{"id":39528,"date":"2013-06-06T11:07:24","date_gmt":"2013-06-06T10:07:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/imf-recognizes-notable-failures-in-greek-bailout\/39528\/"},"modified":"2013-06-06T11:07:24","modified_gmt":"2013-06-06T10:07:24","slug":"imf-recognizes-notable-failures-in-greek-bailout","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/imf-recognizes-notable-failures-in-greek-bailout\/","title":{"rendered":"IMF recognizes 'notable failures' in Greek bailout"},"content":{"rendered":"

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) acknowledged that it made \u2018notable failures\u2019 in its handling of the Greek bailout, admitting they had underestimated how deeply austerity measures would stint growth.<\/p>\n

\n The IMF was successful in keeping Greece in the eurozone, which
\n prevented the entire collapse of the euro currency bloc, and have
\n helped keep the Greek economy afloat by pumping in over 200
\n billion euros ($258.8 billion).\n<\/p>\n

\n With Greece in its sixth year of recession, and with an
\n unemployment rate of 27 percent, in a rare moment of critical
\n self-reflection, the IMF, has issued a report<\/a>
\n asking many \u2018what if\u2019 scenarios, retracing their steps in the
\n Greek bailout.\n<\/p>\n

\n In the titled \u2018Ex-post evaluation\u2019 report released on Wednesday,
\n the IMF takes a slice of the blame in Greece\u2019s worsening
\n financial condition, as they grossly underestimated the impact of
\n austerity measures on its economy.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u2018Notable failures\u2019, according to the report, include failure in
\n restoring market confidence, the banks\u2019 30 percent loss in
\n deposits, high unemployment, waiting too long to restructure the
\n nation\u2019s debt, and a deepening of the recession.\n<\/p>\n

\n In short, under IMF policies, Greece\u2019s recession
\n worsened.\"Image<\/p>\n

\n The IMF have four main criteria for qualifying bailouts, but
\n Greece only fulfilled one out of the four.\n<\/p>\n

\n The report analyzes whether or not granting Greece \u2018exceptional
\n access\u2019 is justified now the country is in a much more severe
\n recession than the \u2018troika\u2019 lenders forecast 3 years ago.\n<\/p>\n

\n In exchange for economic aid, Greece pledged to massively reduce
\n their government spending and to reform their economy under IMF
\n supervision.\n<\/p>\n

\n Cyprus, Greece, Portugal, and Ireland have all received bail-out
\n support from IMF lending.
<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\n Cyprus<\/a> has been hit hard with its bailout
\n arrangement, and is now urging its President to ask the European
\n Commission that Cyprus be listed as a \u2018poorer\u2019 region of the EU,
\n so they can be eligible for more structural funds. Currently,
\n they are classified as a \u2018rich\u2019 country, based on their economic
\n condition in 2004 when they entered the EU.\n<\/p>\n

\n Activists met in Frankfurt on May 31st and staged a protest<\/a> against European leaders handling
\n of the three-year euro debt crisis.\n<\/p>\n

\n They blocked the entrance to the European Central
\n Bank<\/a>, one of the IMF\u2019s \u2018troika\u2019 lending partners which gave
\n Greece bailout funds.\n<\/p>\n

\n Blockupy activists lay blame for the debt crisis in Europe with
\n the banks and in particular the ECB for its role in imposing
\n austerity measures on EU citizens.\n<\/p>\n

\n Many activists expressed distrust in the IMF, only seeing it as a
\n power-wielding organization that collects on European debt to
\n influence its policy.\n<\/p>\n

\n According to Blockupy, the austerity measures proposed by the
\n so-called troika, consisting of the ECB, International Monetary
\n Fund (IMF) and the European Commission have not reduced the
\n national debt of the European countries. An increase in taxes and
\n cuts to social programs have actually worsened the situation,
\n deepening recession and increasing unemployment in the EU
\n dramatically.\n<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on: RT<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) acknowledged that it made \u2018notable failures\u2019 in its handling of the Greek bailout, admitting they had underestimated how deeply austerity measures would stint growth. The IMF was successful in keeping Greece in the eurozone, which prevented the entire collapse of the euro currency bloc, and have helped keep the Greek […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-39528","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-breaking-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39528"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39528\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}