{"id":301744,"date":"2017-04-01T19:37:17","date_gmt":"2017-04-01T18:37:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/greek-syriza-government-and-european-union-finalise-more-brutal-austerity\/"},"modified":"2017-04-01T19:37:17","modified_gmt":"2017-04-01T18:37:17","slug":"greek-syriza-government-and-european-union-finalise-more-brutal-austerity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/greek-syriza-government-and-european-union-finalise-more-brutal-austerity\/","title":{"rendered":"Greek Syriza government and European Union finalise more brutal austerity"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"content\">\n<h3 class=\"nomargin\">\u00a0<\/h3>\n<h2>Greek Syriza government and European Union finalise more brutal austerity<\/h2>\n<h5>\n<p>    By<br \/>\n    John Vassilopoulos<br \/>\n    <br \/>1 April 2017<\/p>\n<\/h5>\n<p>Greece\u2019s Syriza-led government has reportedly reached an informal agreement with the European Commission (EC) on imposing further austerity measures. An agreement is yet to be officially confirmed by the EC\u2014the executive arm of the European Union (EU)\u2014or Greece.<\/p>\n<p>Greek daily <em>Kathemerini<\/em> announced Friday, \u201c[T]he framework for an agreement could be presented at the next scheduled Eurogroup meeting on April 7,\u201d in order to \u201callow officials to draft all the measures that Greek MPs must legislate by the next scheduled Eurogroup on May 22\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Various media reported this week that measures agreed include further crippling cuts to the pensions of 900,000 retirees, worth 1 percent of GDP. Another austerity measure is the reduction of the tax-free threshold to \u20ac5,900 from the current \u20ac8,636. This will result in many more poorly paid workers, earning as little as \u20ac500 a month, being forced to pay tax. The minimum wage in Greece remains at just \u20ac683 per month, as Syriza reneged on its pledge to restore it to what is a still paltry figure of \u20ac751.<\/p>\n<p>The tax increases are worth a further 1 percent of GDP and, as with the pension cut revenue, will go towards paying off Greece\u2019s near \u20ac300 billion debt to global financial institutions.<\/p>\n<p>Syriza and the EU are set to adopt most of the International Monetary Fund\u2019s (IMF) labour reform proposals, with the exception of collective dismissals. In addition, the privatisation of Greece\u2019s energy sector is to be intensified with the sale of 40 percent of the Public Power Corporation\u2019s (PPC) lignite and hydroelectric power plants, and Thessaloniki port.<\/p>\n<p>Syriza and EU officials have been in talks for months as&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.wsws.org\/en\/articles\/2017\/04\/01\/gree-a01.html\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0 Greek Syriza government and European Union finalise more brutal austerity By John Vassilopoulos 1 April 2017 Greece\u2019s Syriza-led government has reportedly reached an informal agreement with the European Commission (EC) on imposing further austerity measures. An agreement is yet to be officially confirmed by the EC\u2014the executive arm of the European Union (EU)\u2014or Greece. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2526,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-301744","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2526"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=301744"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301744\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=301744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=301744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=301744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}