Who is to blame for the recession?

Mackman

It's a result of a lot of different factors. I dont think its possible to blame one person, or many people.
But what didnt help, IMO, is the people who bought houses/flats for outragious prices, and thought it was ok to live off credit. Ive no sympathy for them

amacachi

Loved the programme on RTÉ earlier, everyone going on and on about developers etc., then one guy starts talking, telling a heartwrenching story about how he built/renovated some places and got the money really easily but can't sell them or afford the repayments. Ironically when he was saying what happened with his own spin on it none of the panellists called him a developer or took their pitchforks out.

Money was cheaply and easily available and some people took advantage. Their risk. The vast vast majority of people in trouble now have no-one but themselves to blame.

thomond2006

The View of an Unqualified Critic

The banks had blind and reckless confidence in a property market that was unsustainable. They gave excessive loans to property developers e.g 1 billion from Anglo Irish Bank to Liam Carroll. Crazy stuff.

The developers behavied irresponsibly, by building and building and building in a volatile market.

In terms of tax revenue etc. the government placed too much reliance on the property market. Once this went down the toilet, we were always in trouble.

It doesn't help when the economic superpower The United States is in recession too. They were heading for disaster as soon as Lehmann Brothers collapsed. With the influence that the US economy has worldwide, it was aloways going to have a serious domino effect on the rest of the world.

Also, as a society, we (to quote Charlie Haughey) "lived away beyond our means". Building up credit card bills, overdrafts for was always going to bite us in the ass.
The banks do have to share the blame for giving us the credit though although one has to admit that we were careless.

Don't forget Fianna Fail (pronounced "fail") were in charge.

Recipe for disaster.

Recessions/Depressions come in phases, this won't be the last but it will eventually run its course. I think a lot of people in high places will learn a valuable lesson.

Ally Dick

Mortgages to couples did all of the damage. Once the mortgage multiples were on the basis of one salary and were a realistic multiple of that salary, then property prices would remain realistic. However, when Irish Nationwide decided to advertise 100% mortgages, and the financial regulator did nothing to stop it, then things were always going to get ridiculous. Soon after that, all the banks were offering 100% mortgages, and when mortgages to couples got off the ground, the property bubble took off in earnest. Bertie didn't want to hear any criticism, the financial regulator did nothing, nor did the central bank. If this was tackled at the time, there would have been no property bubble, and no mess. Thank you Bertie and thank you John Hurley and Paddy Neary

jdivision

Bertie Ahern and FF made long term spending decisions based on short-term income (from taxes related to property) and raised wages instead of spending more on services themselves and infrastructure. That's why we're up a certain creek without even a tooth pick. The banks are also to blame for pushing up the mortgage limits each time the market stalled.

atomicent

Ireland is the size of manchester( poulation wise) who in there right mind would think that it was ever going to last, especially house prices,, it was absolutely madness what went on, now everyone is going to struggle for the next 2-3 years because of over inflated prices which will never be what they were again, the irish government are the main people to blame for letting it happen in the first place, but secondly the banks for firing out money like it was toilet paper!!!!! Its as good as toilet paper now!!!!
The foreigners came,made their money and took it home, they were the only clever people to gain anything.

orourkeda

I blame your oul wan.

Hazys

Black taxi drivers

Fuhrer

The Jews!

orourkeda

atomicent wrote: »

Ireland is the size of manchester( poulation wise) who in there right mind would think that it was ever going to last, especially house prices,, it was absolutely madness what went on, now everyone is going to struggle for the next 2-3 years because of over inflated prices which will never be what they were again, the irish government are the main people to blame for letting it happen in the first place, but secondly the banks for firing out money like it was toilet paper!!!!! Its as good as toilet paper now!!!!
The foreigners came,made their money and took it home, they were the only clever people to gain anything.

Who's responsible for putting the current government into power? The irish people

Who took out 100% mortgages to buy overpriced dogboxes? The irish people.

Who gave the foreigners the money to tak home? the irish people.

The sad fact is that the irish people were simply asking to be robbed.

