Greek Fire, Part 8

Today's lesson:  when you decide to make massive budget cuts in the middle of a recession, your economy shrinks.

Greece's economy will shrink another two percent this year, much more than currently forecast by the government, though its debt servicing costs will fall, central bank Governor George Provopoulos told Reuters.

Grappling with a ballooning deficit and a 300 billion euro ($411 billion) debt pile, Athens aims to reduce its fiscal gap by four percentage points of gross domestic product this year through a combination of cuts and higher taxes.

That will still leave it with a deficit of 8.7 percent of GDP and economists say the plan's success will hinge on strict implementation and social peace.

Whenever your economic plan involves maintaining "social peace" you're in trouble.  Just saying.