--> The Greeks, collectively are responsible for their own destiny, and their problems are essentially of their own making.
"as blame and punishment"
Your application of such emotional sentiment I think is hiding the reality from you.
There is no 'blame'.
There is no 'punishment'.
There is just reality.
The Greeks will thrive and be wealthy when they decide to institute social, cultural and economic reforms that enable them to be wealthy.
Have you ever investigated the Greek situation? The country is a basket case of epic proportions. The best description I ever saw of it is "a third world country temporarily able to pretend it's not due to the EU".
Tax collection has already been mentioned. There are many other problems. For instance in most countries workers retire at 65. In theory so do Greeks. But not in practice: Greece has the notion of a "arduous and unhealthy job" which lets you retire at 50. Some of the jobs considered so bad you can retire a decade or more early, on a full pension, include trombonist, bakers, masseuses, hairdressers (this job also qualifies as dangerous!), and pastry chefs.
The notion that Greeks are hard working is systematically undermined by facts about their own laws. The country lived off borrowed money for many years, and is now being brought back to something resembling the correct level of wealth given their laws and economic fundamentals.
Thanks for confirming my point so well. It's lovely how bottom-up democratic everything becomes as soon as blame and punishment are being thrown about.
> The Germans would in fact, do a deal with the Greeks if they instituted proper economic reforms
What do you think austerity is if not widespread drastic "reforms" among other things? The Greeks did go to great lengths to appease the eurogroup but still needed a fundamental debt trimming.