1 Greece shuns debt talks
with ‘troika’ (Mark Lowen on BBC) Greece's new left-wing finance minister says
his government will not negotiate over the Greek bailout conditions with the
"troika" team from the EU and IMF. Yanis Varoufakis said he was
rather seeking direct talks with eurozone leaders, to try to cancel more than
half the money Greece owes.
Jeroen Dijsselbloem,
head of the eurozone group of finance ministers, said Greece should stick to
its reform commitments. He said Greece and the Eurogroup had a "mutual
interest in the further recovery of the Greek economy inside the eurozone"
and warned against Athens acting unilaterally in its efforts to renegotiate its
bailout.
Greece has endured
tough budget cuts in return for its €240bn ($270bn) bailout, agreed in 2010
with the "troika" - the European Commission, International Monetary
Fund (IMF) and European Central Bank (ECB).
The defiance from
Athens was clear: no co-operation with the troika overseeing the bailout. The
troika creditors are supposed to wrap up their latest review of Greek finances
at the end of February, based on which they would dish out another €7bn of
bailout money. Athens needs the tranche to meet debt commitments later this
year. But Mr Varoufakis says his government does not want the money and will
not honour commitments made under a previous "toxic" programme.
2 Weak growth, cheap
oil pull Eurozone prices down (San Francisco Chronicle) Falling prices sent
another worrying signal about the eurozone economy just before the European
Central Bank starts a 1 trillion euro ($1.1 trillion) stimulus effort. Consumer
prices fell 0.6 percent in the 12 months to January, accelerating the 0.2
percent annual drop in December.
Prices are weighed down
by the recent plunge in oil prices. But even excluding energy costs, they are
weak, a sign of the deep economic malaise afflicting the 19 countries that
share the euro currency. A report by the Eurostat statistics agency showed that
the core inflation rate, which strips out volatile food and energy prices, was
at plus 0.5 percent, down from 0.7 percent the month before.
Falling prices have
raised fears that the eurozone will fall into outright deflation, a trap that
can paralyze the economy if it leads to falling wages and investment. Japan
fell into deflation in the 1990s and is still trying to get out. The European
Central Bank is readying a massive 1 trillion euro stimulus program to try to
raise inflation close to its goal of 2 percent and to get the economy moving.
Meanwhile, jobless
figures showed a slight improvement in December, with the unemployment rate
falling to 11.4 percent from 11.5 percent the month before. The number of
unemployed people fell by 157,000 in the eurozone.
http://www.sfgate.com/news/world/article/Eurozone-prices-plunge-0-6-pct-amid-weak-growth-6050720.php
3 Two things depression taught me (Ben Locker in The
Guardian) It’s often said that depression isn’t about feeling sad. It’s part of
it, of course, but to compare the life-sapping melancholy of depression to
normal sadness is like comparing a paper cut to an amputation. Sadness is a
healthy part of every life. Depression progressively eats away your whole being
from the inside. It’s with you when you wake up in the morning, telling you
there’s nothing or anyone to get up for. It’s with you when the phone rings and
you’re too frightened to answer it.
And always, the biggest stigma comes from yourself.
You blame yourself for the illness that you can only dimly see. So why was I
depressed? The simple answer is that I don’t know. The best I can conclude is
that depression can happen to anyone. I thought I was strong enough to resist
it, but I was wrong. That attitude probably explains why I suffered such a
serious episode – I resisted seeking help until it was nearly too late.
Let me take you back to 1996. I’d just begun my
final year at university and had recently visited my doctor to complain of
feeling low. He immediately put me on an antidepressant, and I got down to the
business of getting my degree. The pills took a few weeks to work, but the
effects were remarkable. Too remarkable. The only problem was that the drug did
much more. It broke down any fragile sense I had of social appropriateness. I’d
frequently say ridiculous and painful things to people I had no right to say
them to.
So, after a few months, I decided to stop the pills.
I ended them abruptly, not realising how foolish that was. Last spring I was in
the grip of depression again. So I returned to the doctor. I took the
antidepressant. And it worked. I even felt my creativity and urge to write
begin to return for the first time in years. And tellingly, my wife said:
“You’re becoming more like the person I first met.”
It was a turning point. The drug had given me
objectivity about my illness, made me view it for what it was. This was when I
realised I had been going through cycles of depression for years. I am truly
grateful to all those who love and care for me for pushing me along to this
stage.
And now, I need to get back to work. Depression may
start for no definable reason, but it leaves a growing trail of problems in its
wake. If you still attach stigma to people with mental illness, please remember
two things. One, it could easily happen to you. And two, no one stigmatises
their illness more than the people who suffer from it. Reach out to them.
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