Takk Ólafur Ragnar

Ólafur Ragnar hefur brotið blað í sögu Íslands. Hver ríkisstjórnin á færur annarri hefur fótum troðið lýðræði og unnið gegn velferð almennings og það gengið svo langt að tilvist íslensk samfélags hefur verið teflt í tvísýnu.

Ég hvet fólk til þess að lesa þetta bréf sem Íslendingum barst frá James Galbraith og William Black:

James K. Galbraith holds the Lloyd M. Bentsen, jr. Chair in Government/Business Relations at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, The University of Texas at Austin.  William K. Black is Associate Professor in Economics and Law at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

 

To our friends in Iceland.

 

We have reviewed the IMF staff report dated October 2009 and other materials concerning the question of sustainability of Iceland's gross external debt, estimated to be over three hundred percent of GDP as of now, and liable to rise sharply if the present exchange rate cannot be maintained.

 

We believe that these documents raise a number of grave questions.

 

The IMF report argues that a substantial part of the gross debt can be reduced by restructuring and by deleveraging Icelandic multinational

corporations: in effect reducing their asset holdings and presumably their operations. This assumption depends on the capacity to liquidate external assets at or near their recorded value.  Nothing in the report assesses whether this is, indeed, plausible.. Therefore the optimistic assessment with respect to net debt (~15 percent of GDP) appears to us questionable.

 

The IMF macroeconomic projections for Iceland expect a deep recession, but followed by a sharp recovery of the growth rate of real GDP - despite very large tax increases and exceptionally large reductions in public spending.

 

There is no basis in domestic demand for this forecast. The assumption rests on a very large increase in net exports, for which neither historical foundation nor actual industries and markets appear to have been established. If a very large currency depreciation were pursued under these conditions, that would immediately raise the external debt burden in relation to GDP.  It is also difficult to see how a business sector afflicted by a large decline in investment can simultaneously expand exports. Clearly the assumed surge in net exports can be had only by a large, sustained reduction of imports, affecting both investment and consumption, and therefore living standards.

 

The IMF report fails to consider the potential effect of large tax increases, cuts in public services, decline in domestic income, possible currency depreciation, and catastrophic unemployment on the incentive to emigrate for working people in Iceland.  It seems to us self-evident that the vast burden now being placed on a minute work force will induce emigration. And as the country's liability becomes increasingly concentrated on those who remain, it will become more difficult for those who would like to remain, to do so.(áherslur eru mínar)

 

Iceland is a very small country, with a very small working population. The question facing the Althing is whether the burdens now being dictated to Iceland can reasonably be accepted by the Icelandic people. We are not in a position to answer this question: we merely pose it.  If the answer is in the negative, much more than the economy may prove to be at stake – but indeed the survival of the country as a going concern.

 

Endurreisnaráætlun í uppnám