The banks may have fired out money like confetti. They only did this because there were plenty of people prepared to borrow it from them

gdael

Fighting Irish wrote: »

If you haven't got any debt
If you have savings
If you are have a job/college
If you haven't got a mortgage of €300K+

If you're in the above category the recession wasn't your fault

As of now i fit in all of the above Categories.
But i do have a plasma TV Everyone needs one of those.

Oh, and i dont see no recession It hasnt effected me, or most people i know in the slightest apart from some of my savings going to the tax man. Still plenty off room for manouver though. Maybe the odd redundancy among my friends, but they got jobs again quick enough.

I suppose if you work in Construction, civil service or service it might be a different story. But all is cool in my world.

Will

Property developers for being greedy, my bet is most houses built in last 10 years will crumble fairly quickly. Even in boom times the quality that went into some houses was very poor because they were cutting corners even then to save money.

Banks for lending to them and knowing full well what was looming. Do they go after the guy who has lost them hundreds of millions? No. They go after the poor average joe who missed one payment on his mortgage. Bastids.

Government for turning a blind eye, not listening to economists who could see where we were headed even 2 years ago. Screwing over the average person with tax levies to get the country back on track even though it won't help much.

meglome

SarahSassy wrote: »

I know there are world wide issues at play here and also know people are happy to jump on the bankers and the developers but I think the fault also lies at the feet of all the SME directors who took all the profits out of their companies. The bulk of them have taken all the surplus cash out of the businesses and had nothing left for when times got tough. As such, the recessions is deeper and longer than it should be.

What do you think?

SS

PS Mods not sure where this should go so please feel free to move.

We'll the simple answer is we are to blame. We kept voting in people who's policies had descended into a pyramid scheme. So take a long look in the mirror everyone.

Davao8000

Tommy Tiernan said it was the "Jews"...

Ally Dick

orourkeda wrote: »

Who's responsible for putting the current government into power? The irish people

No choice in this country. You get either Fianna Fail or Fine Gael. Both the same

orourkeda wrote: »

Who took out 100% mortgages to buy overpriced dogboxes? The irish people.

Who had the power to stop this ? The Government, the financial regulator and the central bank. Nobody stepped in. The irish people felt pressured to get on the property ladder

orourkeda wrote: »

Who gave the foreigners the money to tak home? the irish people.

Who is responsible for so many foreigners getting in ? Eh, the EU/Nice Treaty for starters for all the EU migrants, the government for rubber stamping all of the non-EU migrant applications.

The government are mostly to blame. The Irish people have little power

gdael

Davao8000 wrote: »

Tommy Tiernan said it was the "Jews"...

Misdirection huh. We know thats you Tommy.
And we knows the recession is your fault too, so dont start trying to pull the wool over our eyes.

Mr. Presentable

Obama

Had he paid $4bn to save Lehman Brothers none of this would have happened. How much has that decision cost now, I wonder?

inforfun

SV wrote: »

It was white men with blonde hair and blue eyes.

No, no, no.... it was already like this when i got here.

techdiver

Ally Dick wrote: »

The irish people felt pressured to get on the property ladder

Just because you felt pressured doesn't make it an excuse to blame some one else. Anyone who bought a house did so of their own accord. It was clear that it was a bubble but people ignored it for the same old stupid reasons, such as the "rent is dead money", argument. The fact that you referred to it as the property ladder says it all. This is a myth. Their is no rule whereby you must work your way through property before finally settling. This is the very reason so many shoe box apartments were built to facilitate this mindset with the misguided notion that it was sustainable.

Mr. Presentable

jdivision wrote: »

Bertie Ahern and FF made long term spending decisions based on short-term income (from taxes related to property) and raised wages instead of spending more on services themselves and infrastructure. That's why we're up a certain creek without even a tooth pick. The banks are also to blame for pushing up the mortgage limits each time the market stalled.

Why do so many people think that what happens in Irish politics amounts to a hill of beans in the world economy? The world is in recession, not just Ireland

amacachi

nipplenuts wrote: »

Obama

Had he paid $4bn to save Lehman Brothers none of this would have happened. How much has that decision cost now, I wonder?

