Those silly Icelanders, putting the needs of people ahead of the Banksters ......

via truthdig:

Truthdiggers of the Week: Iceland’s Leaders
Posted on Dec 1, 2012

One country refused to bail out its derelict banks and slash social spending amid the financial crisis. And guess what? Unlike the eurozone and the United States, it’s making a sturdy comeback.

Iceland’s stock market plunged 90 percent in 2008. Inflation reached 18 percent, unemployment shot up ninefold and its biggest banks failed. This was no recession. It was a full-blown depression.

Since then, the country has steadily improved. By September of this year, it repaid its IMF rescue loans ahead of schedule. Unemployment dropped by half and its economy will have grown by roughly 2.5 percent by the beginning of 2013.

So what’s Iceland’s secret? According to the editors at Bloomberg News, it’s a refusal to do what virtually every other nation that was pummeled by the crisis did: adopt policies of economic austerity.

Iceland’s approach was the polar opposite of the U.S. and Europe, which rescued their banks and did little to aid indebted homeowners. Although lessons drawn from Iceland, with just 320,000 people and an economy based on fishing, aluminum production and tourism, might not be readily transferable to bigger countries, its rebound suggests there’s more than one way to recover from a financial meltdown.

Nothing distinguishes Iceland as much as its aid to consumers. To homeowners with negative equity, the country offered write-offs that would wipe out debt above 110 percent of the property value. The government also provided means-tested subsidies to reduce mortgage-interest expenses: Those with lower earnings, less home equity and children were granted the most generous support.

The International Monetary Fund’s mission chief to Iceland has sung the nation’s praises too. “Iceland has made significant achievements since the crisis,” Daria V. Zakharova told Bloomberg in August. “We have a very positive outlook on growth, especially for this year and next year because it appears to us that the growth is broad based.” ................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/truthdigger_of_the_week_iceland_20121201/

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17 replies	Author	Time	Post
Those silly Icelanders, putting the needs of people ahead of the Banksters ...... (Original post)	marmar	Dec 2012	OP
du rec. nt	xchrom	Dec 2012	#1
Iceland.. The elephant in the living room of global capitalism...	Democracyinkind	Dec 2012	#2
Is	heaven05	Dec 2012	#3
This needs to be plastered all over.	Starry Messenger	Dec 2012	#4
Waaaaiiiit a minute! Isn't that EXACTLY what Paul Krugman told us to do? nt	Squinch	Dec 2012	#5
Isn't that EXACTLY what Paul Krugman told us to do?	AlbertCat	Dec 2012	#6
That and Glass Steagall	Squinch	Dec 2012	#7
I miss Glass Steagall, don't you?	AlbertCat	Dec 2012	#13
Congress. The morons.	Squinch	Dec 2012	#14
Our leaders were bought	UnrepentantLiberal	Dec 2012	#8
DURec	leftstreet	Dec 2012	#9
Massive K&R! Stand up fight back!	Fire Walk With Me	Dec 2012	#10
I am convinced that Scandinavian society is far superior to our own.	smirkymonkey	Dec 2012	#11
k and r	nashville_brook	Dec 2012	#12
Slow your rolll	ShadesOfBlue	Dec 2012	#15
First, the BBC, while light years ahead of our infotainment industry is hardly the shinning light	Egalitarian Thug	Dec 2012	#17
Have they settled the Icesave issue yet?	Heywood J	Dec 2012	#16