Support NeoGAF

[Deleted member 231381]

The surplus is a result of trading outside of the Eurozone. In fact Germany's trade balance within the Eurozone is quite balanced and you are basically claiming that they should run a large trade dificit just to compensate for its export success outside of the union.

No shit, of course it is. Buying a Euro with dollars is cheap if you want to invest in the German economy because the Greek economy drags it down. The whole point of the Euro being undervalued for Germany is that it mostly effects the trade balance with non-Euro countries. If you're purchasing German products from say, Greece, you don't have to buy Euros to do so because your country also works in Euros, so the concept of the currency being over/undervalued is diminished (hence the internal trade balance is, indeed, more balanced). You're just further demonstrating you don't really understand how these things work.

 

[Coriolanus]

With wireless cards, it'll be quicker than using cash in basically any scenario unless something costs exactly £10 and you have a £10 note.

Is there such a thing as a wired card?

True Finns turned their coats and are now on board with the bailouts.

/schadenfreude

vaderno.jpg

 

[Negotiator]

Btw, can someone tell me another country where food and restaurants are taxed with 23% VAT?

 

[StuKen]

The basic premise of the post is already flawed. If Germany wants a weak currency then they would want to have Greece in the EU, the claim that Schäuble forces a Grexit is quite the opposite of the claimed German goal.

Also any further action of the ECB to help Greece would weaken the Euro and would help Germany's export exbitions outside of the Eurozone.

Any ECB action will also fuel inflation within the Eurozone and that's the thing the Germans are pathologically afraid of. The status quo allows for weakening the currency without the spectre of inflation.

The schizophrenic demands of the Greeks regarding not wanting to play ball but stay within the Euro means the German negotiation position is vastly stronger allowing them to keep demanding more and more concession which pass on the monetary policy imbalances and insulating the German position from their own actions.
What Schäuble or any other finance minister say is meaningless. The actions are what matter and if Greece are negotiating from a position of we want to stay in if only to stop an immanent collapse of the country's banking sector Schäuble and the rest can make as many statements as they want to publicly re-enforce their position.

 

[Negotiator]

Is there such a thing as a wired card?

Wireless = contactless = NFC chip

 

[PdotMichael]

No shit, of course it is. Buying a Euro with dollars is cheap if you want to invest in the German economy because the Greek economy drags it down. The whole point of the Euro being undervalued for Germany is that it mostly effects the trade balance with non-Euro countries. If you're purchasing German products from say, Greece, you don't have to buy Euros to do so because your country also works in Euros, so the concept of the currency being over/undervalued is diminished (hence the internal trade balance is, indeed, more balanced). You're just further demonstrating you don't really understand how these things work.

I love how you are put two complete different things together. The claim that Germany's trade surplus would hurt the Eurozone and then even quote the total trade surplus is stunning in several ways.

But people will quote Bernanke until the end of the world.

 

[ElTorro]

Schäuble invented the perfect paradox.

I still hold to the theory that Germany always assumed that a de-facto debt relief is necessary. They can count after all. What they don't want to do is to actually grant a straight debt cancelation. They want to hide it behind tricks like decades of interest-free payback extensions. Schäuble, while now also being pissed on a personal level, does not want to conceded that point this early on. He want's to wait until nobody is looking anymore. And being a lawyer by trade, he probably also just hates breaking contracts and rules, at least when it does not benefit him.

 

[Uncle]

True Finns turned their coats and are now on board with the bailouts.

/schadenfreude

You know, there's a meme that for once might be pretty accurate here...

 

[KingSnake]

Bribery will never stop, so you may as well tax it directly...

But bribery most of the time avoid the taxable way of making transactions even if it's not done with cash. And when I talk about enforcing laws, I taking about tackling tax evasion directly. It's not that difficult, if there is will.

Even the bribery money end up somewhere in the system at one point. Why not start from that, instead of waiting for don't big change in how the money circulated in the economy.

 

[jakonovski]

Btw, can someone tell me another country where food and restaurants are taxed with 23% VAT?

Nobody. This is a plainly punitive plan and wasn't even intended to make economic sense.

You know, there's a meme that for once might be pretty accurate here...

Be my guest!

 

[Deleted member 231381]

What kind of infrastructure are we talking about here for going cashless?

As far as I see, you need the following three key elements.

1) Internet access everywhere.
2) Everybody who has a business has an adequately modern register machine or similar.
3) Backend on the bank's side to manage payments. That is already in place.

