Greece comes 1st, alas!

'Greece your Glory!' is a well-known saying - intoned with pride in the country of my birth, where most of us are convinced that our country is glorious in almost every way, even - or, especially - if we know nothing about the rest of the world and how it works. Some, fewer though, may repeat it with a sarcastic tone when something ridiculously bad happens, though we do not necessarily love our country any less.

So the news that Greece has rated first in a recent worldwide survey could have been the cause of celebration, were it not for the fact that the first place was negative - Greece came first in a 'which is the most complicated country in the world to do business in' survey by TMF Group (as reported in the reliable financial paper and website Naftemporiki on 12.6.19), a multinational professional services firm based in the Netherlands and whose description is international expansion experts, i.e. the very people who would guide companies to invest somewhere. As they also operate a Greek branch they, unfortunately, know the country and business environment well; their assessment cannot be dismissed as coming from ignorant, prejudiced foreigners whose interests are in doing down Greece and it's glory.

The article suggests that Greece is partnered in the top five by Indonesia, Brazil, United Arab Emirates and Bolivia, with the following five including Slovakia, Germany, Turkey, China and Peru. A glance allows us to see that Greece is in august company. Even if the judgement is harsh, it is not far from the truth whether we like it or not.

From personal experience I can tell you that doing business in Greece is, indeed, extremely complicated, expensive and made worse by the fact that the state is pitted against you. The state apparatus treats any business as a defrauding operation in progress and everything is geared to deter and punish this; little is in place to truly encourage or aid private enterprise. The legal framework is complicated, inefficient and expensive, with the goalposts shifting constantly at the whim of the government, and laws are applied or not to suit the purpose of the day. In that it, of course, mirrors the way Greek society in general operates - chaotically, inefficiently and with the use of 'incentives', infamously known as little envelopes - 'fakelakia'. Some of the 'incentives' required are not small, if the situation is complex, with many people in the appreciation pipeline...

And no, dear reader, thank you for asking, I never had to.

Unless systems are simplified, laws made clear and without lots of windows, are applied fairly, equally and 'without incentives' that allow anyone to bypass their obligations if they can afford it there will be little growth in Greece, and almost none coming from outside that isn't predatory. Foreign companies will not invest unless they are:

a. Multinationals of a certain size, where strategic moves require certain commitments.
b. Running some sort of predatory move or an outright scam.
c. They are investing for sentimental reasons, rare but unlikely in the present climate.

In the meantime the years go by, the country suffers and its best people move away in search of a career, or just a job. Greece, what could have been your glory is going elsewhere... Wake up! This is a national shame, and a national wake-up call... Heed it!