'Let's just swap Greece for Puerto Rico', suggests German finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble

[YouWithTheFace.]

[url]http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/germanys-finance-minister-wolfgang-schuble-offers-to-swap-greece-for-puerto-rico-10380598.html[/url]

[quote]What's the best way to mend Greece's financial problems? By playing swapsies with the US, at least according to Germany's Wolfgang Schäuble.Recalling a recent discussion with the US Treasury Secretary, Schäuble told [URL="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-09/schaeuble-tells-lew-he-d-gladly-swap-greece-for-puerto-rico"]Bloomberg[/URL]: "I offered my friend Jack Lew these days that we could take Puerto Rico into the euro zone if the U.S. were willing to take Greece into the dollar union.
"He thought that was a joke," he added.
Presumably Schäuble [I]was[/I] joking, but it was quite a flippant gag from the Finance Minister, who has been a harsh critic of the leftist Athens government.
Equating the two nations, even in jest, is a little insensitive when their situations are completely different.
Not only do Greece and Puerto Rico have vastly different populations and GDPs, but, as [URL="http://www.vox.com/2015/7/9/8922379/schauble-puerto-rico"]Vox[/URL] notes, Puerto Rico owes about $70 billion (debt-to-GDP ratio of nearly 70 percen), while Greece owes €323 billion (about 172 percent of Greek GDP).
Greece’s government has submitted its reform proposals to its European creditors in a final bid to secure bailout funding and avoid crashing out of the single currency.
Athens has been told that it must present its list of commitments to a meeting of eurozone finance ministers on Saturday – or the leaders of the creditor powers would begin making preparations to deal with the aftermath of a “Grexit” on Sunday.[/quote]

i'd be happy if thye gave me an EU passport as well as my US passport :v:

[GameWalrus]

I'm sure you'd like that EU. All the same, for whatever Puerto Rico is worth I think we'll keep it.

[FreakyMe]

[QUOTE=TheNerdPest14;48168259]I'm sure you'd like that EU. All the same, for whatever Puerto Rico is worth I think we'll keep it.[/QUOTE]

I was gonna say - this is the fastest way to make Puerto Rico a state.

[Twidler]

Ok how about you take Greece and we can have all those guano islands you laid claim too?

Seems like an equatable trade

[Moustacheman]

*Monroe Doctrine intensifies*

[Discofex]

And how will you get the States to agree?

[27X]

giros and olive oil

[uber.]

[QUOTE=Medevila;48168086]Totally fair trade[/QUOTE]

Debt-to-GDP ratio is pretty much useless. Japan's is over 200%, and they're still doing alright.

[Sobotnik]

[QUOTE=uber.;48176233]Debt-to-GDP ratio is pretty much useless. Japan's is over 200%, and they're still doing alright.[/QUOTE]

Their economy has been stagnant for years and one of the biggest reasons is because they have too much debt weighing down everything. In addition to this they usually have deflation too, which only worsens the problem. A 200% debt to GDP ratio is actually pretty bad if it's sustained for a long time (and in Japan it continues to grow).

[Download]

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;48177177]Their economy has been stagnant for years and one of the biggest reasons is because they have too much debt weighing down everything. In addition to this they usually have deflation too, which only worsens the problem. A 200% debt to GDP ratio is actually pretty bad if it's sustained for a long time (and in Japan it continues to grow).[/QUOTE]

It doesn't help that discussing the debt is taboo. No one in Japan seems to want to think about it.