Setting SYRIZA Straight, NYT Gets It Wrong on Debt

[G_j]

http://fair.org/blog/2015/02/14/setting-syriza-straight-nyt-gets-it-wrong-on-debt/

Setting SYRIZA Straight, NYT Gets It Wrong on Debt
By Andy Robinson

As corporate media prepared to caricature the new Greek government led by the anti-austerity SYRIZA party as dangerously naive radicals, the New York Times (1/29/15) published a piece by Liz Alderman with a devious suggestion that SYRIZA Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis does not understand the basic debt dynamics of his own country. She then followed up with her own erroneous definition of a fiscal "primary surplus," a crucial accounting concept for the Greek debt work-out.

Here's the Times report (emphasis added):

When pressed to describe how Greece would pay for bonds falling due in the coming months without taking the €7 billion installment, Mr. Varoufakis replied, "Let's not talk about details." To SYRIZA's detractors, such remarks might signal that the new government does not understand the magnitude of Greece’s financial challenges. But Mr. Varoufakis suggested that the government could finance its obligations by reducing the target for the so-called primary surplus, the amount of cash in Greece's coffers after expenses and interest payments.

But Alderman got the primary surplus back to front. The definition should actually be before interest payments–the primary surplus being a measure of whether a government would be spending more than it takes in if it weren't paying back past borrowing. Could it be the Times reporter does not understand the magnitude of Greece's financial challenges?

Varoufakis surely does. He is a top economist, author of the influential Modest Proposal for Resolving the Eurozone Crisis, a Keynesian plan offered as an alternative to austerity. Before being named Finance minister last week, he was working on debt dynamics with James Galbraith at the University of Texas at Austin.

The New York Times' headline characterized him as "feisty."

Andy Robinson is a reporter in Madrid, Spain

[libdem4life]

1. He is a straight shooter...I imagine he caught on to them after about the second question and

refused to play their little game. I've seen him and he suffers no fools.

[Fred Sanders]

2. The Western media bank funded propaganda machine does not need facts or credibility, it needs volume.

Yanis knows more about economics than the bought and paid for journalists could ever imagine exists.

[G_j]

3. Syriza leader confident ahead of eurozone crunch talks in Brussels

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/15/syriza-eurozone-brussels-alexis-tsipras-greece-anti-austerity

Alexis Tsipras says he is confident Greece can secure a deal, but faces growing criticism at home for softening anti-austerity stance

Greece’s new prime minister Alexis Tsipras is “full of confidence” his country can secure a deal to ditch strict austerity measures while still satisfying Athens’ international creditors, despite warning that crunch talks in Brussels today would be “difficult”.

As a key deadline approaches for Greece to either agree to stick to its existing bailout programme or reach a compromise with its lenders, eurozone finance ministers meet again on Monday in an attempt to hammer out an agreement.

The new leftist Greek government is arguing for an end to relentless cuts imposed as a condition of the country’s rescue funding and wants more time to prove that a more pro-growth approach will work better. But it faces opposition from other eurozone countries, most notably Germany, which have pushed for the strict terms of Greece’s €240bn (£180bn) bailout programme to stay in place. Talks in Brussels last week made no headway in resolving the standoff.

But Tsipras also faces growing criticism from hard-left militants in his own party for appearing to row back on some pre-election pledges to ditch austerity measures.

Asked about the Brussels talks, the 40-year-old prime minister told German news magazine Stern: “I expect difficult negotiations on Monday. But I am full of confidence.

..more..

[Jack Rabbit]

4. Ah, the NYT. The class of the (neo-)liberal media.

I'm ready for Yanis in 2016.