(Full Length) - The Why's of the Euro Crisis 

Bailouts were actually forced on Spain, Greece, Ireland, Cyprus by the ECB, IMF and EC because the alternative to bailout was that these countries would collapse banks of non systemic importance - and if they let banks fail - Germany and France would have been finished because as the biggest economies in Europe - they had the most to lose. Ireland for example could have let Anglo Irish bank fail. It was not of systemic importance to the Irish economy but it wouldn't have been seen by the international community as an Irish bank failing - it would have been seen as a euro zone bank failing - and that would have had a domino effect on other euro zone banks. And Germany and France would have lost most as they had the most tied up in all bloated euro zone banks with their national pension funds etc. The ECB in Germany also broke their own lending rules by flooding cheap credit to banks in these countries in the first place. The crisis has opened Europeans eyes to the power play that has been going on. Britain will either leave the EU next year which will be the beginning of the end of the EU or it will be reformed to keep them in which will see, as a result, power transferred back to national sovereign parliaments for everybody.

Being form Germany, what's astonishing about this lecture at Berkeley is the fact that neither Germany being too compatitive for southern Europe (due to a reform in labor law/ and a cut in welfare benefis in 1999) nor the proposal of a restructuring of the Eurozone are being considered in Germany. The only conclusions our minister of finance Mr. Schäuble and Chancellor Merkel are dawing is that the Greek state was spending too much on pensions and welfare, therefore the only medication is austerity. And our media is exclusively reporting about lazy greeks who 'wanna rip us off'... it truely sad given the ideals we've started with...

The new Lehman Brothers is inside EU-EMU. The stage is set, we need just a trigger...I bet that next Lehman Brothers will not be Greece, but some large German bank...

Awesome explanation... Great insights... Thank - you

The unemployment rates may not be biased down in Greece because more people illegally work for cash there than in countries like the Germany and even the USA.

I'm respectfully disagreeing on "Don't go to Greece this summer" point. Do go to Greece this summer, prices are insanely low, and you'd be crazy to miss out.

We have a good idea who is owed all this Fiat Money. Why not winkle them out, one way or another, and make it pretty clear that we can't pay- wont pay and unilaterally cancel all these Debts!

more than 5 years on Greek 10 year is below 1 % lol

"Why's"?? Come on, this is a university, correct? Perhaps the difference among a plural, contraction and possessive is not taught anymore.

To theo9e6 www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2015/03/13/contrary-to-what-most-people-think-greeks-work-the-longest-hours-in-europe-infographic/