
Spain Is Doomed - mattobrien
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/04/spain-is-doomed-why-austerity-is-destroying-europe/256032/
======
yummyfajitas
The article goes off the rails pretty early: _What matters for a nation is its
GDP. That's a country's equivalent of personal income._

GDP is not income, it's a sum of flows. The classic illustrative example is a
man marrying his maid:

Unmarried: Man earns $200k/year, pays his maid $25k/year. GDP = $225k.

Married: Man earns $200k/year, pays his wife $0. GDP = $200k.

In both cases, the ability of this pair of humans to service debt and purchase
goods and services remains the same. Both couples are equally wealthy, you've
just tweaked an accounting identity.

~~~
DanielBMarkham
One of the things I'm beginning to suspect is that the metrics are rigged.
That is, most economic discussions are based on terms that aren't meaningful
in any practical way. I see a lot of economists poking at the metrics with
their pencils and talking theory while waving their arms around wildly.

But I am simply an observer. I love watching smart people argue about stuff,
so economics fascinates me. One thing is for sure, there is a ton of diverging
opinions about the Euro and the sovereign debt crisis.

~~~
beagle3
The metrics, GDP being an example, are selected for political rather than
merit. And then they are rigged. See e.g. <http://www.shadowstats.com/> for an
attempt at an honest (or at the very least, consistent with 30 years ago)
measurement of inflation and unemployment. The results are not pretty.

My only surprise is that so many people are unaware of it. The government's
income is indexed to the real inflation (by being an essentially constant
proportion of salaries/profit), and expenditures are indexed to a computation
the government is able to redefine at will. Is it a surprise that it is, in
fact, redefined often, and that it always makes the government look better?

~~~
seanp2k2
Economic "theories" and "research" make me laugh, because the system is so
complex now that it's quite obvious no one knows how to control it or analyze
it, except when they're taking credit for their foresight after the fact and
shouting "I told you so!" while 10 other equally-likely-at-the-time wrong
predictions go un-noted.

Further, there is no free market, supply and demand never works like it
"should", and the emperor has no clothes.

Markets are all artificial and manipulated by those who have the most to gain.
Very relevant: US wireless ISPs ("telcos".) Their product is bandwidth since
everything is digital now, yet we still have "minutes", "SMS", "mms", and
"3G"/"4g" (and the inherent ambiguity in those terms deserves another article
entirely...)

Make no mistake, you are being conned, you are being lied to, you are being
manipulated...every day, for the profit of the ultra-rich. People die and
generations are enslaved so a few thousand sick bastards can be kings in the
"free world".

~~~
javert
I agree with some of your points, but your rich-bashing is about as immature
and idiotic as racism.

~~~
batista
Really? Because I seem to recall many intellectuals with degrees to fill up a
room, and tons of thinkers, participating in "rich-bashing".

It has nothing to do with "immaturity", and all to do with your theory of
understanding the world. A lot of theories of political economy --and they
cannot just be dismissed a priori-- say that rich people are rich because of
taking advantage of other people, societal imbalances, and, on top of this,
that most "primary amassment" of capital in a society involves actual crimes.

So, it's only "immature" in some specific theories of economy/society, not all
of them. That it happens to be considered "god given fact" in the society you
might live in, is no proof that it is right. Contrarian theories are also
quite common elsewhere.

~~~
javert
_many intellectuals with degrees to fill up a room_

Doesn't inspire confidence, and shouldn't.

 _they cannot just be dismissed a priori_

Correct. They can (and should) be dismissed by observing that they contradict
reality.

 _That it happens to be considered "god given fact" in the society you might
live in, is no proof that it is right._

Don't know why you assume I'm just parroting something I've heard elsewhere.
And it's not considered a "god-given fact" in the society I live in, anyway.

 _Contrarian theories are also quite common elsewhere._

Again, the standard of truth is not how many people hold a view, but whether
ot not it is correct.

