The thing is things have been working in terms of austerity, and the battle has been whether they should commit to more. The Greeks don't want to, and the Europeans don't want to lend more money until they do.
I'm not saying the Greeks are lazy or anything like that, but the issues about who pays tax and how much are definitely a piece of the problem. I have heard of many loopholes and I've never even been to Greece! So it's not a question about how much work gets done or whether people are hard working, but about whether the government is collecting it's share. The only way a government can be rated for credit is on its taxation power and because the Greeks are notoriously terrible tax collectors the credit rating follows suit. It's not an attack on their character as a nation or anything like that, and it's no different than a bank not wanting to lend to people here based on these kinds of issues. It's not personal, but why would a German citizen want to send more money to Greece at this point, when clearly it's a band-aid solution and basically just kicks the can a little further down the road?
Couple that with less fear of contagion and a Greek government that has decided this is its hill to die on and you can see the issue for this referendum.
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