Originally Posted by
iahphx
Of course not. But it pays its creditors -- as do almost all other countries in the world. Even Hugo Chavez! Argentina has decided to thumb its nose at the world and not pay. It's probably not the right thing to do.
Maybe not, but so far Argentina seems to be getting away with it. Bringing the country to heel is no simple chore, especially when the government has popular support.
As a taxi driver in Mendoza put it to me a few years ago, "as long as there is beef and red wine in this country, things will never get so bad that its people will be forced to demand change of the government". There's a certain truth in this, I think, which shields the government from consequences of its own idiotic policies vis-a-vis international creditors and the likes of the IMF.