欧洲面临崩盘危机（上）

    乍一眼看上去，亚尼斯•布塔利斯不太像是个支持自由市场的改革家。这位现年69岁的塞萨洛尼基（Thessaloniki，希腊第二大城市）市长前臂和指关节上都有纹身，满头白发修剪得很短，面部皱纹很多，看起来就像是块历尽沧桑的皮革。在一个闷热的夏日午后，我们坐在他那单调乏味的办公室倾谈。他戴着金耳环，身穿牛仔裤，脚踏一双Keds黑色高帮无系带胶底球鞋，还一根接一根地抽着骆驼牌（Camels）无过滤嘴香烟。进入政界之前，布塔利斯是个生意人，现在他仍然拥有该国最顶尖的酿酒厂之一（不过，他过去纵酒过度，现在正在戒酒，不能再享用自己的陈年佳酿了）。他在政治上很难算得上是保守派，当年第一次入选塞萨洛尼基市议会时，他甚至还是个共产党党员。

    不过，就算是对布塔利斯来说，希腊那史诗般的经济滑铁卢也已经让他忍无可忍。“希腊人借钱毫无节制，花钱大手大脚。在商品制造和提供旅游业等服务方面也完全丧失了竞争力，”他愤怒地说，一边说还一边用力挥舞手中的香烟以示强调，“如果想开公司的话，就算是去保加利亚也比希腊好！”

    塞萨洛尼基是希腊北部的工业中心，它本该成为国际邮轮公司的重要港口、欧洲退休者的旅游胜地和巴尔干地区的运输枢纽，但众多不利政策使该市无法充分发挥潜力，这位深感挫折的市长正全力改变它们。布塔利斯受够了掣肘，准备亲手解决这些问题。比如说，他威胁要采取激进措施（当然是按照希腊标准来衡量），把该市运转失灵的垃圾收集行业私有化。“相关工会正在抵制我的改革，以每三个垃圾桶只清理一个的方式进行‘罢工’，”布塔利斯不满地说，“我正在考虑雇佣合同工，这样每吨垃圾的清理费可以省下一半！”

    布塔利斯眼前的这团乱麻——以及必须立即采取行动的紧迫性——正是整个欧洲面临的问题的缩影。想必阁下肯定已经听说过，整个欧洲大陆目前深陷于不断升级的债务危机无法自拔。危机2010年初肇始于希腊，但最近几周已经蔓延到意大利和西班牙，而这些国家经济规模太大，一旦出事没人能救得了。这些国家——还包括葡萄牙和爱尔兰——要么背负着沉重的债务，要么现在仍有庞大的财政赤字，但却还在不断累积新债务，这一切都是他们过去十年来毫无节制浪费公帑的后果。如今，投资者担心这些国家的竞争力长期低下，无法保持足够的增长速度，将来连国债的利息都无力清偿。因此，全球养老金基金、保险公司和银行纷纷抛售西班牙和意大利国债，使其国债收益率一路飙升，直指灾难性的高位。 

    At first glance, Yiannis Boutaris would seem to be an unlikely free-market reformer. The 69-year-old mayor of Thessaloniki, Greece's second-largest city, has tattoos decorating his forearms and knuckles, short-cropped white hair, and a face creased like worn leather. As we sit and talk in his drab office on a sweltering summer afternoon, he's chain-smoking unfiltered Camels and wearing jeans, a gold stud earring, and black high-top Keds sneakers with no laces. Boutaris was a businessman before he got into politics, and he still owns one of the country's leading wineries (although, as a recovering alcoholic, he can no longer drink his own vintages). But he's hardly a political conservative. He was originally elected to Thessaloniki's city council as a member of the Communist Party.

    Even Boutaris, however, has reached a breaking point with his nation's Homeric economic failures. "The Greeks borrowed and consumed recklessly, and got totally uncompetitive at making things and providing services like tourism," he says angrily, jabbing the air with his cigarette for emphasis. "If you want to start a business, you'll do better going to Bulgaria!"

    The frustrated mayor is battling to end policies that block Thessaloniki, the industrial center of northern Greece, from becoming what it should be -- a principal port for the world's cruise lines, a favorite resort for European retirees, and a transit hub for the Balkans. Fed up, Boutaris is taking matters into his own hands. For instance, he's threatening to take the radical (for Greece) step of privatizing the city's dysfunctional waste collection business. "The unions are 'striking' against my reforms by picking up one can out of three," grouses Boutaris. "I'm thinking about hiring contract workers. We could save 50% on every ton of garbage!"

    The mess that Boutaris is tackling -- and the overwhelming need to take action now -- epitomizes the problems facing Europe. As you've no doubt heard, the continent is trapped in an escalating debt crisis. It began in Greece in early 2010, but in recent weeks it has spread to Italy and Spain, nations that are simply too big to bail out. Those countries -- as well as Portugal and Ireland -- suffer from either crushing debt loads or gigantic current deficits that are piling on new debt, a legacy of their reckless overspending during the past decade. Today investors worry that these nations are so chronically uncompetitive, they can't grow fast enough to pay the future interest on that debt. As a result, global pension funds, insurers, and banks are dumping Spanish and Italian bonds, threatening to drive rates to ruinous levels.