Establishing which of these things is the equivalent of "the Apollo project"?

The Internet access needs to be fast and stable. If it's not fast enough you run into problems in cities where thousands of transactions might have to be processed simultaneously. If it isn't stable, you can end up with periods where, given there is now no longer cash in this economy, people are literally unable to make purchases. There's probably other things, too. I'll straight up admit this is not my area of expertise; but as I said, my girlfriend's brother works for a large firm that's trying to expand cashless options in Germany and he frequently complains at how Germany doesn't have the infrastructure, so my presumption is that Greece is worse. I'll ask him next time I see him and post what he says.

 

[ElTorro]

The Internet access needs to be fast and stable. If it's not fast enough you run into problems in cities where thousands of transactions might have to be processed simultaneously. If it isn't stable, you can end up with periods where, given there is now no longer cash in this economy, people are literally unable to make purchases.

Speed is not an issue. Transaction payloads are very small. A ridiculously unstable Internet might be an issue. But it's easy to have redundant Internet connectivity, like landline and mobile at the same time.

More importantly, modern countries nowadays need fast and stable Internet anyway. It is not valid to argue against cashless payments with the challenges of providing Internet everywhere when you need to provide Internet everywhere anyway. The impact to the economy of not having it goes beyond just cashless payments.

And again, we don't need high-speed Internet for that. Basic mobile carrier connectivity is already enough.

There's probably other things, too. I'll straight up admit this is not my area of expertise; but as I said, my girlfriend's brother works for a large firm that's trying to expand cashless options in Germany and he frequently complains at how Germany doesn't have the infrastructure, so my presumption is that Greece is worse. I'll ask him next time I see him and post what he says.

Maybe he is referring to thing like NFC payments or more secure means of authentication. Paying with card is rather ridiculous from a security standpoint. Stealing another person's card is virtually the same as stealing their bank account, since very often the only authentication is a signature that nobody really checks. For this reason, many people advocate chargeable pre-paid cards as cash replacement. These would also go around another small problem, namely that every transaction is associated with a small processing fee.

Paying with your card per se doesn't require more than what I listed. The most complicated part are the IT backends on the bank's side, but these are already in place.

 

[Negotiator]

You don't need a high-speed connection. Google "GPRS POS".

 

[Deleted member 231381]

I love how you are put two complete different things together. The claim that Germany's trade surplus would hurt the Eurozone and then even quote the total trade surplus is stunning in several ways.

But people will quote Bernanke until the end of the world.

smh

There is no point in talking to you if you do not understand at an even basic level the things being talked about here. Germany has a trade surplus with non-Eurozone countries because the rest of the Eurozone drag the Euro down relative to Germany. Equally, Germany drags the Euro up relative to other Eurozone countries, so the currency is too strong for them, so they run a trade deficit with non-Eurozone countries. Because they do not control their own currency, this means they have no capacity to government run deficits without experiencing net money outflow (this is the damage Germany's trade surplus does to the Eurozone). This is the entire problem Greece is facing right now.

(the internal Eurozone trade balances are also affected, but simply because everywhere works in Euros, all Euros flow to the point of highest returns which is not Greece).

 

[KingSnake]

What kind of infrastructure are we talking about here for going cashless?

As far as I see, you need the following three key elements.

1) Internet access everywhere.
2) Everybody who has a business has an adequately modern register machine or similar.
3) Backend on the bank's side to manage payments. That is already in place.

Establishing which of these things is the equivalent of "the Apollo project"?

I will answer about the banks side, as I know this well. Most of the banks handle the infrastructure in such a way that while it needs to be very reliable and operational 24/7 it's also sized usually for normal operations (plus contingency) because infrastructure operational costs are quite big (and even if you can externalise some of it, there are banking laws that limit that). So any big increase in the number of cashless transactions means investments in the banking infrastructure. Even distributing POS' to all the merchants means quite a lot of money. Surely, this will be recuperated from them, but still. You can't just impose a paradigm change without big costs for all the private companies in the chain.

This increase in electronic payments happens anyhow naturally, as it's cheaper for the banks and it shouldn't be imposed in an authoritarian stile as a magic solution. The State should take care about it's own responsibilities and that is - enforcing law compliance.

 

[Uncle]

Be my guest!

The True Finns just shot themselves in the foot.

I don't know how much the rest of you know about true finnish culture (I'm an expert), but honesty and keeping your word are huge parts of it. It's not like it is in Brussels where you can become successful by being a liar. If you bend over for someone from the EU, you bring shame to yourself, and the only way to get rid of that shame is repentance.