The guy was alleging that there exists a small cabal of uber-rich who control
the world. That's pretty clearly not the case.

~~~
batista
> _Doesn't inspire confidence, and shouldn't._

Having qualified university expertise on something should inspire SOME
confidence, all else being equal.

But I wrote that for another reason: to show that one doesn't have to be an
"idiot" to argue that, as the parent implied.

 _> Correct. They can (and should) be dismissed by observing that they
contradict reality._

They should be dismissed __IF __they are found to contradict reality. And
that's not as clear cut as the existence of gravity or the water becoming ice
at 0 oC.

 _> The guy was alleging that there exists a small cabal of uber-rich who
control the world. That's pretty clearly not the case._

Well, it depends on your definition of "small" and of "control". If I remember
correctly, a small number of people do have a disproportionate amount of the
total wealth, in the US and globally. A power-law distribution basically,
right? And that wealth surely asserts lots of control. Surely SOPA and PIPA,
for example, weren't proposed/passed with the insistence and for the benefit
of Joe Sixpack or Joe Hacker.

~~~
javert
If you think the rich are exploiting the poor and not the other way around,
you are gravely mistaken.

------
christkv
There is a fair bit of people who considers the euro to have been planned to
cause a crisis to driver deeper integration in the Euro zone.

Spain is grim BUT it's important to understand how big the black economy is
here. A lot of the unemployment numbers are colored by people actually working
on the side while putting the dole in their pockets.

Also GDP debt is not that bad and the government seems able to actually push
through reforms in comparison to Italy or Greece.

I would prefer to see the percentage of people on the "ajuda" that is the only
thing available after you loose the unemployment benefits.

Living here there is one massive obvious issue. The property prices have not
dropped as massively as in the states. My theory is that the banks are not
selling property as they don't have to mark to market. If they had to write
the market value of all that property I figure the whole Spanish banking
system would be bankrupt.

~~~
wagerlabs
[http://www.cincodias.com/articulo/economia/parados-cobran-
ay...](http://www.cincodias.com/articulo/economia/parados-cobran-ayuda-
economica/20120416cdscdieco_1/)

There are 5,27 million of unemployed in Spain. 3 million of them receive
unemployment benefits of some sort which leaves 43% without any sort of
benefits. The two million that do not receive anything at the moment could
become 2.5 million by the end of the year.

Of the 3 million with unemployment benefits, 53% receive 426 euros (557 USD).

N.B. I live in Tenerife, Canary Islands (Spain).

~~~
mipapage
"There are 5,27 million of unemployed in Spain... which leaves 43% without any
sort of benefits"

Sure, but how many of those people were unemployed before this mess? I live on
the mainland, and honestly there are a lot of people "working", if you know
what I mean. No benefits, no real job, but money comes in. The worst part is
when they admit to it (or working illegally and collecting benefits) and laugh
it off, then follow with "we know its wrong, its just the way we are". THEN
they complain about the politicians? Who are... Just like them, but at a
bigger scale?

~~~
christkv
The estimates I have seen for the black economy is somewhere in the range
20-30% of GDP for Spain

------
jstalin
The article's title tells me that the author doesn't understand what's going
on. "Why austerity is destroying Europe." How about the reality of the
situation -- overspending and borrowing have destroyed europe.

Iceland seems to have fixed the problem the correct way: default.

Greece just did the equivalent of a credit card balance transfer while
converting the loan to a secured transaction. In the name of "saving" the
banks of Europe, Greece has been financially raped. Spain is next.

Oh, and Japan and the United States aren't too far behind.

~~~
nextparadigms
I think US would rather devalue the dollar by 30% in a very short amount of
time than get in trouble over its debt. That would still be a catastrophic
outcome, but I'm just saying that's most likely the option they will take.

~~~
jstalin
I agree. I think the reserve-currency status of the US places it in a position
where inflating out of debt will be less devastating than in other parts of
the world.

~~~
CWuestefeld
You're probably right. But what happens after that?

On one side of the coin, people see that investment in US debt isn't so safe
as they thought. Thus, borrowing becomes more expensive for the USA.

On the other side of that coin, America will have mostly escaped the really
bad consequences of its behavior. I submit that we will not learn our lesson
from it, and won't alter our behavior in any meaningful way.

I see those two things combining in a really vicious cycle.

------
antirez
It is hard to read the Europe crisis without taking into account that is a
model that, while flawed, traditionally tried (hard) to provide decent
conditions for the poorest segments of the population. This huge national
expenses (and taxation levels) of most EU countries are sometimes just stupid
wastes, but also the result of a set of services that we know take for granted
but are not granted in many places outside Europe.

