Word: greeks
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...clear case for additional measures," said Olli Rehn, European Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs, perhaps airing a not illogical belief that Greece may try to avoid all the pain necessary to resolve the crisis it created. "We're trying to change the course of the Titanic," shot back Greek Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou. "Anyone else doing this would get applause. But they tell us, 'You're not doing enough. You won't be able to do it anyway...
When the euro was launched in 2002, it was celebrated as a triumph of monetary unity. The 16 nations in the so-called euro zone could certainly use another dose of that founding spirit today. As questions mount about the very future of the currency due to the ongoing Greek debt crisis, there seems to be more anger in parts of Europe over Greece's financial recklessness than a willingness to save Planet Euro from imploding by bailing Athens out. That's certainly the case in Germany and France - the two largest euro zone economies - whose peeved taxpayers will have...
...country has no sense of responsibility, and now we're supposed to fix it," says Karen Schumann, 27, a Berlin media consultant. The complaint has a familiar ring to it. Greece has a staggering budget deficit of 12.7% of GDP and a $410 billion public debt, which free-spending Greek officials long kept secret from the rest of the euro zone. Now that Greece is on the verge of defaulting, its monetary partners will have to hand over huge loans to help keep the country solvent - all in order to prevent the euro from going into a free fall...
...strikes some people in France and Germany as being agonizingly ironic following last year's bank bailouts. "First we're forced to watch our taxes save irresponsible bankers and immoral financial markets from collapsing under their own greed, and now we'll watch as the same politicians give the Greek government money to pay debts it piled up and lied about," complains Jean-Charles Robert, an information-technology employee from suburban Paris. "It never ends - in fact, it just gets worse...
...pledge failed to uplift the global financial markets, which continued dumping Greek government bonds and pushing the euro down even further. Hopeful to reverse that, euro zone finance ministers held a follow-up meeting on Monday that was intended to show their collective determination to back Athens up. But the ministers seemed instead to belittle the cost-cutting measures that Greece had proposed by putting forth their own plan for the country to cut spending, raise taxes and finance its debt within 30 days...