Bill Black — When will the EU and the ECB Stop Torturing the Greeks?

The troika refers to the European Union (EU), European Central Bank (ECB), and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF, traditionally, was the greatest proponent of any international entity of inflicting extreme austerity on nations suffering economic crises. The IMF’s economists have increasingly reviewed the evidence and concluded that austerity reduces growth and that putting nations into inescapable debt traps is stupid and harmful. The EU and the ECB, however, have been impervious to these economic studies and intent on hammering the Greeks. The purported EU “bailout” of Greece is an exercise in EU propaganda. Overwhelmingly, EU aid involving Greece goes to Greek banks – and the bank bailout bails out the creditors of Greek banks. Those creditors, overwhelmingly, are EU banks.

The EU and the ECB have forbidden Greece to use stimulus and locked Greece into a debt trap that will crush the Greek economy for over a half-century....

The troika is the EC, the ECB and the IMF. Should be "European Commission" instead of EU?