Javier Caraballo posts a photo of a sign hung on a Madrid bar door by its barman explaining his particular crisis and that suffered by all those Spaniards without ownership in a broad sense of some part of the means of production and distribution:
| 1999 (pta) | 2011 (€) | 2011 (pta) | increase (%) | |
| monthly salary waiter | 145,000 | 900.00 | 149,748 | 3 |
| café solo | 80 | 1.20 | 200 | 150 |
| ticket 10 metro journeys | 640 | 9.40 | 1,564 | 144 |
| train ticket to Cotos (Madrid) | 320 | 4.80 | 799 | 150 |
| litre of milk | 80 | 0.80 | 133 | 66 |
| kilo tomatoes | 120 | 2.40 | 399 | 233 |
| loaf of bread | 25 | 0.60 | 100 | 299 |
| 1st year secondary science textbook | 1,200 | 35.00 | 5,824 | 385 |
| room rental | 30,000 | 400.00 | 66,554 | 122 |
| purchase 90m2 flat | 18,000,000 | 300,000.00 | 49,915,863 | 177 |
Javier says that we’ve had three bubbles simultaneously: in construction, which has left us with 5 million unemployed; in public administration, which has multiplied vertically and horizontally; and in consumer prices relative to salaries (which in the case of the barman have been frozen partly by the arrival of millions of immigrants accustomed to even lower wages); and that if something is not done rapidly we will reach a point of no return.
Various friends who have been transferred from contracted to unofficial status confirm my belief that official unemployment figures are wildly exaggerated; the size of the state seems to be being reduced, although nothing like as fast as the government tells foreign audiences, and probably not fast enough to avoid Armageddon; but, perhaps like Javier, I struggle to understand why there has been no rioting, African style, regarding the prices of basic necessities, which show little sign of abating.
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