I don't think he quite made that much money from his books.

Snakeblood

meglome wrote: »

We'll the simple answer is we are to blame. We kept voting in people who's policies had descended into a pyramid scheme. So take a long look in the mirror everyone.

Did you vote for them? I didn't.

I'm not really willing to accept group blame for something I had no part of, didn't appreciably benefit from, and being grouped with them means that I'm lumped in with people I find incredibly offensive.

af_thefragile

Its them arab folks
Its them jew folks
Its them black folks
Its them paki folks
Its them chinese folks
Its them polish folks


Am I doin it right??........

Oh The Humanity

Southsiders, obviously.

First with the lattes.....now look :mad: mutter...

Karl Hungus

Bono.

major bill

The driver of the gravy train!!!!!:o:)

TheZohanS

SarahSassy wrote: »

Cos its my job to know.

I blame you for it. You should have warned someone.

SME's had nothing to do with it.

gdael

What i want to know is -
Who us to blame for lifting us out of the recession.

What are us irish going to beat ourselves over the heads with then. We'll think of something.

Agricola

Stan Staunton

BizTalker

The Irish Economy itself, lacking to show any flexibility. Good times were based all on the construction bubble. Time to saw tatoes

Agent J

The underpants Gnomes.

Micilin Muc

Yore Ma

Nevyn

Yore Ma is the underpants gnome?
That explains a few things, your lack of height to start with.

Agent J

Step 1: Yore Ma
Step 2: ????
Step 3: Underpants Gnomes.

Nevyn

Agent J wrote:

Step 1: Yore Ma
Step 2: Who ****ed her to that she gave birth to...
Step 3: Underpants Gnomes.

FYP

Was it a banker?

orourkeda

Ally Dick wrote: »

No choice in this country. You get either Fianna Fail or Fine Gael. Both the same



Who had the power to stop this ? The Government, the financial regulator and the central bank. Nobody stepped in. The irish people felt pressured to get on the property ladder



Who is responsible for so many foreigners getting in ? Eh, the EU/Nice Treaty for starters for all the EU migrants, the government for rubber stamping all of the non-EU migrant applications.

The government are mostly to blame. The Irish people have little power

The majority of the voting public in this country will not accept their share of the blame for this economic f*ck up. Remember it was a majority vote that put this government into power. It was a majority that passed the nice treaty. If you felt pressurised to get onto the property ladder by the government dont expect anyone to feel sorry for you., It just shows you didnt use your brain to decide.

orourkeda

BizTalker wrote: »

The Irish Economy itself, lacking to show any flexibility. Good times were based all on the construction bubble. Time to saw tatoes

Sawing tatties resulted in a famine.

Sawing property resulted in recession.

As for irish economic flexibility. Come on. Get real. There simply aren't the numbers to be anything other than a be-atch to British economice superiority

meglome

Snakeblood wrote: »

Did you vote for them? I didn't.

I'm not really willing to accept group blame for something I had no part of, didn't appreciably benefit from, and being grouped with them means that I'm lumped in with people I find incredibly offensive.

I hear ya. I was talking about the very collective WE. I didn't vote for them either so it really pisses me off.

I warned all my friends about jumping into a bubble. At a party the other night some lads I hadn't seen in a few years came up to me and mentioned that I'd tried to warn them. Normally 'I told you so' would feel better, I just felt really bad for them.

Kipperhell

BizTalker wrote: »

The Irish Economy itself, lacking to show any flexibility. Good times were based all on the construction bubble. Time to saw tatoes

I knew a lot of people making lots of money and none had anything to do with construction. People are assuming that Ireland somehow was the only country to go into recession. Lots of job losses here are from big international companies who are having cash flow issues nothing to do with our construction industry.

orourkeda

Ally Dick wrote: »

No choice in this country. You get either Fianna Fail or Fine Gael. Both the same



Who had the power to stop this ? The Government, the financial regulator and the central bank. Nobody stepped in. The irish people felt pressured to get on the property ladder



Who is responsible for so many foreigners getting in ? Eh, the EU/Nice Treaty for starters for all the EU migrants, the government for rubber stamping all of the non-EU migrant applications.

