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Corruption is also in crisis, as shown by the traditional annual survey of Transparency International, which was held for the fourth consecutive year in Greece. According to the data submitted, "only" 632 million euros were spent in bribes in 2010, which is a whole 155 million euros less than in 2009. The survey reported cases investigated both the private and public sectors.

By sectors, the most serious corruption is registered again in the health care and tax offices. In other words, if only two things are certain in the USA - death and taxes, then in Greece death and bribery are certain. Because, if you don’t pay your taxes, you can always grease the palm of the tax officer. Corruption in the urban planning office ranks third for last year. The building permit varies between € 200 and € 9,000 paid in cash to the employees, which is much less than in the previous years. The decline in its ranking is due, according to experts, to the overall reduction in the national turnover of the construction sector which registers a drop of about 40% compared to two years ago.

The study shows that the people pay for a surgery between € 150 to € 7500 in cash. There is no receipt and the amount is not registered anywhere except in the doctors’ pockets. In order to formally terminate the activities of a company in 2010, businessmen had to pay tax officials between € 300 and € 15,000 on average in order to prevent the possibility of being “struck” by an unexpectedly high fine for unclear infringement, for example.

As revealed in the citizen – institution relations doctors and tax officers keep both the knife and the bread in the public sector. In the private sector, health care is again on the top of the corruption pyramid, followed by lawyers and other representatives of the legal profession. One swallow which we await for to bring the spring is the indicator of corruption in the banking sector, which noted a serious decline. 10.8% of respondents said in 2009 they had to give bribe when they needed banking services. This indicator has fallen by half last year.

The total number of participants in the survey is 114 individuals. 92% of them are adamant that Greece is a corrupt country. The height of the crisis and the beginning of the structural reforms in the country have helped the average Greek to realize that the long-standing practice of appointing civil servants by kinship criteria is a form of corruption.

Mass layoffs in the private sector and slow changes in the public one have also had their impact in the shaping of public opinion. 61% of the respondents said they want the disclosure of civil servants’ assets to be legalized to make it transparent whether their standard of living meets their monthly income. In comparison, those interested in transparency in 2008 were less than half of the participants in the survey.

"The results are really encouraging but they must not make us complacent. The economic and moral crisis that we are experiencing now comes to confirm that we have no second chance for failure," said Costas Bakouris, Chairman of Transparency International-Greece. He stressed that the time has come for change and called to Greeks to reconsider values ​​and practices in society, so as to provide a basis for the development of sustainable and responsible society in the future.