If our model will fail there will be to reconsider a lot of things, but if it
will survive this crisis it will show that it is possible to create developed
nations where a decent level of public health care, school, and services are
possible in the long run.

~~~
StavrosK
This didn't sink in until my recent trip to the States.

"So if you're poor and you get sick you just... die?" "Pretty much."

~~~
cobrausn
No, not pretty much.

Usually you end up in a lot of debt. But it is actually illegal in the US
(last I checked) to actually turn away a dying person at the emergency room
because of a lack of coverage.

Now, they may wish they had died when they get the bill, but that's another
argument.

~~~
vasco
How do the hospitals get payed if people can't pay them? Do people go to jail
because they had no money when they were about to die?

This looks as efficient to hospitals as writing a bill to a rock or a tree

~~~
tedunangst
The hospital charges the rich people more. It's socialized medicine, just set
up differently than people expect.

~~~
Daniel_Newby
Not quite. The rich people have insurance policies that put the screws to the
hospital to get an amazingly good deal. The make-up money comes from people
who have crappy insurance policies and/or just enough money to pay. If you can
spend the rest of your life paying off your hospital stay, you will.

~~~
sp332
_The rich people have insurance policies that put the screws to the hospital
to get an amazingly good deal. The make-up money comes from people who have
crappy insurance policies and/or just enough money to pay._

Hospitals over-charge a lot. If you call hospital billing and negotiate a bit,
you can get a much lower bill.

 _If you can spend the rest of your life paying off your hospital stay, you
will._

Well this part, I'm OK with. I will gladly take credit on my future earning in
exchange for a shot at _having_ future earnings.

------
ajays
I'm not an Euro Zone resident, so I have to ask: what's stopping the people of
Spain (especially the youth, with their 50% unemployment) from hopping over to
Germany and finding work there? Isn't it the case that any member of an Euro
country can work in any other country?

~~~
retr0rocket
Europe is not like the USA, there is a significant cultural and language
divide between states that stops people from hopping over the fence like that.
if i were to pick up and move to california from New York, there would be
almost 0 change (other then the stress of moving etc), not quite the same leap
from spain to germany even if they are geographically closer

~~~
ajays
I do understand the language divide at least. But given a choice between
unemployment and, say, working in a place where you don't speak the language,
I know I'd pick work any day! At least you're picking up work skills and a
second language, which is far better than sitting at home twiddling your
thumbs.

~~~
corin_
But it's rarely as simple as a.) paycheck, different language or b.) no
paycheck.

What about family, friends, hobbies, etc. There's plenty of people not willing
to move to a different town/city/village in their own country for a job, yet
alone to a different country.

------
drKarl
The problem with spanish economy comes from the HUGE construction bubble it
had a few years ago. Spain alone was building more than France, Germany and
Italy TOGETHER. Government made money, construction enterprises made money,
real state companies made lots of money, employment was high, even some
citizens speculated buying and selling houses at a higher price some years
later. To support that accelerated growth and construction, spanish banks
borrowed money (LOTS OF IT) from european banks, mainly german banks. Banks
went crazy giving mortgages, just as in the US. Mortgages went up to 25-30
years and beyond. When the bubble burst, prices went down, mortgage interest
rates went up, and many people lost their jobs. That led to many people unable
to pay for its mortgage, and banks started acumulating real state. Nowadays,
banks hold a HUGE real state stock, and they don't want to sell it at current
prices, because they would have to admit that their assets aren't worth what
they claim. Because of that strategy of the banks, prices haven't go down as
much as in other countries which suffered a bubble burst too. There is a very
big stock of inmovilized real state in Spain.

~~~
drKarl
And add to it that Spain issues bonds but doesn't easily find buyers now. ECB
(European Central Bank) has given spanish banks thousands of millions of euros
at an 1% interest rates, and those spanish banks, instead of giving loans and
credit to enterprises and people, they buy spanish bonds (at 5%-6% levels).

------
draggnar
Germany has a better educated workforce, a much larger amount of flat land
that is connected by waterways, and a central location to other high income
nations. They are more competitive. For Spain to be competitive, they need to
be able to price their goods lower. This means that their money won't be able
to buy as many things from abroad, but they will be able to export things and
conduct business amongst themselves. The simple fact is the fiscal policies in
Europe are united and the political policies differ. The Euro was supposed to
help unify the continent and avoid another war but instead has put the
southern countries into debt.