The government are mostly to blame. The Irish people have little power

Thta's what irish people tell themselves to absolve themselves of their share of the blame

A_SN

SarahSassy wrote: »

I know there are world wide issues at play here and also know people are happy to jump on the bankers and the developers but I think the fault also lies at the feet of all the SME directors who took all the profits out of their companies. The bulk of them have taken all the surplus cash out of the businesses and had nothing left for when times got tough. As such, the recessions is deeper and longer than it should be.

What do you think?

SS

PS Mods not sure where this should go so please feel free to move.

Well... people tend to look for the most directly responsible party, but I think the blame is to put on the resurgence of neoclassical economics in the 1970s, at the expense of Keynesian economics. Over the last few decades they just turned into a cult of "let's not touch the market at all for it is perfect without any intervention". Now these dumbasses got a tough reality check and it's back to Keynes with stimuluses and regulation.

So I blame that on ideological folly, and a poor memory or understanding of pre-1930s economical cycles. Or to put it simply, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it". We started acting like before the Great Depression again, we got our arses bit, so now we try to fix things the same way we did back in the 1930s (which was the right way to do it) and we can try to hope that this time we won't forget the lesson.

blinding

When any human enterprise goes tits up. Those that are running the show are responsible for the fook up.

If you are not willing to take the responsibility then do not take the job in the first place.

The politicians that were willing to claim all the credit should also take the brick bats when the fook up.

Some politicians, bankers and developers should be executed for their "leadership" during this crisis.

Ulysses Gaze

Thta's what irish people tell themselves to absolve themselves of their share of the blame

And that's why as a nation, we will be back here again in 20 years time. We expect to be babysat by Government rather than make rational, logical decisions based on researching facts and figures.

The irish people felt pressured to get on the property ladder

Peer pressure? I thought people grew out of that when they left their teens.

thegen

David McWilliams and George Lee sure they talked us into it;)

Stark

Daragh101 wrote: »

whatever about people buying up property, and developers going mental borrowing from banks, in fairness its not really their fault!
The government did not regulate the banks correctly, letting them lend money where they should not be, and telling people that the "good times were here to stay" was the real reason for the recession!
If your a developer and you think you can make a few bob from building an estate, why wouldnt you if the banks were willing to give you the money!

the builders/public caused the recession, but it would not have been caused if the banks were regulated properly!.

The banks may be responsible for their own mess but they didn't force people to take loans.

Every idiot who bought multiple homes as "investment properties" and just left them sitting there in the hopes that greater idiots would eventually come along is responsible imo. At least the developers kept the supply going and didn't buy up millions of houses and keep them empty thus driving up house prices for anyone actually looking to live in a house.

star.chaser

Richard Simmons

johnp

Daroxtar wrote: »

john

Sorry

Fighting Irish wrote: »

If you haven't got any debt
If you have savings
If you are have a job/college
If you haven't got a mortgage of €300K+

If you're in the above category the recession wasn't your fault

Yay, that's me!

Oh, wait, I'm confused now

gdael

All of us posting on forums when we are supposed to be at work are to blame.

Obviously we have nothing to do, but waste our employers money by posting on boards :eek:

And then we have the cheek to complain about civil servants being wasters :rolleyes:

A_SN

gdael wrote: »

All of us posting on forums when we are supposed to be at work are to blame.

Obviously we have nothing to do, but waste our employers money by posting on boards :eek:

And then we have the cheek to complain about civil servants being wasters :rolleyes:

Muahahahahaha, nice one! The value of work is insignificant compared to the value of capital. That's why these guys over at Wall Street make so much more money than your boss (I presume), even if they would do just as well if they based their decisions on throwing darts at the Wall Street Journal. The very root of the current recession is in how the capital was handled and inflated (or even based on really crappy assets/loans or whatever). Nothing to do with workers dicking around the Internet .

Morlar

Irish financial institutions and international financial institutions are to blame for the recession.

The reason it is hitting Ireland so bad in comparison to the rest of the world is directly due to govt incompetence and squandering of BILLIONS of our money over the last decade.