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Meanwhile, in Europe...
For years, since the onset of the euro crisis, we have heard that the crisis is over. Every year, politicians keep on telling us that the worst is over, but that next year will be so much better. Do you really think so? Here are some hard facts & figures instead of wishful thinking of lying politicians showing that the euro crisis is not over. On the contrary, things are getting worse.
Italy
La Dolce Vita, the good life, is no longer achievable for millions of Italians. Italy is the third largest Eurozone country and is in dire straits. Public debt has ballooned to well over 130 percent! Is this money ever going to be repaid? Who is going to do that? The country has one of the fastest aging populations in the world. Italian women, when having any children at all, prefer to have just one child. In order for a society to maintain a healthy demographic balance, they should have at least two. Nonetheless, unemployment, from a European perspective, is relatively low at 12 percent. But wait, youth unemployment is virtually at 40 percent. So there are no jobs in Italy, public debt is out of control and its aging population lays a heavy burden on both income taxes and Social Security payments.
Spain
Spain is one of the Eurozone’s largest countries. It is not in a recession, but in a downright depression. Do you need some figures? Unemployment stands at 26.3 percent?. That means more than one out of every four workers is idling and receiving benefits from government and waiting for better days. Even worse, youth unemployment is a staggering 57 percent. Indeed, more than one out of every two youngsters is out of work or is not expected to find one soon. Do you need more proof? Spanish government is spending billions on Social Security, money it simply does not have. Public debt has gone from a fairly modest 30 percent in 2007 to well over 90 percent this year and will soon move to 100 percent and beyond.
Portugal
Portugal is one of the smaller Eurozone countries in the Mediterranean Sea with an economy that is in shambles. The country had to be bailed out by the rest of the Eurozone to the tune of €78 billion. Public debt is around 128 percent, hardly lower than Italy’s. Unemployment hovers around 16.5 percent, which is unsustainable in the medium term. Youth unemployment stands at a depressing h 42 percent.
Although it seems that Portugal has lived up to its promises as part of the bail-out programme, the country will need a second bail-out coming 2014. Of course, it will be paid by other Eurozone members having a healthier economy.
Europe in shambles
Politicians babble about the worst of the crisis being behind us, or even ‘fixed.’ That is just cheap talk. The hard facts & figures prove them wrong. Europe is on the verge of a genuine collapse. On the one hand, this is because the Euro simply does not work, but makes things worse instead. On the other hand, Eurozone member states are simply unable to devaluate their currencies as they are part of the single currency bloc. As long as this flawed monetary currency, or rather political currency, is kept afloat, less well-off countries within the Eurozone will continue to suffer.
The ECB, the European equivalent of the Fed, will do ‘whatever it takes’ to keep the single currency alive. For now, markets have accepted this, but in the near term they will call their bluff. When, not if, that happens, the euro will be gone and with it billions worth of paper assets, wreaking havoc on an already damaged economy.
Does the graph below suggest the crisis has been solved?
Courtesy: Zerohedge… of course
Europe has run out of money
The Eurozone has close to 20 million unemployed. These are millions of people requiring need food, housing and medical care. This is simply unaffordable in the medium term. Youth unemployment is a ticking time bomb. It will not take long before young people will take to the streets, demanding jobs and a comfortable future.
Has the crisis been solved? Will the Eurozone recover any time soon? We would not bet on it. Europe is an ageing, moribund continent and the sh*t will hit the fan sooner rather than later. Europe has simply run out of money due to its overgenerous entitlements. What will it take for people to start noticing?
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Plunder woman and IMF Prada Woman have awesome competition from Malala; honest miracle woman.
Who will Mutti vote for as she is king maker in the land of the Amazons.
Jeff Bozos can just get the hell out of Dodge. From now Amazon.com will be run by a WOMANNN...
No woman no cry! Bye Bye Bozos.
Breaking: Greek government may indeed planning provocation operations!
http://failedevolution.blogspot.gr/2013/10/breaking-greek-government-may...
Zee News Yuan moves ones step closer to global currency China launched a currency swap deal with the euro zone on Thursday, in the country's latest push to transform the yuan into a major world currency.
Srlsly folks... what kind of trust you put in somebody sayin':
"Portugal is one of the smaller Eurozone countries in the Mediterranean Sea..." ?!?
Would you take any "advice" from such people?
And no, that was not a typo. Vote down this pos, send him back to primary school.
That's an ... "anal-yst"?
Does "anal-ysis"?
Youth unemployment is a major issue worldwide.It bothers me that at the moment there is an army of angry youth no jobs no prospects.This does not end well.
