I speak to my Greek friends and family, mostly outside of tech, and the sentiment isn't yet as positive as the macro numbers in articles like this indicate.
As a diaspora Greek, it's positive news, but it seems this all hasn't "trickled down" to citizens' day to day lives as much. It does give some hope for those who left for economic reasons, and there are even groups out there to encourage a return to restore the brain drain of the 2010s.
That being said the elder population would probably be grumpy no matter how much things improved.
Exactly. Like, what was the outlook ten years ago? Possible exit from EU and euro, state bankruptcy, economic and political collapse. The stability and slow economic improvement might be a bad result for many countries, but for Greece it's IMHO a good result (for me, better than expected).
If you're still on X, or subscribe to newsletters, I can recommend The Greek Analyst[0]. He follows a lot of macro trends for Greece and makes an active effort to be a positive voice in the sea of Greek pessimism, including results like these "great result in relative context" pieces.
One of the things with Greeks (in Greece) really is that they're notoriously pessimistic and depressed, unlike what people usually associate with the country. I do think though that there's a bit of a new spirit though among the younger generation which is slightly less focused on 2k year old history and a bit more realistic in the way they approach the world. But maybe that's just wishful thinking on my end
I don't think it's wishful thinking. I think newer generations in times like these will tend to rebel against the attitude of their parents in any direction that takes them. With grumpy old Greeks, that means the younger generation are calmer and maybe more positive too. Life's too short to be miserable.
I find the ancient and Byzantine history fascinating myself. Naturally the liberation struggles are also important, but the very religious and closer-to-present history and culture don't interest me as much. I also always found it quite hypocritical of the older generation that they biased towards the more recent history and the Orthodox religious aspects, but then they'd sell you trinkets of the ancient world while quietly ignoring the pagan nature of it.
IMO, one of the last big issues with Greek culturally and in terms of economic opportunity for young adults, is mandatory conscription. I won't be returning for anything more than a holiday unless I get a permanent exemption. Many Greeks tend to ignore the opportunity cost this impacts young men with. It's not just "a forced gap year" since you have to do it regardless of if you study or not.
By having emigrated before the peak of the crises around 2015, I avoided both wasting a year on conscription and finished my studies sooner. Anecdotally I'm pretty sure taking that leap was the best thing I could've done, considering what I know of my pees right now (highly educated, but overworked and underpaid).
I think that's spot on - what annoys me with some older Greeks is a fairly consistent 'look at our amazing history' attitude, as if they're ancestors of Gods. But then the actual culture is deeply rooted in Greek orthodoxy, driven by entirely different values, mostly pretty conservative. In reality, many older Greeks know relatively little about their own ancient history, or they focus on very specific aspects of it. Even though it's actually so colorful and full of human conflict and complexities.
I believe it's important for the country to look beyond that history. Not saying one shouldn't be inspired by it, almost everyone in the West is somewhat inspired by it anyway. This is a piece of humanity that played out on the same geographical area as modern-day Greece with a somewhat similar language, but it's long gone.
And I totally agree regarding conscription - if it were some sort of useful exercise for 6 months or so, one could probably make sense of it, but as it stands currently, it's a total waste of time.
I've been keeping an eye on Greece as they started to introduce benefits for foreign capital / workers similar to what Portugal did. I've a feeling this is why Greece is seen to be doing so well. If it ends up being like Portugal, it will be foreign investors and a select few locals that benefit the most.
From the one or two accounts I follow that talk about these macro trends, the benefits for capital at least are helping, not sure about individual incentives. As Greece's tech hubs grow, they also start to paint a different picture of work and work culture in Greece.
I remember being very negative about the Greek's long term outlook ~10 years ago. I mean, it was obvious that there will be an economic downturn for many years in basically all scenarios, but I was very worried about the political uproar, turn to populism and authoritarianism (which would further worsen the economic woes).
IIRC there was an election in ~2015 which Syriza won, back then pretty radical in its anti-austerity campaign. But after they won, they made a turnaround and more or less went along with the austerity.
The problem of Greece is that due to decades of nepotism and corruption, there is no real political hope. The ruling party is one of the two that has brought Greece to where it is now, and the prime minister comes from a family with a long tradition in politics and power thirst.
His best man is the biggest gangster in Greece, Marinakis. They found a ship of his containing 2 TONS! of heroin, and nothing happened.
Because the Mitsotakis family controls the court system in Greece.
Not to make an excuse, but tell me a country that isn't like that. For all the pomp and circumstance that democracy provides, it all feels like it boils down to tribalism where oligarchs rule and control the tides. Sure we all control our individual boats but the tide is what controls the sea.
Sure every nation has an elite, but it’s a stretch to say that Germany, Sweden, Denmark, USA, and many other countries have an oligarchic system similar to how it is in Russia, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan.
