Kiss Tax Revenues Goodbye – Greek Civil Insubordination Takes On A Surreal Twist
by Tyler Durden
ZerHedge.com
10/12/2011
While we understand the motive of Greeks to cripple the financial nerve center of the country by effectively immobilizing the finance ministry and subjecting the country to a 9 day shutdown, we are yet to witness the ingenuity of the people, when angry, to completely lock down the country’s financial apparatus, especially when it comes to the revenue side of the ledger. Behold the latest reason why the next time the Troika does its paper napkin “assessment” of the Greek deficit to GDP it will be double digits, and have a 2 handle.
As Bloomberg reports: “The GENOP union, which represents workers at Public Power Corp SA, has blocked access to the building where company bills are issued in Athens to protest a property tax which is to be paid via electricity bills, state- run Athens News Agency reported, without citing anyone.” That’s right: one needs actual physical presence in Greece in order to be able to enact the key component of the most recent Troika “compromise.” Which the government does not have. This leaves two options: risk an all out civil war as G-Pap lets the police out and begins a confrontation between the broader population and the government or, more likely, do nothing, hope nobody in Germany realizes that Greece is doing absolutely nothing to collect taxes, and continue the status quo charade, which is one where Greece is merely a conduit for the ECB to fund Greece so it in turn can fund European banks with interest payments and in the process preserve some credibility in the Euro, and make the jobs of JCT, and soon, Mario Draghi, non-redundant.
In light of all this, we wonder just how much sabotage may have been a factor in the recent discovery that Greece had run out of ink to print tax forms with. A conservative estimate? 100%.
