Debt history capsized Greece

Greece reached today’s impasse by coming clean about a secret, to begin with.

Soon after he was elected to lead the country in autumn 2009, the prime minister blew the whistle.

George Papandreou said Greece had lied to join the euro currency:

“Today, we are facing a deficit of up to 12.7 percent of GDP, and a soaring national debt of nearly 300 billion euros. Greece faces the risk of sinking under its debt.”

At the first crisis summit, the countries of the European Union promised to support Greece.

Austerity policy promised and then executed by Greece proved to be economically toxic, and therefore toxic to ordinary people, whether the massive expansion of a bipartisan clientelist state in the 1980s was to blame or foreign bailiffs.

The Greek debt was revised upward, to 15 %. Come December 2010, the markets all but stampeded. Ratings agencies downgraded the country, circling, watching.

In 2010, the debt climbed to 350 billion euros, unsustainable. Greece asked for outsi