Why is it that public benefits like housing or old age pensions which could be afforded in much less prosperous times are suddenly becoming unaffordable now?

For every saver, there has to be a borrower. But with Governments and private citizens in peripheral countries already under water with debt, where are the additional borrowers to come from to provide an income for additional savings?

You can't at the same time flay the Greeks for borrowing both too much and too little. And if their economy crashes, you may lose not only your interest income but your savings as well.

Deutsche Bank is more or less bust, thanks to it's ill advised speculation on derivatives, trying to achieve a return on savings that was simply not sustainable.

There will be no return to high interest rates soon, and anyone who tries to tell you different is lying. In fact you could be lucky not to lose some of your savings as well, without a cast iron European wide savings insurance scheme.

And who will fund that?

Index of Frank's Diaries