When I was growing up in post-Junta Greece in the 70s and early 80s and then when I came back in the 90s, inflation and interest rates were high but the interest rates were always higher than the inflation rates (15 and 20%, at one point). I know people who had always invested in Greek bonds and kept their heads above water because of the 5% differential. Then, as Greece prepared for the euro, inflation crashed to 'normal' levels in the low single digits. So the people sitting on ten year bonds paying them 20% did very well but even then interest rates remained positive for ordinary bank accounts.
Just today I was watching an ad on Greek television from a bank advertising a 'privileged' new account that would permit you the grand interest rate of 3% so long as you kept your account growing by at least a euro per month.
Nowadays Greece cannot borrow on the international market and if it did the interest rates would be usurious at around 35%. Even the 'bailout' loans that Greece is getting are above 6%. Inflation is certainly not lower than 3% in country and not much lower EU wide. So your ordinary depositor, even with a 'privileged' account is receiving a negative interest rate. Is this not theft?
In lieu of further text there is a poll. Please take it. It refers to ordinary bank accounts, CDs and other instruments where your bank pays you for your money. Let us not even think of the interest rates the banks charge us for lending us our money.