We recall, and admire, the development of democracy and the great art and other achievements of the ancient Greek civilization. But, sadly, how the mighty have fallen!
Greece today is in terrible shape. There have been disorders in the streets of Athens as modern Greece is struggling on the brink of bankruptcy.
Greece is reported to have a national debt of $400 billion. (That’s 300 billion in euros, the currency standard that Greece and 15 other European nations use.)
Because of the widespread fear in Europe that the economic failure in Greece will result in spreading economic failure to other European nations, some of the European countries are offering to give Greece some economic artificial respiration.
We certainly are sympathetic toward Greece and hope for its recovery. But will it recover? Much will depend upon whether it abandons unsound economic policies and adopts sound ones.
Greece has agreed to make great spending cuts over three years, reducing its budget deficit to less than 3 percent of its economic output by 2014, from 13.6 percent last year. We hope Greece will do it, and that it works.
But what about the United States? Our federal government isn’t managing our economics responsibly. The United States owes $12.9 trillion! That’s not a very good sign that we are economically responsible.
Fortunately, though we have lots of serious economic challenges, the United Sates is not in such sad shape as Greece is. But we continue adding to our national debt. We continue to operate with unsound economic policies in the federal government, in some state governments, in some local governments, in some banks, in some private companies — and in many of our personal finances.
So the question arises: If we in the United States get into deeper economic trouble from our irresponsible financial policies, “Who will bail us out?”
Does the United States want to continue with unsound economic policies until, someday, we might be in a position where we would need to beg the countries of Europe to “bail us out.”
Would they respond positively, simply through fear that our economic troubles might pull them down, just as the countries of Europe now fear that Greece’s troubles may pull them down?
Wouldn’t it be far wiser for us Americans, especially our elected officials, to look at our unsound and irresponsible financial policies now — and quit doing the wrong things and start doing the right things — so we can reduce our economic negatives, and proceed with a much sounder economy for our nation and our people?
Greece once had a wonderfully advanced civilization. It doesn’t now.
The United States has had the most advanced civilization the world has ever known. Do we have it now?
Will we recover? Or will doing the wrong things, economically and otherwise, doom us to the kind of “decline and fall” that so many earlier advanced civilizations have suffered?