The Impact of Austerity Measures on Social Security Beneficiaries: The Case of Greece

This article discusses how welfare cuts in Greece affected social insurance beneficiaries’ access to better living conditions by raising the question why welfare benefits are not excluded from cuts even though they obviously minimize poverty rates in people of the third and fourth age. It focuses on the Memoranda reform measures imposed after 2010 acknowledging on the one hand that these measures are for the most part unjustifiable and in parallel locating which changes have been accepted and welcomed by the social insurance fund executives.