A family with one unemployed parent and one parent working half-time decides to get a 50″ plasma television. The loan the money from the bank and purchase their TV.
When the day they have to pay back the loan for their TV arrives they have two possibilities: They can work more to earn enough for their consumption (actually even their previous consumption) or they can reduce costs in order to make do with their current income. None of the possibilities seem very enticing to the family; they are very comfy in front of their new TV and neither do they want to waste time away from the TV (increase earnings) nor do they want to do without their snacks (reduce costs).
Thus, the family decides to democratically decide whether to pay back the loan. Unsurprisingly the result is to continue as before and default on the loan, completely ignoring the liabilities they have accepted and signed for.
Just like the bank won’t accept the “democratic right” of the family to refuse to pay, the EU countries loaning Greece money also cannot just accept that Greece prefers not to increase retirement age (work more) and to continue public over-spending (neglect to reduce costs). Just like the family has no democratic right to decide to neglect paying their loan, Greece has no right to refuse their liabilities either.