Take a healthy Europe like it was 20 years ago, add an ugly parasite like the Euro and the ECB, wait a few years and voila you have Europe today. The problem is not the European dog but the privately owned ECB parasite that is killing it.
That is nonsense. The Euro is the only good thing in Europe. The fact that socialism doesn't work is not the fault of a shared currency that can't be devalued. There would be hyper-inflation and even deeper collapse in about a dozen countries today if not for the euro. Then again, maybe that is the problem: nothing is being done to change the status quo because it is too stable.
I would not go that far to say that the EUR is the only good thing in Europe. in fact, if I had to decide between the EUR and the girls on this continent, I'd dish the EUR without batting an eye ;-)
yet yes. and no. important parts of the status quo are not ours to change. too much of it depends on how Washington decides "the rules". at the moment, at least
which reminds me: ban derivatives (again). break up the megabanks (again)
Oh right, Portugal, the country with that large coastline on the MEDITERRANIAN SEA.
Yup, it's a WORLD OF DEBT! See my funny music video "WORLD OF DEBT":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99xsqxzJnXs
Oddly enough, fiat monetary units work for the vast majority of the people as a unit of exchange. Where the entire system falls down is where the fiat is transitioned from a unit of exchange to a unit of wealth. A fiat is a fleeting unit of wealth because once dubbed as wealth those who control the creation of fiats become unrestrained, realizing that all they have to do to steal the real wealth of people and nations is to create more fiats for themselves and buy EVERYTHING: real property, production capacity, resources and naive and foolish slaves to do their bidding.
Wait a second...the CEO of Societe Generale was on CNBC with Maria Bartiromo saying Europe was doing much better than two years ago...
"Italian women, when having any children at all, prefer to have just one child"
What I have been told by Italian immigrant friends of mine is the ones having children are the Libyan immigrant workers. They have virtually taken over southern Italy.
"Italian women, when having any children at all, prefer to have just one child"
and in the same sentence he says;
"...youth unemployment is virtually at 40 percent."
So the solution to all the problems is automation and having more babies?
Won't any one here on ZH write a post that hones in on the real problems in a coherent logical way?
Don't ask the impossible from guys who worship RP's golden retriever ears.
these problems are the result of fiat currency and central planning, the more the wealth is centralised the more malinvestment you get, as people are not making their own financial decisions instead you get a few official assholes who think they know better than everyone else lining their own pockets and making dumbfuck decisions on behalf of everyone else.
cartelize the banks with central banking systems and poverty and civil unrest is always the outcome in the long term.
the writing is on the wall for europe and the US at this point.
There is always a voice that tells the greedy and corruptable that they are special and deserve more than others because they are special. It is funny how people's false-pride and vanity make them susceptible to the lies over and over again.
"Give the kid a job"Remember the old cartoon with Daffy Duck's nephew that wanted to be an opera singer?
Just as they get the horse eating a 100% sawdust it up and dies...every damn time.
The fact is, after losing national sovereignty, which is not the worst of it, - the EMU, that is - these countries inability to print and devalue their own currencies is a huge problem. I have Ambrose Evans Pritchard on RSS and he really sees the EMU for what it is; an unmitigated disaster.
EMU!!
What an acronym.
The Euro is about to fly like one!
"Portugal is one of the smaller Eurozone countries in the Mediterranean Sea". That will come as a surprise to the Portugese. They are a country on the Atlantic, with the whole of Spain between them and the Mediterranean.
Geography is becoming the forgotten subject in schools apparently.
EDIT: I should have read the rest of the comments before posting this. Others have obviously studied geography...
details, details... hey the Mediterranean is mere stones throw over the strait of Gibraltor from Portugal.
Sarah Palin could see it from her house but Russia is in the way.
Three years of austerity: "Zero in the quotient" for public debt
http://failedevolution.blogspot.gr/2013/05/three-years-of-austerity-zero...
"It is more than clear, that the policies of memorandum are leading to a dead end, and this is clear not only from the daily life of citizens in countries that adopted memorandum terms, not only from the financial data of these countries and bleak predictions particularly for growth and unemployment, but also, by statements from executives or former executives of IMF (Roumeliotis-Blanchard), which of course were made? purely for distraction purposes, and by numerous analyses of many economists in Greece and abroad. This is also clear, from the destruction that these policies brought, under the pressure of IMF, in any area applied in the past.