What this means is the True Finn voters, after hearing about this, are not going to want them in the govenrment, nor will they vote for them in any elections. This is HUGE. You can laugh all you want, but True Finns have alienated an entire voter base with this move.

Soini, publicly apologize and cancel your decison or you can kiss your party goodbye.

Spoiler

One can dream, at least.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

Speed is not an issue. Transaction payloads are very small. A ridiculously unstable Internet might be an issue. But it's easy to have redundant Internet connectivity, like landline and mobile at the same time.

More importantly, modern countries nowadays need fast and stable Internet anyway. It is not valid to argue against cashless payments with the challenges of providing Internet everywhere when you need to provide Internet everywhere anyway. The impact to the economy of not having it goes beyond just cashless payments.

And again, we don't need high-speed Internet for that. Basic mobile carrier connectivity is already enough.

Maybe he is referring to thing like NFC payments or more secure means of authentication. Paying with card is rather ridiculous from a security standpoint. Stealing another person's card is virtually the same as stealing their bank account, since very often the only authentication is a signature that nobody really checks. For this reason, many people advocate chargeable pre-paid cards as cash replacement. These would also go around another small problem, namely that every transaction is associated with a small processing fee.

Paying with your card per se doesn't require more than what I listed. The most complicated part are the IT backends on the bank's side, but these are already in place.

That's quite plausible. Thank you for the post.

 

[Ty4on]

Btw, can someone tell me another country where food and restaurants are taxed with 23% VAT?

Restaurants in Norway have 25%, but food which is not served (including take away) has 15%.

 

[Theonik]

The big barrier is convincing small businesses to invest in modern POS terminals, to train them to use them and then to force consumers to use cards. Just this part is quite expensive, but more importantly it simply takes a lot of time. You can't really force this change either. You will likely cause huge disruptions in the economy, on par with the current capital controls which translate in MASSIVE costs.

Edit:

Restaurants in Norway have 25%, but food which is not served (including take away) has 15%.

That's not purely tax but is including service charge no?

 

[ElTorro]

I will answer about the banks side, as I know this well. Most of the banks handle the infrastructure in such a way that while it needs to be very reliable and operational 24/7 it's also sized usually for normal operations (plus contingency) because infrastructure operational costs are quite big (and even if you can externalise some of it, there are banking laws that limit that). So any big increase in the number of cashless transactions means investments in the banking infrastructure.

These investments don't scale linearly with the number of transactions. The largest part of the bill comes from upfront software development and ongoing maintenance of your good old 70ties/80ties COBOL mainframe, as well as its integration with newer systems like online banking, etc.

The thing is that once this system is in place, scaling it up or down with the number of transactions is easier and cheaper. Transaction processing isn't the most resource taxing thing in the world anyway. It has to be reliable from a purely functional point of view, but that is true whether you have 100.000 transactions per day or 10.000.000 transactions per day.

More importantly, the knowhow how to make and manage such systems is readily available for purchase.

The big barrier is convincing small businesses to invest in modern POS terminals, to train them to use them and then to force consumers to use cards. Just this part is quite expensive, but more importantly it simply takes a lot of time. You can't really force this change either. You will likely cause huge disruptions in the economy, on par with the current capital controls which translate in MASSIVE costs.

To be honest, I can't take that point seriously, when at the same time many people claim that Greece is being subjected to woes similar to the Versailles treaty. Humanity has surely dealt with more demanding and challenging tasks than training people how to use a credit card. Especially when they go through some hardship. If somebody would tell me that you can't implement cashless payments because people just don't want to be trained on using them, I'd rather take that as strong evidence that these people just don't want to change anything period.

Of course you need some time to change the way people pay, but that doesn't mean that you should not do it.

 

[EloKa]

Some quote on the currently used different online payment methods in greece:

With an Internet penetration rate of nearly 60%, only ⅓ of the nation uses smartphones. Like many emerging markets, many Greeks do not have reliable access to banks, leaving the majority of Greece’s population without debit or credit cards. Most of Greek online purchases are completed with prepaid cash cards, which provide a convenient alternative to credit or debit cards.

More detailled split:

• 11% Credit Cards
• 56% Prepaid Cards
• 25% Mobiles
• 6% Bank Transfer
• 1% E-Walltes

I don't see how Greece could theoretically go "cashless" anytime soon.
Even tho that split is only for online purchases you can already see that Greece still likes its cash and the internet penetration is way to low to go full digital.

