Parliament to discuss Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy Framework |  |
- Parliament to discuss Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy Framework
- General Strike on June 15
- Sir Patrick Michael Leigh Fermor (1915-2011)
- Learn from Socrates & Confucius
| Parliament to discuss Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy Framework Posted: 14 Jun 2011 02:56 AM PDT The Greek government, on June 10, tabled in Parliament a Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy Framework envisaging a new round of austerity measures designed to bring in overall revenues of € 28 billion by 2015, together with a € 50 billion privatisation program.  The plan includes tax and other fiscal measures, expected to generate over € 6 billion by the end of this year, € 700 million of which will come from cutbacks in the national Public Investments Programme. With the Medium-Term plan, the government hopes to raise € 28 billion over the period 2011-15: € 6.5 billion (or 23.1% of the overall amount, in 2011), € 6.8 billion (or 24%, in 2012), € 5.2 billion (18.5%, in 2013), € 5.4 billion (19.3%, in 2014), and € 4.3 billion (15.1%, in 2015).  The above amounts will be raised through, among other things, a streamlining of the payroll system for public sector employees, reductions in public sector operational costs, abolitions and mergers of state agencies, restructuring of public utilities and organizations, cuts in defence expenditures, a rationalisation of health spending, an improvement of social security funds revenues and clampdown on contribution-evasion as well as enhancement of tax compliance. Presenting the Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy Programme, during a press conference on June 10, Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou said the ministry will present a new tax bill in September, aimed at simplifying the existing law, introducing lower VAT rates and cutting corporate tax rates.  Meanwhile, in a press release issued yesterday, regarding the latest downgrade of Greece's economy by Standard & Poor's, the Finance Ministry says that the decision neglects the determined efforts of the Greek Government to avoid any possible violation of Greece's contractual obligations, and the strong desire of the Greek people to plan for their future within the Eurozone.  It also stresses that "the Greek Government has shown its willingness and capacity in the recent past to meet important fiscal targets and last week submitted to Parliament a Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy to be passed by the end of June that outlines detailed, specific fiscal commitments that will ensure the sustainability of Greek sovereign debt." Finance Ministry: Announcement on Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy Framework (in Greek) Photo of Minister Papakonstantinou by Kathimerini daily  |
| Posted: 14 Jun 2011 02:56 AM PDT A general strike has been called for tomorrow, June 15, by Greece's two largest trade union federations, the General Confederation of Employees of Greece (GSEE) representing the private-sector workforce and the civil servants' union federation ADEDY. The strike is expected to affect both private and public sectors, including flights, health services and public transport. Ferries and ships will remain docked and all trains will be at a standstill, including the ones serving the Athens airport.  |
| Sir Patrick Michael Leigh Fermor (1915-2011) Posted: 14 Jun 2011 02:56 AM PDT  "Known as "Paddy" to friends, admirers and name-droppers alike, Leigh Fermor combined a love of adventure with the erudition of an older age - and the eclectic inquisitiveness that spawned his mini glossary of beggar slang from remote Greek villages," writes Kathimerini daily in an obituary for British travel writer Sir Patrick Michael Leigh Fermor, 96, who passed away on June 10, in Britain. Leigh Fermor's war exploits (he captured a WWII German general in Nazi-occupied Crete) and travel books on Greece made him highly popular in this country, where he lived most of the year in a house he had designed in the 1960s near the southern village of Kardamyli, Mani, in southern Peloponnese.   A Greek Culture Ministry statement described him as "perhaps the greatest contemporary travel writer, (who) loved Greece as his second country." It also called him one of Greece's most significant cultural ambassadors in the world. The Guardian: Sir Patrick Leigh Fermor obituary  |
| Learn from Socrates & Confucius Posted: 14 Jun 2011 02:56 AM PDT  Many lesson from ancient philosophers, like Socrates, Aristotle, Confucius, have proven to be important in today's management. The international conference Leadership and Management in a Changing World: Lessons from Ancient East and West Philosophy, which is currently taking place in Athens (June 12 to 14), discusses exactly this: how ancient values and practices can improve modern management and leadership in a cross-cultural perspective. Focusing on key management areas, the conference will present developments and innovative approaches to management and leadership inspired by or in any other way enlightened by philosophical considerations both from the Eastern and Western schools of thought.  More than 50 speakers, academics, and executives from all over the world will present papers, some of which will be considered for publication in a special issue of the Journal of Management History. The conference is jointly organized by two leading Universities in Greece and China, the Athens University of Economics and Business, and the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing.  |
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