One view of the austerity programme that is being carried out in Greece under the auspices of the eurozone is that it is leading to the pauperisation of the Greek working and middle classes, also that it is undermining intergenerational stability betweeen families due to the restructuring of pensions.
I would like to tie this to what you have already discussed, foreign investment and direct investment because you can only contain this huge problem (caused by the) internal devaluation that you are managing through new direct investment.
Before the Syriza government came into force under the previous government when we were told that things were going quite well, the record shows that foreign direct investment stock in billions of US dollars decreased by 3.8 billion between 2013 and 2014, that’s when the previous government was really pushing forward (with the eurozone programme). The percentage of GDP of direct investment stock and capital stock went from 9.8 to 8.5 in the same period. Similarly the number of green field investments between 2013 and 2014 dropped from 26 in 2013 to 22 in 2014. What is going make the current measures you are working on… improve Greek competitiveness? Because that’s where the cookie crumbles: what’s going to improve Greek competitiveness in what you are doing?
And could you give us more specific information about what plans you have or what directions you are going to take, beyond privatisations because privatisations are going to lead to a reduction in jobs not an increase in jobs, which is what you need.
Which sectors are you going to push forward and how are you going to do that within in this context of competitiveness in a framework of internal devaluation which is being so hard on the working and middle classes?
Post a comment