity. Clearly to his mindset, his (temporary) title provides his only raison d'etre. He disallows himself the right to be. Fine.
There are good analysts around, the aforementioned woman is not of them. She's just a volunteer trying to be nice and help make this a memorable event for the kids graduating, the parents, the graduates and all the friends.


I know I sound lame, but I do understand that these people, politicians, are enemies and as such dangerous to the school. They must be treated with great care... so I cannot describe this man in plain English.


Nevertheless, for a party that touts "the power of responsibility", it should perhaps choose its public representatives more responsibly -- or at least teach them manners and, perhaps, humility.




Whatever may be the case, that party also comprises serious and decent people. To these, I kindly request:

Please don't let your colleagues harm our school!
Just let us be, leave us alone.
(I promise to try to get you all invited and perhaps even, help to get your kids admitted so you can brag about it.)

*As in "Athens College & Psychico College", i.e. the colleges, as Athens College, the school, is wont to be now called, having split into two organisations following the request of a idiopathically psychotic past Prime Minister (he's now left us to greener pastures, having himself joined some such).

What's Good About Greece, nowadays

A good and rare thing about living in Greece nowadays is immunity; another is impunity. Both, are privileges open to some segments of the population.
Anyone working as a journalist and equipped with a media's card, for example.
Impunity.

People expressing their just -- or not so just -- opposition to you-name-it, en masse.
Impunity.

Now, of course, this impunity is selective, i.e. does not apply to everything nor does it apply in the same way to everyone enjoying it.
I.e., "journalists" are not really allowed to break shop-windows; liberation hooligans are not really allowed to park their Jeeps wherever they like, or break into homes at will.

Neither is allowed to kill anyone; only politicians can do that -- and it's not recommended even for them.

This selective liberal immunity vs. strictly prohibited acts is a bit like buying prescription drugs at a Greek pharmacy: all you have to do is ask for them. You don't really need a prescription. Since most medication in Greece officially requires a prescription, it is easy to realise that, either MDs would have to spend their time prescribing aspirin (prescritpion drug until recently) or pharmacists would sell nothing. Drugs, however, (Xanax, for example) are distributed under prescription only, and no amount of cajoling will get you anything at any pharmacy in Greece without it.


But for those who use and abuse it, this selective immunity is a good thing to have. The other day, the police had cleared an Athenian street of its rogue parked cars -- all except for a Renault sporting an "ERT" sign. No doubt, a world-renown journalist breaking the story of the century!
Stay tuned...

Why does one keep a blog?

It has become a customary thing to sit and write on a public medium, be it a forum or a site or a blog. Apart from the quest of popularity and the need to make oneself heard, I asked myself what it is exactly deep down that makes us want to do it.

Could there be an overwhelmingly personal, human dna-related explanation for the mounting number of terrabites dedicated to lonesome soliloquies?

In a world where the nagging frustrations are dealt with in a desultory manner, and cyberspace is quick replacing the village square, the first thing that comes to my mind is, Thank God for the Internet, because at least some contact is achieved in this fashion and something is always better than nothing in my book. However, this explanation does not go too far below the surface of things -- which is where we want to be.

I think there is a more immediately recognisable source for the urge to cyber-blab and waffle and it is rooted in peoples' natural gregariousness. Indeed, isn't the forum, or a frequented blog, a recreation of the erstwhile community with all its components?

Less the physical presence and contact, of course, the cyber community is where one is heard simply because one is there, part of that community; and one exists and is acknowledged as such by that fact itself. In our overwhelmingly urban society being heard is to exist and vice-vera; it's a way of rising above anonymity.
On the other hand, it is no plain sailing as communicating / talking / touching others, requires a strategic approach with set tactics and rules of operation.
Not so with communities -- the small size, the customs inherent, the stories that (used to) emanate from each community are (were) legion. Of course, one of the staples of such communities is that no-one is anonymous and nothing is secret!


So, have we reached the point where the quest for privacy and anonymity has taken us to the other side where we now look for that locality, the sense of "growing old together"?

I think so. And there comes the frustration of cyber-contact, a frustration that can only be ultimately washed away through actual contact.

The blog, is one's own tiny little forum, a little voice unhindered by custom, rules, lies, or circumstance other than our own. But it's one voice amongst millions of others, many more added every second.

Some voices are lucky and around them, forms a community. So what of it's virtual, it is a community of sorts, and soemthing is always better than nothing...