Comparison to a cashless country like USA:

• 78% Credit Cards
• 2% Prepaid Cards
• 1% Mobiles
• 1% Bank Transfer
• 18% E-Walltes

 

[Negotiator]

mPOS:

Greece has a high percentage of smartphones.

 

[Theonik]

To be honest, I can't take that point seriously, when at the same time many people claim that Greece is being subjected to woes similar to the Versailles treaty. Humanity has surely dealt with more demanding and challenging tasks than training people how to use a credit card. Especially when they go through some hardship. If somebody would tell me that you can't implement cashless payments because people just don't want to be trained on using them, I'd rather take that as strong evidence that these people just don't want to change anything period.

Of course you need some time to change the way people pay, but that doesn't mean that you should not do it.

The problem is that the businesses will have to pay for it. A lot of these are small businesses where the cost of something like this proportionally high.
Of course it should be done, but we are talking about timeframes when it can happen. It's a very ambitious undertaking.

 

[Negotiator]

Some quote on the currently used different online payment methods in greece:


More detailled split:

• 11% Credit Cards
• 56% Prepaid Cards
• 25% Mobiles
• 6% Bank Transfer
• 1% E-Walltes

I don't see how Greece could theoretically go "cashless" anytime soon.
Even tho that split is only for online purchases you can already see that Greece still likes its cash and the internet penetration is way to low to go full digital.

Comparison to a cashless country like USA:

• 78% Credit Cards
• 2% Prepaid Cards
• 1% Mobiles
• 1% Bank Transfer
• 18% E-Walltes

Prepaid cards are a scam. Banks charge you €1-2 to top them up.

Greeks (even some young ones) are highly technophobic. They're afraid of hackers hacking into their bank accounts, so they think that prepaid cards are more "safe" to use, along with PaySafe.

Again: it's a culture/perception issue, not a technological one.

 

[ElTorro]

The problem is that the businesses will have to pay for it.

For purchasing a new register machine? That is surely negligible. And transaction fees are small. (< 0.02&#8364 You can easily apportion them to the prices in your store. And the government can adjust taxes to compensate for that.

 

[KingSnake]

These investments don't scale linearly with the number of transactions. The largest part of the bill comes from software development and maintenance of your good old 70ties/80ties COBOL mainframe, as well as its integration with newer systems like online banking, etc.

The thing is that once this system is in place, scaling it up or down with the number of transactions is easier and cheaper. Transaction processing isn't the most resource taxing thing in the world anyway. It has to be reliable from a purely functional point of view, but that is true whether you have 100.000 transactions per day or 10.000.000 transactions per day.

More importantly, the knowhow how to make and manage such systems is readily available for purchase.

I'm not talking about the core banking system. I'm taking about cards infrastructure and communications infrastructure used by the bank. Sometimes even hardware infrastructure costs. It might not be the biggest cost, but why should you invest in it if there is no need. Crab was quoting an average of 18 electronic transactions per year in Greece. Jumping from this to full electronic payments us quite a huge resize.

And I've yet to see 70's and 80's Cobol mainframe. Although I'm still nostalgic about the Novell network from my first year in a bank.

 

[ElTorro]

I'm not taking about the core banking system. I'm taking about cards infrastructure and communications infrastructure used by the bank. Sometimes even hardware infrastructure costs. It might not be the biggest cosmainframeshy should you do it if there is no need for them. Crab was quoting an average of 18 electronic transactions per year in Greece. Jumping from this to full electronic payments us quite a huge resize.

As I said, costs for upscaling backends are small compared to putting a backend into place in the first place. And if you have 18 transactions per capita in Greece, then you already have such a backend in place. Upscaling it is not the unsolvable or super expensive problem that seems to be conjured here. As I said, transactions have small footprint compared to everything else that we do in our modern world with online services.

And I've yet to see 70's and 80's Cobol mainframe. Although I miss the Novell network from my first year in a bank.

At IT consulting firms working for the financial sector you see them every day.

 

[Negotiator]

I'd rather see Greece using some EU/ESPA funds to promote a cashless society (via subsidized POS machines) than see absurd taxes such as 23% VAT on food/restaurants.

Norway may be rich enough to pay such high taxes, but Greece clearly isn't.

Complaining about "authoritarianism" is pointless when these taxes are strangling the economy...

