It's a number that is well within the range. The article may be misleading, but if so it did its job, and I used those numbers. Millions more were similarly informed (or misinformed.)
I do not support Germany here; I am not even sure who to root for. One relevant question here is very simple: WHY is Greece unable to pay its debts? Insifficient productivity of workers, compared to their pay, is one possible answer. Are there other reasons? If there are, perhaps it would be useful if those who know clearly enumerate them. Many people who post on FR have never seen Greece, don't speak the language, and have to depend on articles like the one that you identified as misleading. The article mentions that 3/4 of retirees retired before the legal age - and you list some possible reasons for that. If so, is it because there are too many disabled public workers, or wounded soldiers, or mothers in age 50-61 with "young" (?????) children under 18 (??????) How many workers in other countries are allowed to retire and to draw pensions in similar circumstances? What's the point of a high retirement age if the law is full of loopholes and exceptions that 3/4 of the population qualifies for?
All those are interesting questions that directly relate to the problem at hand. As I said earlier, Greece can fix their economy only if it has workers who are eager to work, produce goods, sell those goods abroad and to each other, and create wealth. The opposite to that is drawing pension and sitting on a couch. What is the ratio between these two polar groups? How many workers are banging on the gates of factories and demanding to let them in, to work from 9 to 5 for a modest compensation, competing with Chinese?
Let me reiterate: I do not pretend to know specifics. Perhaps you do - and then please explain what is the lay of the land from your vantage point. There are not too many dogmatics on FR; but correct information is always in short supply.
Here’s another article, originally from Market Watch which explains much of what is happening:
http://www.pappaspost.com/marketwatch-opinion-europes-secret-fear-about-greece
Let me add a few personal observations. Corruption, official and otherwise became endemic among the political elites in Greece by about, say’ 1990. It made and makes no difference which party we are talking about, PASOK or Nea Dimokratia. Every service in the Greek governments from Athens down to the local level were for sale. Development costs could triple because of all the “tips” and “envelopes” government officials and politicians demanded and got. A few families, maybe as many as 25-30, really ran the government. A substantial percentage of money from the EU which the Greek governments borrowed for, say’ roads or other infrastructure projects ended up in the pockets of these families. Some was used to curry favor with the population, the rest they just kept. The biggest offenders, unfortunately, were the leaders of ND, the conservative party. They were astonishing crooks. PASOK was not much better, but they were better. BTW, the EU bankers and the bureaucrats in Brussels and politicians in, say, Germany and France were all complicit in what was going on. They were making money off Greek loans like there was no tomorrow.
Remember that Greece is a small country with a small GDP. Thievery and corruption on the scale of the last 20 years or so simply bankrupted the country.
Other things have been going on, but in a nutshell, the foregoing is what happened.