------
DanielBMarkham
What happens when you keep spending more than you have? Your economy
contracts. Can you inflate it with easy currency? Sure thing -- up unto a
point.

This Keynesian conversation is going to be very interesting to watch over the
next few years. Lots of countries trying different things. I imagine no matter
how it turns out, there will be quite a bit of spin, though. But still, it's
better to have examples than just listen to theory, even if the examples are
murky.

From what I hear, more QE is coming from the ECB. That might have a generally
good effect on many economies. Or it might just be fun to blow through for a
few months. We'll see.

~~~
yequalsx
I don't think Keynesians advocate "spending more than you have" forever. The
thrust, as a I understand it, of their arguments is that deficit spending can
be useful in getting out of a downturn and can have beneficial aspects. Of
course, if done improperly, it can have bad effects.

~~~
CWuestefeld
_I don't think Keynesians advocate "spending more than you have" forever._

As you indicate, Keynes by-the-book does not. He would have us actually save
during booms, so that we can pump up the economy in the busts.

However, in practice, those in power who follow Keynes seem to be doing so not
because of any belief in the economics, but because it justifies their wish to
buy greater power by wielding more money. Thus, they don't follow the invest-
when-booming part of the model. The result is that the government spending is
_at best_ balanced, and much more often it's in deficit.

------
cmcewen
"Europe's policymakers have blundered in the control of a delicate machine,
the workings of which they do not understand. They're not evil. But they're
almost certainly wrong."

How does this columnist then believe that he understands the economy if
policymakers are so clueless? If Spain's economic problems were so easy to fix
that everybody could just read this article and solve them, they probably
wouldn't exist in the first place.

~~~
skylan_q
"The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really
know about what they imagine they can design."

-F.A. Hayek

The author isn't claiming they know how to manage it better. He's just
suggesting that their management, or philosophy of management isn't correct.
(But maybe I'm giving the author too much credit!)

------
meric
All it boils down to is Monetarist vs Keynesian. I'm not too sure Keynesian is
good in the long run. _points to US's rapidly escalating debt_. Oh that's
right, according to Keynes: "In the long run we are all dead".

~~~
nhaehnle
_points to US's rapidly escalating debt_

... and explain why again this is a problem? Unfortunately, the majority of
commentators just take "high debt = bad" as a given, because they confuse
their own situation (private household, currency _user_ ) with that of the US
government (currency _issuer_ ).

The US situation basically boils down to: the rest of the world has been crazy
for US$ for some time and is therefore willing to send real goods to the US in
exchange for numbers in a computer system. This is certainly going to change
in the long run. That will drive down US imports and make imported goods more
expensive for US residents, but that's only fair. It won't lead to collapse.
In fact, if it is semi-intelligently managed, it could lead to a rebirth of US
industry.

~~~
meric
I didn't say Keynesian would cause economy to collapse. I am just saying it
does not achieve its goal of smoothing out boom and busts because it requires
too much competence from the governors of the economy

Keynesian is saving money during booms and spending money during recessions.
Yet during booms the money saved is too little and during recessions the money
spent is too much. The debt will get bigger and eventually you either revert
back to monetarism and pay down your debt or you default on it by not
paying/printing money, the latter latter choice leading to hyperinflation,
while the latter former choice means you're reverting back to Monetarism
because no one is going to lend you money anymore.

But remember, the purpose of Keynesian approach was to smooth out booms and
busts in the economy, yet what we're seeing is making them lasting longer and
falling harder.

During a boom, I think the mentality of politicians goes something like "We
have money to spend on buying votes but instead, we are saving it? Insanity!?"

When you're forced to spend lots of money for the sake of spending money, the
money is likely to be inefficiently allocated, investing in stuff that leads
to more spending (like $900 handouts to each citizen) rather than investing in
stuff that increases production in the long run (like building a fast railway
network between cities, which require years of planning).

Monetarists would balance the budget and make careful measured investments in
the economy. Yes there will be boom and busts but even in recessions the
economy is still fundamentally sound, and thus will be sure to recover. See
Germany for example.

~~~
nl
Don't blame Keynesian economics for the failings of the US politicians,
specifically GW Bush.

Other developed countries (Canada[1], Australia[2]) followed Keynesian
economics and had budget surpluses during period leading up to 2008.

