Greece: On Pace for the Worst Recession in Modern History

This Greek couple threatened to jump to their deaths because their financial situation has deteriorated. The married couple have serious financial difficulties as the Depression in Greece has taken a toll. They learned they could lose their jobs and this prompted the action. The couple was talked off the ledge but only after five hours of a standoff. (hat tip Global Macro Monitor)

Also see Austerity Policy Destroying Greek Society at Naked Capitalism

Michael Hudson calls this "The Greek Experiment" and predicts it will end badly

The Atlantic tells us that Greece Is on Pace for the Worst Recession in Modern History.

The Greek economy shrank nearly 7% in 2011, the fifth straight year the country has been in a recession. GDP has shriveled by a sixth since 2006, and unemployment has tripled over that period to 20%. With new rounds of austerity just announced, and a default yet to come, the nightmare isn’t even close to being over. Will Greece be the deepest recession of the last 30 years?

It’s getting there. Argentina’s output plummeted 20 percent peak-to-trough when it defaulted in 2001, and Latvia’s economy has shrunk by a fifth since 2008. Uri Dadush, an economist with the Carnegie Endowment in Washington, told Reuters that "on the current path, which is not sustainable in my view, we may very well see Greek GDP go down 25-30 percent, which would be historically unprecedented. It’s a disastrous crisis for them.