This blogger has just returned from a week on the Balearic Spanish Island of Menorca. It was as always a lovely break in the sun but it was plain to see the people of Spain have worries. Unemployment is high and increasing all the time, the value of the Euro is down and Spain's banks are floundering. This week Spanish banks have been downgraded by Moody's investor service. 16 banks in total have been affected. Moody's have said they will be reviewing other banks in the near future.
A jittery week on the stock market has added to Spanish woes and those people with money in some of Spain's banks have moved their savings elsewhere. As yet there has not been a run on the banks but undersandably confidence is low.
Mounting debts in Spain look impossible to clear. Some will take hundreds of years, or longer, to pay off. In other words the debts will sooner or later need to be written off or they will pull the country and its people under. It is loooking increasingly likely that Spain will need to call on the EU to help out. Whether it would need a bail out on the scale of Greece is not known. Spain may not yet be in the same predicament as Greece but it has many economic woes.
The older generation have in some was seen it all before. For these people the threat of conflict in Europe and poverty seem a real possibility. The feeling that Spain and other countries are gradually being dictated to by German Chancellor Angela Merkel causes concern. Protests in Spain continue to come from the younger generation, especially students, but all age groups are losing their work and feeling the pinch.
For many the Spanish Dream is over.
A jittery week on the stock market has added to Spanish woes and those people with money in some of Spain's banks have moved their savings elsewhere. As yet there has not been a run on the banks but undersandably confidence is low.
Mounting debts in Spain look impossible to clear. Some will take hundreds of years, or longer, to pay off. In other words the debts will sooner or later need to be written off or they will pull the country and its people under. It is loooking increasingly likely that Spain will need to call on the EU to help out. Whether it would need a bail out on the scale of Greece is not known. Spain may not yet be in the same predicament as Greece but it has many economic woes.
The older generation have in some was seen it all before. For these people the threat of conflict in Europe and poverty seem a real possibility. The feeling that Spain and other countries are gradually being dictated to by German Chancellor Angela Merkel causes concern. Protests in Spain continue to come from the younger generation, especially students, but all age groups are losing their work and feeling the pinch.
For many the Spanish Dream is over.
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