The US, OTOH had expanding deficits. It is time people stopped blaming "the
system", and assigned the blame where it should lay. It is the fault of one
administration, and one administration only that the US economy is in the
state that it is.

This isn't about progressive vs conservative politics either: Australia & the
US both had conservative leaders in this time period, while Canada had a
(center left) Liberal government. Only one country ran deficits.

[1]
[http://www.canadahistory.com/sections/eras/moderncanada/budg...](http://www.canadahistory.com/sections/eras/moderncanada/budget_surplus.htm)

[2] <http://www.budget.gov.au/2007-08/>

~~~
meric
I live in Australia and I know our government isn't in that much debt compared
to all the other countries. But I saw how the government spent billions of
dollars inefficiently (Basically a lot of fraud, involving subsidies to people
upgrading insulation in their house). During the boom we saved $20 billion
dollars but after the financial crisis the government is now at -$80 billion
dollars.

Really? The best Keynesians in the world managed to save 20 billion during
good times and needed to spend 100 billion to prop up the economy when times
are bad? Oh and the government estimates we will spend another $200 billion
before we start saving again.

I doubt they will be able to save $320 billion to get back to where we
started, before the next recession.

How is that sustainable? We'll be fine for the next 10 years. But seriously...
"Don't blame Keynesian economics for the failings of the politicians" is like
saying "Don't blame Communism for the failings of the people".

I'm not blaming the system. Just need to vote for the party that is going to
keep the budget balanced. The system works fine, I just voted for the wrong
party last election.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_national_debt>

~~~
nl
I'm from Australia.

If you read the wikipedia article you'll note that net debt is only $80
billion, not $320 billion.

It's sustainable because when the economy grows the debt becomes a lower
proportion of the total budget which makes it simpler to pay off.

I don't think either Australian party is proposing a balanced budget. The
(current, left wing) Labor party is getting criticized for trying to bring the
budget back to surplus next year. It's unclear exactly what the oppositions
proposed budget position would be, but it is likely they would follow similar
policies.

~~~
meric
"If you read the wikipedia article you'll note that net debt is only $80
billion, not $320 billion."

If you read my comment more thoroughly you'll note I said net debt is -$80
billion and that $300 billion is an estimate from 2009 (which wikipedia
agrees).

"It's sustainable because when the economy grows the debt becomes a lower
proportion of the total budget which makes it simpler to pay off."

No it's not. Yes it's a lower proportion, by what, one percentage point a
year, or maybe even negative one depending on the interest on the bonds
(growth - interest). I'll bet next recession they'll be at something like -$10
billion, the next one after that -$35 billion and it just rolls downhill from
there.

"I don't think either Australian party is proposing a balanced budget."

You're right, maybe I'm too optimistic. The system is no good at all. I would
really hope some day I will be able to participate in a direct democracy
government.

"The (current, left wing) Labor party is getting criticised"

The government is getting criticised for everything it does. And?

Reply to earlier comment: "The US, OTOH had expanding deficits. It is time
people stopped blaming "the system", and assigned the blame where it should
lay. It is the fault of one administration, and one administration only that
the US economy is in the state that it is."

Okay it's Bush's fault, what now?

------
kposehn
Despite many of the very clear comments in this thread pointing out holes in
the article, the overall conclusion is unfortunately fairly sound - for the
mid term.

The current austerity measures combined with unemployment mean the markets at
large do not expect Spain to remain stable enough to invest in. With extremely
high unemployment, especially among youth, comes social instability. This kind
of instability frightens governments, which typically point to the private
sector as the source of all ills and nationalize swaths of industry in order
to feed populist sentiment.

This fear is being reflected now, and I tend to agree that I don't expect the
mid-term to be kind to Spain. However, in the longer term it may come out
better off, provided Germany continues to hold the Eurozone with an iron-
wallet.

Germany does (mostly) control the EU by proxy anyway (~ '-')~

------
stretchwithme
Spain's minimum wage is up 50% from 8 years ago. Demand for labor has
collapsed.

There's a thing called the law of supply and demand. Price fluctuates to keep
both roughly equal.

But when you hold the price artificially high, you get more supply than
demand, especially when supply is not easily changed, as is the case with
labor.

There is no mystery here. Just people adopting policies whose effects they do
not or will not understand.

[http://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=ml9s8a132hlg_...](http://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=ml9s8a132hlg_&ctype=l&strail=false&bcs=d&nselm=h&met_y=minimum_wage&fdim_y=currency:eur&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=country&idim=country:es:ee:lt:bg:cz:hu:el:pt&ifdim=country&tstart=1055919600000&tend=1326873600000&hl=en&dl=en&q=spain+minimum+wage)

------
wagerlabs
I live in the Tenerife. Canary Islands are, supposedly, one the top 3 regions
with the most consumer debt.

Unemployment here is also higher than in the mainland since there's not much
of an economy. There was construction but that bubble burst. There's
tourism... and nothing else.

The interesting bit is that you don't really see the effects of the economic
crisis, not directly. Most everyone drives nice cars, the parking lot at the
mall is full, etc.

You do see indirect effects, though. There are more security guards at the
mall and the supermarket within. One of the cafes installed two video cameras.
The pharmacy posted a note that stating that no refunds will be offered on
medicine or unused prescriptions.

Oh yes, the property prices here are behind the mainland adjustment-wise. Must
be due to our awesome weather.

------
Facens
This article is totally pointless. It doesn't provide a single argument, just
a bunch of assumptions.

------
sopooneo
One of the great things about terrible situations is that everyone agrees on
how bad it is. This agreement makes them think they have something in common.
But if you prompt them to _independently_ suggest _solutions_ , you usually
find that they hardly agree at all. That's happening here with the Euro. The
situation is potentially unfixably bad, which gives the advantage that nothing
will work and no one will ever have to find out they didn't agree all along.

------
harryf
Is it me or do Euro austerity measures seem to drive a certain segment of
economic commentators nuts? The number of articles I've seen raging about
"evil" Germany forcing Greece / Italy / Spain to the brink of destruction with
austerity measures. It's like they're afraid of something. What if austerity
measures work? Is that going to burst someone's bubble?

