Part of the background to the sack of Athens is the widespread belief among Europe’s austerians that, despite everything that has happened, they are in the process of being vindicated. After all, growth has resumed in the GIIPS countries – in fact, even Greece was growing until Syriza came to power and scared away the confidence fairy.

Now, many of us took on similar claims in the UK – and quickly noted that a large part of the story behind the resumption of British growth in 2013-2014 was actually a pause in fiscal consolidation. Confusion between levels and rates of change is endemic here — actually, it’s just amazing how much discussion of macroeconomics since the crisis is nonsense because people who imagine themselves sophisticated are muddled about the difference between levels and changes. But the models are completely clear: the rate of growth of GDP should depend on the change in the structural budget balance. So you would expect GDP growth to pick up, other things equal, if there is a slowdown in the pace of tightening even if austerity isn’t actually reversed.

So how does the story of the GIIPS fit into this analysis? Exhibit 1 shows the overall stance of fiscal policy in the GIIPS, using the IMF’s estimate of the structural budget balance as a share of potential GDP — an imperfect measure, but good enough, I think, to make the point. To get a single number I weight countries by their 2009 PPP GDP, also from the IMF. The story is clear: rapid, drastic tightening from 2009 to 2013, but a standstill in 2014. A revival of growth in 2014 is therefore no surprise — and it actually supports the Keynesian story, rather than refuting it.

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Exhibit 2 shows things a bit differently, with more detail. Each point in the scatterplot represents an individual GIIPS country in a given year, with the horizontal axis showing the change in the structural balance — effectively, the additional austerity imposed in that year — and the vertical axis representing the rate of growth. As usual, we see a clear negative association, consistent with a Keynesian story.

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In addition to the usual scatter, however, I have marked the observations for 2014 in red. As you can see, 2014 was a year of modest growth for all of the countries; it was also a year in which fiscal consolidation was effectively put on hold. And the outcomes were well within a range consistent with the previous austerity-growth relationship.

So is there anything at all here suggesting that it’s OK to impose further fiscal tightening on Greece, that this won’t deepen its depression? For that matter, does Greece even stand out as having done worse than you would expect given the incredibly harsh fiscal adjustment? No and no.