http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ee577e68-ec32-11df-9e11-00144feab49a.html?ftcamp=rss#axzz14pDs386Q
> The second cause of rising bond yields is that harsh economic
> austerity programmes have turned out to be less effective than hoped
> at cutting budget deficits but have fulfilled gloomy predictions that
> they would stifle any incipient economic recovery.
>
> “The European peripheral countries are all suffering from the combined
> realisation by the market that the promised reforms are slow in coming
> and unlikely to deliver substantially higher growth in the near term –
> and that fiscal retrenchment is painful and partially self-defeating
> in terms of growth,” said Luis Garicano, professor of economics and
> strategy at the London School of Economics.
>
> In the first nine months of this year, Portugal’s deficit actually
> rose slightly, prompting a new and more drastic austerity plan
> approved in principle by parliament last week.
It reminds me of this scene from Songs From the Second Floor:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9mUx4EgLEg&feature=related
....In a subsequent scene, we see the spectators at a bar, bawling their eyes out and wailing, "We have already sacrificed our youth! Can we do more?"
SA