hurricanemaxi
Joined: 08 Sep 2011
Posts: 66
|
 Posted: Mon Sep 12, 2011 10:02 am Post subject: Papandreou OKs Taxes, Cuts to Dodge Default |
 |
|
Prime Minister George Papandreou, vowing to avoid a default and keep Greece in the euro, approved new measures to help plug a yawning budget gap as resistance builds at home and in Europe to extending more aid to the European Union’s most-indebted nation.
The Cabinet yesterday voted to cut one month’s wages from all elected officials and impose an annual charge on all property for two years, to be levied through electricity bills to ensure rapid collection, Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos told reporters in the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki.
The measures will help the country meet deficit targets of 17.1 billion euros ($23.6 billion) in 2011 and 14.9 billion euros in 2012, covering a 2 billion-euro shortfall for this year that has been exacerbated by a deepening recession, he said.
“We have to do everything we can to emerge from this difficult situation,” Venizelos said. “We cannot give anyone a pretext to say that we are at fault.”
The salary cuts and taxes come after the euro slumped to a six-month low and Greek two-year notes yields surged to a record 57 percent on concern the country is sliding toward default. EU leaders’ divisions threaten to scupper a second bailout approved in July, and German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble on Sept. 10 repeated a threat to withhold the next 8 billion-euro payment from the original rescue unless Greece shows it can meet fiscal targets agreed with the EU.
____________
hotel in dublin
Wedding Dress Tunbridge Wells |
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
