General strike against pension reform sweeps Greece
Source: Agence France-Presse
17 minutes ago
Athens (AFP) - Greece was hit Thursday by a general strike against an unpopular pension overhaul that has rallied workers against the embattled government of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.
The 24-hour labour action has deprived the country of train and ferry services and will sideline dozens of flights.
Hospitals will operate on emergency footing, gas stations will remain closed and taxis have been pulled off the streets.
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The general strike -- the third in as many months -- is directed against government plans to lower the maximum pension to 2,300 euros ($2,500) a month from 2,700 euros currently and introduce a new minimum guaranteed basic pension of 384 euros.
Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/general-strike-against-pension-reform-sweeps-greece-075349833.html
yeoman6987
(14,449 posts)I know Greece is a financial mess, but to cut the pension that much is insane. I really thought 10 percent, not 70 percent.
happyslug
(14,779 posts)The $384 is a new MINIMUM Pension, I suspect very few people get that low amount now, most get the full 2700 Euros. The problem is a 10% cut is a cut most people can NOT handle. People live up to their income, thus a cut in income means they have to cut back on what they have become use to.
Remember the Observation on income:
1. As Income goes up, the percentage spent on necessities goes down.
2. As Income goes up, the percentage spent on luxuries goes up.
3. As Income goes up, the percentage spent on housing stays the same.
When a pay cut hits, it hits the hardest for it forces people to look into moving to cheaper housing. Worse in most situation (and this appears to be true in Greece), housing prices have gone up, so this cut is a double hit, the person on a pension must look for new cheaper housing, in an area where housing costs are raising.
This was the formula that lead to the General Strike of 1877 (The Railroads cut salaries, then raise the rent they were charging their workers for the houses the workers were living in).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Railroad_Strike_of_1877
http://railroads.unl.edu/views/item/strike_77
http://libcom.org/history/articles/us-rail-strikes-1877
https://books.google.com/books?id=ByYbAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA3&lpg=PA3&dq=1877+General+Strike+reports&source=bl&ots=HFbygHf9X7&sig=K3p3IoNvTh4D3ePdHaMb6AT9u2Y&hl=en&sa=X&ei=aBPeUeO2DNa04AP094C4DA&ved=0CE4Q6AEwBzgK#v=onepage&q=1877%20General%20Strike%20reports&f=false
Remember that is 10% of TOTAL INCOME, look at your own income, and determine how much a 10% pay cut will hurt you AND think that your cost of food and other necessities are going up as while as the cost of housing.
yeoman6987
(14,449 posts)I miss read that big time. To be honest, I'm relieved not that I want anyone losing their earned pension (even a dollar) but this at least isn't as bad as I thought. It will of course still hurt.
happyslug
(14,779 posts)I mentioned George's three observation on income above. The reverse is also true, but with housing and food both going up you are entering the area known as "The Iron Rule of Wages"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_wages
In simple terms, people can NOT work at any income where necessities to survive can not be obtained. While some economists point out this means people will reduce the cost of labor to where all they can afford is food and an mud hut, Ricardo writing in 1809 rejected this concept and said the "Iron Rule of Wages" varies depending on what a people think are "necessities"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Ricardo
When people hit this wall of wages, you have massive revolts for they see the alternative as starvation. Worse, as things improve the level of revolt INCREASES (Karl Marx pointed out this phenomena). The reversal by the present Government of Greece of its election promises indicates to the people something has to be done AND the actions of the Government HAS lead to the bottoming out of the economic problems and thus some improvement (again Marx pointed out it is in such period of improvement AFTER an economic disaster that you see a Revolution).
Things were going BAD for France in the 1787 Famine, but the Famine was over by 1789 and things were looking good when the French Revolution started in 1789.
You had a massive European Famine between 1844 and 1846, then when things improved after 1846, you have the Revolutions of 1848.
Russia worse year in WWI, was 1916, things were looking up by the end of 1916, thus the Revolution of 1917. Germany worse year was the Summer of 1918, but things were looking up by the fall, thus the German Revolution of October 1918 (and similar revolts in Hungary and Austria in the fall of 1918).
Hitler was appointed Chancellor in 1933, but the worse years for Germany had been the inflation crisis of the mid 1920s and then the depression which hit Germany in 1930, but Germany had turn the corner by 1932.
The Soviet Union was having hard times in 1986 to 1987 but the economy had turned around by the time of the attempted coup in 1989 that lead to the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Russia was again having its worse year in 1997, when it devalued its currency, but Putin did not replace Yeltsin till 1999, again as the Economy stabilized.
The main reason Castro stayed in power after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989 was the Cuban Economy did not recover till the late 1990s, but then the push for radical change had died out (One of the reasons for this delay was the refusal of the US to end its embargo on Cuba, spreading out the pain and given Castro a convenient scapegoat for the economic problems of Cuba in the 1990s). Bill Clinton did the same for North Korea when North Korea had its Famine in the 1990s, by refusing to give aid, even if refused, Clinton did not permit the problems of North Korea to end quickly, but to be dragged out and thus no revolution.
I bring up the above, for this may be the first step in a true revolution in Greece, something the rest of the Euro Zone does not want, but have NOT done anything to prevent.