‘Negative growth’ is a well-known oxymoron, but the Director of the Europe Department of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has taken redefinition to a wholly new level. In an interview with IMF Survey Magazine, Reza Moghadam says that since starting to follow the orders of the Troika (IMF, European Commission and European Central Bank), Ireland has “seen modest growth.” ...

Portugal’s riot police have clashed with demonstrators protesting against the government austerity measures, which include salary cuts and tax hikes. On Monday night, thousands of angry demonstrators made a large fire outside the parliament building in the capital Lisbon where the riot police used batons to disperse them. ...

Thousands of Spaniards marched in cities across the country on Sunday to decry tough austerity measures, part of a growing protest movement that shows no signs of abating and could culminate in a general strike in November. Hundreds of thousands of Spaniards have taken to the streets in near-daily protests over the past few months, creating a headache for the centre-right government as it faces regional ele ...

Instead of an analysis of what kind of "austerity measures" and in whose favor, the troika and its vassals in the Greek government have been preparing, I'll just show you a table of taxes before and after the new tax system, a part of the latest austerity package, is implemented, by income category. This is income tax only, it does not include social security taxes... The really fun part is at the bottom of ...

Tens of thousands of Spanish and Portuguese protesters have gathered on the streets of Madrid and Lisbon to rally against the economic pain caused by the countries’ harsh austerity programs. In Spain, demonstrators spoke out against government spending cuts, tax hikes, and the nation’s alarmingly high unemployment rate. ...

No wonder the protesters are back. They are angry at the backdoor rewriting of the social contract Ha-Joon Chang   Rioters beat a policeman during a rally against government austerity measures in Athens. Photograph: John Kolesidis/REUTERS Throughout the 1980s and 90s, when many developing countries were in crisis and borrowing money from the International Monetary Fund, waves of protests in those count ...

Police respond with tear gas to firebombs thrown from sidelines of demo against €12bn cuts. Violence erupted in the heart of Athens as mass protests against further austerity measures in crisis-hit Greece escalated on Wednesday. ...

Faced with unprecedented protests, the Portuguese government has been forced to withdraw the announced increase in workers' social security contributions. This is a victory for the movement of the Portuguese workers and people, but only a very temporary one. ...

Yesterday, Portugal saw the biggest mobilization since the 1974 revolution. Hundreds’s of thousands of people came to the streets to protest the new package of austerity measures being imposed by the troika. 3 People have been arrested for separate incidents. One of those arrested was caught in possession of explosives in front of the IMF offices in Lisbon. There is an uncertain number of injuries due to an ...

Across Europe it is the sick the old and especially the young that are being forced to pay for the economic crisis. In Spain and Greece youth unemployment stands at over 50%. In Ireland although that figure is somewhat lower at 17.9% but this still means nearly 1 in 5 youth are workless and the statistic covers up the distressing reality that we face; in particular, ongoing attacks to education and the lack ...