Household incomes dropped by 15 percent in the second quarter of 2012, compared to the same period a year earlier, figures by Greek statistics service ELSTAT showed on Thursday.
Welfare benefits went down by 9.5 percent over the same period, data showed while indicating a 7.3 percent reduction in consumption.
At the same time, Greek households were hit by a 37 percent increase in taxes, ELSTAT said.
Households are estimated to have lost 5.4 billion euros in disposable income.
PS No comment. What should I comment on this?
I have a string in my heart for you “Greeks”. It’s sadly to watch all this “austerity measures”. But today I’m happy to be “home” in Sweden. In other cases I would have been one off the “Wheelies” on the streets of Xania, protesting against whatever!
//Ulf
The 15% drop is the drop in gross or net ? That is before or after you takeoff the extra 37% tax ?
I will try to check later
It doesn’t matter, as it’s expressed in percentages. The only difference is where do you start from, x or x-37%? The drop will still be 15%, the actual amount will be 37% less or not, depending on where your starting point…
This is why governments love percentages. It’s not half as bad if they say 15% less than it would be if they say gone down from 500 to 425. Most people will immediately know what difference 75€ less in their pockets makes. 15% alienates it just the little bit extra.
would somebody tell those stupid people that AUSTERITY alone does not work
in ireland we have soup kitchens in some of our high population centres
we have minimal growth rising unemployment and a growing sense of misery
they crack down the social tissue and cohesion through austerity. that’s all they want. reason?
Reason? “Divide et Impera”
1% of the world population ownes 99% of the total wealth, they consume 39 times more resources than anybody else, and are not about to let that position of power go. Through the use of gombeen-men like Samaras, “the Gump” Kenny, Draghi and others, they manage to keep it that way.
If you want somebody to stab somebody in the back for you, or a politician to shaft a complete nation, 30 silver coins was and still is the price. There are always takers….
Some food for thought, and another answer to your question: reason?
Who do you think is the driving force behind all of the Greek, Portuguese, Spanish, Irish etc experience?
http://www.newcommunityproject.org/consuming_appetites.shtml
Reason? – So the population accepts changes they would not normally accept. Question is what changes? I think it is also important to highlight the fact that government decisions would mean nothing if taxes were voluntary.
what changes would the population accept? tax hikes? health & welfare cuts? pension decreases?
You mean you had soup kitchens? They get closed down because of bureaucracy, like in Galway? Never mind the people, the rules must be obeyed?
http://www.people-in-need.com/766/abusing-power-to-hide-abuse-of-power/
35.000 families in a super rich country like Holland are dependent on food banks for their daily nourishment… There seems to be madness everywhere.
so many? tsk tsk tsk
Greeks do not pay tax, that’s why they are in this pickle in the first place! You can raise that tax to 50% and still only non government employees will foot the bill.
Have no sympathy for the people, they are all corrupt in their own little world thinking the rest of the Europe will bail them out
Nice to see that the EU manipulated media machine is still effectively spreading the muck. I have a good few friends who are “government employees” What would you like them to pay tax with, some of them haven’t been paid for 15 months or more… and my friends are nothing out of the ordinary. Others get paid in installments. Literally as in “take it or leave it” “It” can be as little as 20€ for a full week work. “You’ll get the rest when things get better”
The rest of Europe is making very sure “things” will not get better, on the contrary. They are working on 20€ a week becoming the norm. Cheap labour is the name of the game, so that the rest of Europe can keep it’s standard of living at our expense. “Our” being the PIIGS.
Hey Will, why don’t you stick to making silly Alien Independence day movies and lame Prince of Bel-Air comedies.
You obviously don’t know anything about Greece. Sure, many Greeks are tax cheats, but certainly not the Government employees as their taxes are taken automatically out of their salary before receiving the net pay. It is the private (non-governmental) people like lawyers, doctors, plumbers etc that have caused this problem.
Get your answers straight and go make another movie!
I must add here that taxes are autotomatically deducted by all employees (private sector) and pensioners. However nowadays, public servants still get higher salary & pension than the public sector. Their lump sum and complementary pensions were also even 70-80% higher than their contributions.
For people who say austerity is the wrong approach, how many greek bonds have you bought lately? Or is more money going to drop from heaven?
this kind of austerity we live in is certainly the wrong approach too. especially knowing that nobody is responsible for the mismanagement and the non-stop-borrowing of the last decades, and that I have to come up for the expenses others made.