For nearly two years, as the debt crisis worsened, Diomidis Spinellis led a team that devised innovative software to help Greece crack down on tax cheats. He sent daily reports to his superiors showing which regional tax offices lagged in closing cases and collecting tax revenue.
But last September, Mr. Spinellis, who interrupted a brilliant career as a computer science professor in 2009 to work for the Greek Finance Ministry, resigned, frustrated that officials did little or nothing with the data he generated.
“I cannot remember getting an enthusiastic response,” Mr. Spinellis, 45, said with characteristic understatement in an interview in his tiny, book-filled office at Athens University of Economics and Business, where he has returned to teaching.
I knew that things were bad in Greece, but I had no idea how much the rot had become institutionalized in its culture and it's government. This very interesting article in the Thursday edition of The New York Times was originally titled "The Powerful Resist Change to Greek Tax System"...and is Roy Stephen's second offering of the day. The link is here.
