Pain of Austerity: Angry Greeks Face Yet More Cuts

September 10, 2012 from Russia Today

Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras is trying to push a new round of austerity measures through parliament in order to obtain a vital new cash injection from the EU. But obtaining consensus on where the latest painful cuts should come from is far from a done deal, as leaders of the coalition government disagree about where to slash spending worth roughly 12 billion euros. Samaras's allies in the government objected to across-the-board cuts on wages and pensions and also criticized plans to trim disability benefits. At the same time, Greece's foreign lenders, who are currently in the country to assess its progress on meeting the bailout terms, also rejected parts of the austerity measures, with talks set to continue. But the fiercest opposition to the cuts have come from the Greeks themselves, as Peter Oliver reports.

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Greek government-debt crisis

The Greek government-debt crisis is one of a number of current European sovereign-debt crises and is believed to have been caused by a combination of structural weaknesses of the Greek economy coupled with the incomplete economic, tax and banking unification of the European Mo... Explore this topic

Antonis Samaras

Antonis Samaras is a Greek economist and politician who has been Prime Minister of Greece since 20 June 2012. He has been leader of New Democracy, Greece's major conservative party, since 2009. Previously, Samaras served as Minister of Finance in 1989, then as Minister of Fore... Explore this topic

2010-2012 Greek Protests

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Greece

Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. According to the 2011 census, Greece's population is around 11 million. Athens is the nation's capital and largest city, its urban area also including Piraeus. Greece is strategically located at the cr... Explore this topic

Thessaloniki

Thessaloniki (Greek: Θεσσαλονίκη, IPA: [θesaloˈniki]), Thessalonica, or Salonica is the second-largest city in Greece and the capital of Macedonia, the nation's largest region. It is honorarily called the Συμπρωτεύουσα Symprotevousa (lit. co-capital) of Greece, as it was once... Explore this topic

Austerity

In economics, austerity describes policies used by governments to reduce budget deficits during adverse economic conditions. These policies can include spending cuts, tax increases, or a mixture of the two. Austerity policies may be attempts to demonstrate governments' liquidi... Explore this topic

Coalition government

A coalition government is a cabinet of a parliamentary government in which several political parties cooperate, reducing the dominance of any one party within that coalition. The usual reason given for this arrangement is that no party on its own can achieve a majority in the ... Explore this topic

Anti-austerity protests

Anti-austerity protests, chiefly taking the form of massive street protests by those affected by them and some of them also involving a greater or lesser degree of militancy, have happened regularly across various countries, especially on the European continent, since the onse... Explore this topic

Eurozone

The eurozone, officially called the euro area, is an economic and monetary union of 17 European Union member states that have adopted the euro as their common currency and sole legal tender. The eurozone currently consists of Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France,... Explore this topic

European sovereign debt crisis

The European sovereign debt crisis is an ongoing financial crisis that has made it difficult or impossible for some countries in the euro area to repay or re-finance their government debt without the assistance of third parties. In 1992, members of the European Union signed th... Explore this topic

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Greek government-debt crisis

Antonis Samaras

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