Article FS4Q Reform in Greece is for the good of all Europe | Peter Ammon

Reform in Greece is for the good of all Europe | Peter Ammon

by
Peter Ammon
from on (#FS4Q)
Greece is going through difficult times. But proven economic reforms can create a Europe strong enough to meet challenges from Ukraine to Islamic State

Judging by the flood of comments that followed the recent European summit on Greece, a modern Greek drama is unfolding in which a small but proud nation, the motherland of democracy, is being subjected to senseless austerity by cold-hearted bureaucrats and penny-pinching foreign politicians. These comments have rather puzzled me.

A few days ago, the German parliament gave its approval to negotiations on a new financial assistance package for Greece worth up to a86bn (60bn). Germany's share will be a bit more than a quarter, or the equivalent of roughly a500 per household. That is big money and it's on top of the a215bn that Greece has already had under the first and second assistance packages in 2010 and 2012. Greece has received assistance equivalent to more than its entire annual GDP - which dwarfs, for example, the Marshall plan. All eurozone countries will contribute, despite some of them having per-capita incomes significantly below Greece's. This is a broad act of European solidarity.

What matters is to put Greece back on its feet and to restore trust

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