The dogmatic adherence on these destructive policies, shows that the real goal is to impose certain conditions in favor of a dominant economic oligarchy. With its starring puppets Merkel and Schäuble, this financial oligarchy, imposes “by fire and sword” these conditions in heavily indebted countries, through a peculiar economic war. Although we must be wary about the results of the polls, the recent poll in Germany gave a big relief to Merkel, and makes things easier, in order to continue the implementation of harsh austerity policies on indebted eurozone periphery. The financial oligarchy rushes to launch a violent federalization of Europe, based on purely neoliberal standards."
http://failedevolution.blogspot.gr/2013/04/a-scenario-nightmare-for-futu...
1. Portugal is not "in the Mediterranean Sea".
2. Spain, Portugal, Greece - and to a lesser extent Italy - have never been part of the rich North. Only for a decade or two they had a flirt with wealth. After 2007 they just returned to their old way of living, which was just fine. Not good, but fine. Most of the unemployment data is cooked, to get more bailouts - for the governments, not the people.
This is the only real problem: private debt... mortgages, credit cards. This is what weighs people down.
Public debt will never be paid, everybody knows that. Or does anyone believe that the US is going to pay back their debt? Of course not.
So you are saying we shouldn't worry about public debt? Cool...we can just stop earning and borrowing all together and just vote for the government to provide everything, paying with treasuries. I knew we could figure this out! We just needed someone to make it this clear. Deficits DO NOT MATTER! Amazing how much pressure that takes off.
Everythings fine, don't worry. Everything is fine. Everything used to be horrible but it is now fine.
because currency devaluation is such a wonderful solution to the problem of a non-inflating currency....
Exactly. As if the answer to all of the centrally planned problems is to give the central planners the power to put out their fire with more fire. The problem is that all of this was centrally planned. Whether they are executing it correctly or not depends on what is really in the plan. Regardless, Europe has a lot of centrally planned problems that aren't going away unless the central planners go away first.
When did Portugal pass through the Straights of Gilbratar and make it over to the Mediterranean Sea?
the bridge of euros has connected it.
2007
nitpicker
Maybe nitpicking, but I believe it happened at about the same time as the USA moved into the Indian Ocean.
They used to call it 'continental drift'.
Continental drift is the reason my mattress wants to move off the bed to the west. Every few days I have to move it back.
So that's where the seven new states came from...
Ahem... what? Let me guess: you're american...
He's an imbecile, trying to sell some advice about gold...
Glad someone else said it, so I wouldn't have to...
Geography seems to be a Mystical Art for most 'Mericans.
It's not just geography. Look at how the US scores, compared to the rest of the world, in math, science, etc. Observe the inability, often demonstrated here on ZH, to distinguish between homophones like "there, their, they're".
Look at how little US citizens know about civics. Heck, mention civics and most Americans think of a model in Honda's sales lineup.
That's not just the US, though: go to a french site and -er, -ez and -é endings are arbritarily used all the time.
"Observe the inability, often demonstrated here on ZH, to distinguish between homophones like "there, their, they're"."
Not to mention "should of" instead of "should have." That one's really unforgivable.
"Portugal" --- that's, like, some sort of county in the country of Europe, right?
It's a colossus compared to Luxembourg.
and a former global Great Power, where at a point in history the Pope had to broker a deal between Portugal and Spain so that "they would divide the world between them". See Treaty of Tordesillas
so a former global colossus. this can happen to all great empires
akak, you know my point of view in this: Portugal is an esteemed sovereign member of our mis-named european confederation
It has it's own culture, language, tax authority, army, fleet, airforce, police, courts and parliament. It's a nation. Practically the poster-boy of "the nation-state", way more than France or England. and a little family of previous colonies, among them the young giant Brazil
an excellent reminder to all "nation-state deniers", btw ;-)
definitely, "educated" in North America.
actually there is a thin change to pay off all that debt. before junking away, hear me out.
it would only require a new technological revolution which would lead economy to a new era. something equal to industrial revolution. for example the infrastructure projects such as railroads, canals etc of 19th century which crossed entire continents were part of the foundation for our contemporary industrial(not so much anymore) economy. can any of you imagine projects of that scale and ambition nowadays? i cannot. closest thing to it was the space program but that's long dead. problem is, even if we would have this breakthrough in sciences/technology, who would finance it? everything really innovative has been stonewalled or discredited by the people of money and power, and soon disappeared forever from the public view.
i think i should have add /sarc after all that wishful thinking but i didn't, because i think there would still be plenty of innovation, only in the domain of how to slave population socially, educationally and financially even further. cheers.
NSA.
Listening to every electronic transmission in the world is a technical revolution, of sorts.....