This is what is at the heart of the greek crisis: the financial bankruptcy of the country is just the logical conclusion of an all-encompassing moral bankruptcy (in terms of everyday behavior, things taken for granted in non-failed states, such as paying the toll). The tragic flaw of modern Greeks is their utter inability for self-criticism, and for recognizing that a society is an interconnected organism, where one’s actions, no matter how seemingly trivial or harmless, eventually have repercussions on all. Greeks have, in recent decades, been living life as if each person is an island unto himself. No doubt, people are warm and friendly on a personal basis, and family and friendship ties are much stronger than in many other cultures, as you so beautifully demonstrate in your article. But there is a singular failure of imagination in recognizing that the community is not just the people one interacts with personally, but also comprised of many, many others one may never meet, but who still may be affected by one’s choices. Does someone like Mr. Evmorfidis (and his behavior is not the exception but the rule, as he himself gleefully asserts) realize that, by not paying the toll (which indeed would be a drop in the ocean for him) he is further bankrupting the Greek state? And, much more importantly: does he realize that, once such flouting of the law becomes so normalized, it becomes a small step from not paying the toll to not paying one’s taxes? Greece would not be bankrupt if the so-called shadow economy was not as gigantic as it is.

So your first paragraph warning people that the findings are suspect because they come from the conservative Catholic church should be a warning that should be given for all research done in these social issues.