 

[Theonik]

For purchasing a new register machine? That is surely negligible. And transaction fees are small. (< 0.02€) You can easily apportion them to the prices in your store. And the government can adjust taxes to compensate for that.

I edited but no, the cost would have to be heavily subsidised or there would need to be large pressure for them to invest.

 

[hydrophilic attack]

The surplus is a result of trading outside of the Eurozone. In fact Germany's trade balance within the Eurozone is quite balanced and you are basically claiming that they should run a large trade dificit just to compensate for its export success outside of the union.

How can you repeatedly misunderstand this point? And how can you repeatedly reply with this incorrect argument?

Countries like Greece and Italy in the Eurozone ensures that Germany will have an undervalued currency. The fact that Germany has an undervalued currency ensures that they can export goods at a lower price than if they had their own currency. This low price of German goods apply to trading partners outside of the Eurozone just as much as it does to countries within the Eurozone. Whether Germany's large trade surplus comes from eurozone countries or not is irrelevant to the argument. How many times do we have to explain this to you?

Out of curiosity, are you German? Trying to discuss these things with you fills me with as much frustration as it seems Varoufakis was feeling when trying to discuss with Schäuble. Is this complete inability to understand economic policy as much of a typical national personality trait as laziness supposedly is for Greeks?

 

[KingSnake]

As I said, costs for upscaling backends are small compared to putting a backend into place in the first place. And if you have 18 transactions per capita in Greece, then you already have such a backend in place. Upscaling it is not the unsolvable or super expensive problem that seems to be conjured here. As I said, transactions have small footprint compared to everything else that we do in our modern world with online services.

Nothing is unsolvable. But still costs money. And as I said, my issue is with this being imposed from the State when it will anyhow happen naturally.

At IT consulting firms working for the financial sector you see them every day.

Oh, so that's why there are so many billable hours.

 

[Coriolanus]

For purchasing a new register machine? That is surely negligible. And transaction fees are small. (< 0.02€) You can easily apportion them to the prices in your store. And the government can adjust taxes to compensate for that.

Plus there is also the decrease in security cost. Pretty sure quite a few businesses would absolutely love if they didn't have to handle cash anymore. (provided they were already collecting taxes, obv)

 

[norinrad]

Yes, but you are saying that someone going to a Dutch supermarket with cash can be turned away, that would I'm pretty sure be illegal and not compliant with EC good practice.
http://ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/euro/cash/legal_tender/index_en.htm

Many places in Greece will accept bank cards but you need to go much further than that to ensure it's viable to abolish cash and you still have issue of tourists.

No that's not what i said. There are a few where you can pay cash and a few where you can not. Not everyone carries cash around.

 

[Undead]

How about offering "incentives" towards cashless?

Like in UK we have companies that charge extra on bills if you don't pay by direct debit or if you require a paper bill to be sent to you.

1 Euro charge for a paper bill and a 2.50 Euro charge for processing cash payments for bills would be a good start towards "convincing" people to go cashless at least for bills to start with and that MIGHT get the ball rolling.

 

[KingSnake]

How about offering "incentives" towards cashless?

Like in UK we have companies that charge extra on bills if you don't pay by direct debit or if you require a paper bill to be sent to you.

1 Euro charge for a paper bill and a 2.50 Euro charge for processing cash payments for bills would be a good start towards "convincing" people to go cashless at least for bills to start with and that MIGHT get the ball rolling.

Yes, incentives are the better solution. I don't know about Greek banks, but in other countries there are bigger fees for cash over the counter transactions that for the electronic transactions, for example.

 

[Joni]

Btw, can someone tell me another country where food and restaurants are taxed with 23% VAT?

Here is an overview. As you can see, mainly for restaurants there are a lot of countries that charge their max rate, which for Europe differs between 17 and 27%. http://ec.europa.eu/taxation_custom...tion/vat/how_vat_works/rates/vat_rates_en.pdf

 

[hydrophilic attack]

You know, there's a meme that for once might be pretty accurate here...

You shouldn't have warned that it is a meme up-front. Part of the ritual is one or two new gaffes, who are not aware of the meme, actually believing that you're serious.

 

[Uncle]

You shouldn't have warned that it is a meme up-front. Part of the ritual is one or two new gaffes, who are not aware of the meme, actually believing that you're serious.

Well to be honest, I really do think that this might hurt their popularity quite a bit.

 

[Coriolanus]

hmhm

Greece’s interior minister Nikos Voutsis has said elections could come in September or October.

