Greece

[bluefargo]

Yah land could be half the price 2-3 years from now .... or it could be twice the price. Twice seems more likely to me.

On the subject of Greece there was a commentator on the radio the other day who said it is mathematically impossible for Greece to pay back it's debt. (Don't know whether that is true but my guess is probably)
Another story said 2/3 of the doctors in Greece don't pay income tax along with a lot of others. Apparently non payment of income tax is rampant in Greece.

[Prairiefire]

I'm not surprised,the BTO's in that nation and many others want a free ride on other folks work . The the country because little or no primary commodities has to rely on the tourist business to keep things going. They borrowed more than they can ever pay back, the bankers who lent them the $ had blickers on and were doing this rebundling of bad debt to make it look like it a BB or BBB debt when it fact it was a blend of very risky debt.

The USA has much the same just that because they trade world wide it does not register on the radar.There seems to be enough cash to pay the bills,especially the war materaland arms stuff. The only outfits making any $ out of all of this are the banks and the outfits who sell these countries stuff. We will pay for this fiscal shenanigan sooner or latter .By the way Canda has a big debt larger than when the Libs took over from Mulrooney .
The solution.....higher interest rates and inflation.... whoopee !!

[cottonpicken]

I don't think anyone here wants to look in the
mirror and talk about who does and doesn't pay
tax.Everyone is aware we have one of the lowest
corporate tax rates in the world?

100% corprate and private tax in the us would still
leave them a deficit.

I don't know canadas numbers but we would be
close.

These facts are hard for some swallow,just like how
much purchasing power the
"deflation/bond/cash/fixed income"crowd has lost.

Gold moves 600% and they don't relize the train
already hit them.

[bluefargo]

CP - I can't argue with you. You've studied this stuff; I haven't.

But I think there is some fundamental differences between Greece and places like Canada for instance.
Maybe I'm naive but for the most part most citizens here pay tax. I know I do my share. We all try to minimize tax.
But as I understand it the Greeks are very adverse to paying taxes and in many cases don't especially the rich.
How they get away with it I don't know.

So you have countrys like Germany loaning money to "irresponsible" countrys like Greece who have no chance to pay it back even if they were willing to change. Sooner or later Greece and others are going to default. What happens then?