The ECB has published estimates of the direct cost to eurozone countries of bolstering the financial sector from 2008 to 2013. Ireland’s bank bailouts cost the Emerald Isle the equivalent of close to 40% of its annual economic output, Euronews reported. This is not good news for the Irish taxpayer as most of the money was spent on bank recapitalizations and toxic assets. In other words money spent with no chance of any return. In the case of Ireland it means the country splurged the equivalent of 25% of its GDP with nothing coming back. Cash-strapped Greece was second on the list spending the equivalent of close to 25% of its GDP on bailouts. Across the eurozone as a whole the rescue packages cost some €500b euros ($529b). However, it has transpired that France, Italy, Finland, Slovakia and Estonia spent next to nothing on bank bailouts.