~~~
skylan_q
"What if austerity measures work? Is that going to burst someone's bubble?"

Yes. The managerial class. Banksters need reckless spending in order to put
more people and nations into debt servitude. If austerity works, people might
( _gasp_ ) start to look to the free market for answers to economic woes, and
start damming the banks and governments for their mis-management of economic
matters.

------
huhtenberg
> _Spain Is Doomed_

So, generally speaking, this should make moving to Spain and working remotely
from there pretty attractive, shouldn't it? Can anyone from Spain comment on
how the life is like there at the moment (assuming the 100K USD income level)?

~~~
gjulianm
Spain is a nice country to live in. With that level of income you can live
without any kind of economic problems. Our sanitary system is free and pretty
good (for now), so no worries about medical insurance.

Crime rates are low, so no security problems neither. Cities like Madrid and
Barcelona offer all kind of services and their public transportation is great
(you don't even need a car). And, of course, our climate is really great.

In short: Spain is a good country to live in. Although all the news you can
hear with "Spain is sinking, Spain is doomed" we still live (I'm talking from
my experience) very well.

------
fasouto
I'm spanish and I couldn't agree more. Many scientist and engineers are
leaving the country looking for better work conditions. Also It's really
difficult to run a business here. No future...

------
nhebb
When did writers at major publications like The Atlantic start submitting
their own articles to HN? It's one thing when a programmer or other startup /
tech blogger submits their own work, but when a magazine does, it just feels
like spamming.</rant>

------
excuse-me
The graphs are meaningless. What they measure is how strict the government is
at collecting unemployment figures for young people.

It simply shows 3sets of countries.:

Spain/Greece/Portugal it's presumably very easy to claim unemployment and 50%
of those 50% listed are also working for cash

Italy/UK/France it's relatively harder to claim unemployment while working and
most of the 15% are actually unemployed

Germany has a much smaller youth population and managed to absorb more of them
in youth-training-schemes. And it got doubly lucky that birth rates fell
fastest in the east where the unemployment is. It's as if in the mid80s the UK
had persuaded everyone outside the M25 to stop having kids.

------
hk_kh
The alarming headlines on these articles won't help Spain get any better.
Sometimes it seems politics and the media just want to see Spain sink.

Maybe it's just that seeing it from the inside doesn't render it that bad.

------
loverobots
Spain today, US tomorrow. Unless we make the dollar even more worthless, $1
trillion+ deficits are not exactly sustainable