Speaking on Kokkino radio station, he said that elections are highly likely. The station reports:

“If it’s not September it will be on October and it will be a product of an overall insight-not just of the Syriza government- on the broader developments” he said.

Asked what would be the main question for the next election, the minister of Interior said it would be a mandate to apply our program.

A decision on a reshuffle would be made before 22 July, he added.

 

[Osiris]

Btw, can someone tell me another country where food and restaurants are taxed with 23% VAT?

Restaurants and take-aways are taxed at 20% VAT in the UK.

 

[Ether_Snake]

The basic premise of the post is already flawed. If Germany wants a weak currency then they would want to have Greece in the EU, the claim that Schäuble forces a Grexit is quite the opposite of the claimed German goal.

Also any further action of the ECB to help Greece would weaken the Euro and would help Germany's export exbitions outside of the Eurozone.

Wrong, Greece out of the euro would lower the euro's value due to lost confidence. Other countries would be expected to leave. Plus the ECB would have to print more euros than ever.

Btw, people keep saying "we can't trust the Greek government in following the deal!", but who can trust the Troika when Germany and co. say outright they want Greece out?

 

[operon]

Wrong, Greece out of the euro would lower the euro's value due to lost confidence. Other countries would be expected to leave. Plus the ECB would have to print more euros than ever.

Btw, people keep saying "we can't trust the Greek government in following the deal!", but who can trust the Troika when Germany and co. say outright they want Greece out?

They're offering the money, hence why its Greece they need to trust.
Surely it's in the Troika interest to help Greece get back on their feet as they might actually get paid

 

[StuKen]

They're offering the money, hence why its Greece they need to trust.
Surely it's in the Troika interest to help Greece get back on their feet as they might actually get paid

Then why ignore the IMF reports showing the next bailout is unsustainable. There is no impetus to fix anything but to keep the status quo which benefits the export conditions for European economies. The firewall is in place, there is no risk of contagion anymore. A default still means they will be paid eventually so the only cost is social and just like imperial misadventure of old foreigners are expendable.

 

[Ether_Snake]

They're offering the money, hence why its Greece they need to trust.
Surely it's in the Troika interest to help Greece get back on their feet as they might actually get paid

Everyone knows Greece can't pay back anyone going through with this deal because it's destructive. It's a trojan horse to privatize assets, and keep Greece boubded, since Germany can't kick them out. Basically, they went for a win-win situation.

And Shauble again said today he wants Grexit.

Edit: Nice to see Draghi himself say Greece needs debt relief.

 

[EloKa]

And Shauble again said today he wants Grexit.

nope.

 

[My words exactly!]

True Finns turned their coats and are now on board with the bailouts.

&#921;'ll post this again (this being GAF, i hope someone gets it)

I still hold to the theory that Germany always assumed that a de-facto debt relief is necessary. They can count after all. What they don't want to do is to actually grant a straight debt cancelation. They want to hide it behind tricks like decades of interest-free payback extensions. Schäuble, while now also being pissed on a personal level, does not want to conceded that point this early on. He want's to wait until nobody is looking anymore. And being a lawyer by trade, he probably also just hates breaking contracts and rules, at least when it does not benefit him.

A Wikileaks report from NSA interception revealed that Shauble was already aware that a debt cut was necessary from 2011 and he even supported it back then
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-...le-saw-greek-debt-unsustainable-even-after-ha

nope.

Yes
http://www.wsj.com/articles/grexit-...of-german-government-says-schauble-1436877063

 

[Nabbis]

True Finns turned their coats and are now on board with the bailouts.

/schadenfreude

What a surprise. Oh wait. Finnish politicians as a whole are even more of a joke than USA Republicans.

 

[Negotiator]

Politicians are clowns everywhere.

 

[Theonik]

Plus there is also the decrease in security cost. Pretty sure quite a few businesses would absolutely love if they didn't have to handle cash anymore. (provided they were already collecting taxes, obv)

Nobody is questioning that it's a good investment. Just that it's a significant upfront cost and a hard sell for small businesses.

Politicians are clowns everywhere.

It's kinda part of the job...

 

[EloKa]

Yes
http://www.wsj.com/articles/grexit-...of-german-government-says-schauble-1436877063

He said that a long-term voluntary Grexit might help the greece population in the long run. Like over a time period of 5 or 10 years.
Not a Grexit by force, not now and not anytime soon. He only stated that a Grexit might help the average population in Greece.

That's something total different compared to:

And Shauble again said today he wants Grexit.