Greek voters head to polls for key election amid austerity crisis NEW: The crisis raises the question of whether democracies can handle austerity No party is expected to win a majority in the vote Unemployment is near 29% among 25- to 34-year-olds Athens, Greece (CNN) -- Voters in Greece headed to the polls Sunday to take part in parliamentary elections amid widespread uncertainty over what government will emerge and how it will attempt to handle the budget crisis gripping the nation. In recent months, the outgoing coalition government has pushed through a series of painful austerity measures in order to secure emergency bailout funding for Greece. Many voters are angry at the two main parties in government, PASOK and New Democracy. One young mother said her aim Sunday was to "punish" the pro-austerity politicians and "get rid of them for good." Austerity is "the wrong path," said the woman, who did not give her name. "Austerity measures just make people poorer and the situation does not get any better in the long term or in the short term either," she said. But another voter at the same polling station said politicians had been doing the right thing. "We don't have an alternative," he said, saying he backed "whichever party actually understands that and wants to deal with it and wants to take these hard measures." He also did not give his name. The country's national debt threatened to force it out of Europe's common currency, the euro, prompting the European Central Bank and other lenders to swoop in with emergency funding last year. In exchange, they demanded that the government slash spending brutally. However the voting turns out, Greece is in for more rough times ahead, said Alexis Papahelas, executive editor of the newspaper Kathimerini. "Everybody understands that the markets dictate reforms, austerity and so on," he said, even as voters want to "send a very strong message to the politicians." The question that raises, he said, is: "Is this compatible with parliamentary democracy?" If no party wins a majority on Sunday, as is expected, a coalition would again have to be formed. Politicians will have until May 17 to come up with a working coalition or set a date for another round of elections. Results are not expected from the country's 26,000 polling stations until late Sunday night. Antonis Samaras, leader of the right-leaning New Democracy party, urged voters at a rally on Thursday in Athens to swing behind his party. Opinion polls suggest New Democracy will take about a fifth of the vote, with PASOK a few points behind. Far-right parties are among the fringe groups expected to benefit from voters' disillusionment with the two biggest parties' backing for austerity measures. The extreme right Golden Dawn, an ultra-nationalist party that blames immigrants for many of Greece's problems, may take more than 5% of the vote and claim seats in parliament, opinion polls suggest. Another far-right party, LAOS, could take about 3% of the vote. Surveys indicate SYRIZA, the Coalition of the Radical Left, could take slightly more than 10% of the vote, with the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), which wants Greece to leave the single-currency eurozone, close behind. KKE leader Aleka Papariga told supporters Wednesday that the debate over whether Greece should stay in the eurozone was pointless. "Without a radical political change, a large section of the people will be fully bankrupted," she said. While the mainstream parties are still expected to win the bulk of the vote, the rise of fringe parties has affected campaigning. In a gesture to right-wing concerns, for example, New Democracy has promised, if elected, to be much tougher on illegal immigration. While his party backed the bailout deal, Samaras argues that the terms of the bailout deal are so restrictive they will stifle economic growth. He wants to push through further privatization and cuts to public-sector waste. The austerity measures have already led to cuts in jobs, wages, pensions and benefits, and have badly affected many people, especially pensioners and those needing state help. Taxes have gone up and the national unemployment rate for January, the latest month for which figures were available, was just under 22%. Among 25- to 34-year-olds, it was nearly 29%, leading many young people to leave the country to seek work elsewhere. The country's massive pile of debt has threatened the stability of the 17-country eurozone during a crisis that has dragged on for almost two years. Greece pushed through a huge debt swap in March to save it from disorderly default and clear the way to receive a second bailout from the European Union, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund, worth €130 billion ($171.5 billion).