What the newspapers say: July 16, 2010 

Half of the money cashed in on VAT goes on the interest rates of credits made by Romania, one newspaper reads on Friday. Elsewhere in the news, one newspaper reads about the incredible career of a Romanian in France. Last but not least, there are plenty of artists who have at least considered to take their lives, now that the suicide of Romanian artist Madalina Manole brough this issue into light, as one paper notes.

Gandul quotes Central Bank governor Mugur Isarescu saying that half of the money cashed in by the state from the VAT goes on the interest rates of credits made by Romania. The decision to increase the VAT at 24% was not a good one, Isarescu said since the state would pay even higher interest rates in credits.

According to data, the interest rates can amount to 2 billion euro instead of 1.5 billion euro. Therefore, the VAT increase is not a good deal for the state. Authorities hope to cash in about 950 million euro until the end of the year from the VAT rise from 19% to 24%.

Half of this sum will be added to the interest rates. Until now, Finance ministry paid over 600 million euro to banks on interest rates. A simple calculus reveals that state spending on interest rate would have reached to 1.5 billion euro this year at a VAT rate of 19%.

This year, Romania needs to loan at least 13 billion euro to cover the budgetary deficit and pay older loans with newer ones. Of these, 4.5 billion euro will be loaned just to pay old loans.

Elsewhere in the news, Romania libera reads about the incredible career of a Romanian Olympic in mathematics, Iulia Gosea who became a sommelier in France and was rewarded the Oscar of sommeliers in April.

Iulia Gosea was elected the best sommelier expert in sparkling water in the world, at the World’s Best Sommelier 2010 organized in April in Santiago de Chile. After she became a mathematics professor in Lyon, Iulia Gosea transformed a hobby in a passion and became a sommelier.

In 2008, Gosea returned in Romania where she decided to work for six months to see what it takes to be a sommelier in Romania. Nonetheless, she also attended stages in the kitchen, near international renowned chefs.

Related to the case of Romanian singer Madalina Manole who committed suicide this week, Gandul newspaper reads that there are plenty of other Romanian artists who have considered to take their life. Among these, famous designer Catalin Botezatu, famous showman Mihai Mitoseru or singer Laura Lavric.

Each of them considered the possibility to take their lives as they had to go through hard times. Experts quoted by the newspaper read that usually, those who come to kill themselves see the world in black and white, all events are catastrophic and without escape.

Catalin Botezatu, designer, talks about his intent to take his live years ago, after a deception in his love life. When a person is decided to take his/her life, there is little one can do to convince him/her of the contrary, Botezatu said.

Another TV moderator, Mihai Mitoseru had to take a life and death decision years ago after he lost the woman he loved and he was supposed to marry. He said that he had such dark thoughts at the time but he understood that life is not always fair.

Experts say that those who consider killing themselves cannot stand criticisms, have no tolerance to frustration. These people should learn to accept themselves as human being, irrespective whether they are good or bad, they are successful or not etc.