On Wednesday – a 77-year-old retired pharmacist walked up to the Greek Parliament building and shot himself in the head to protest the crippling austerity measures that are ripping apart that nation. The man – whose name has not been released – left behind a note reading, “I have no other way to react apart from finding a dignified end before I start sifting through garbage for food.”

His suicide prompted thousands of Greeks to take to the streets in central Athens in fresh new protests against trickle-down austerity. Since trickle-down austerity began in Greece – suicide rates have jumped up 40%. Not only is trickle-down austerity bad economically – it’s bad morally as well. Yet it’s just the thing that the Republican budget written by multi-millionaire Congressman Paul Ryan would bring to the United States.