It would only take 4 weeks for the country to turn itself around!

irish_bob

ghost_ie wrote: »

lmimmfn wrote: »

While i agree with that its only part of the solution, total government costs are supposed to be in the region of 80million a year on salaries/expenses etc. ), now i heard that on the radio several months ago so dont quote me on that.

The problem is its too damn big, they are there to serve the public, the country is in deep recession we dont need all these guys anymore, there needs to be a kinfe cut through the whole sector. They all complain about the levy poor souls, they now have a form of contributary pension, well i say increase the levy on an optional basis and those who dont pay it get a substantially less pension when they retire. quote]

I don't know what the higher echelons of the public service receive in salaries but I do know what the lower orders get. My daughter is a nurse. She receives just under €35,000 a year before tax, PRSI, Income Levy, Health Levy etc. per annum. That's not an exorbitant salary, is it? Not when compared with what higher civil servants, td's, ministers and spin doctors are paid. After all, twice her salary is being paid to the head of the HSE as a bonus.

Certainly salaries should be cut - but let it be for those public servants earning over €100,000. This would include every TD in the country, and every member of every quango.

If the salaries of ordinary members of the Public Service are cut whilst those at the top remain untouched most of those young enough to do so will do what my daughter will do - emigrate. You will never have to pay her salary again. Her pension will be paid by another country. The elite will remain - expecting you to pay not only their salaries but their pensions as well

your daughter will have to take a pay cut if she decides to emmigrate , oh and nurses are not lower paid ps workers , they average a grand a week , nurses like guards and teachers are extremley well paid in this country , a 20% pay cut over three years would be desirable for all three professions , we are in a post bubble economy now , the property boom is over , the public sector boom must end also

cyclopath2001

irish_bob wrote: »

the property boom is over

But mortgage capital repayments are still at boom-time rates.

jimmmy

cyclopath2001 wrote: »

But mortgage capital repayments are still at boom-time rates.

Thats the way of the world. Were those who bought property before the boom complaining about "capital repayments at slump-time rates" during the tiger era ?

jimmmy

irish_bob wrote: »

nurses like guards and teachers are extremley well paid in this country , a 20% pay cut over three years would be desirable for all three professions , we are in a post bubble economy now , the property boom is over , the public sector boom must end also

true enough but given the pay of people like teachers ( Irish male primary school teachers earn €64k average and female teachers €56k average.
http://www.rte.ie/news/2009/0416/teachers.html ) and Gardai ( average pay 60 k ) , I suspect these rates will be cut by 25 to 30% within 3 years ; if the govt do not do it then the IMF will. Time will tell. Current p.s. pay rates , the highest in the known world, are unsustainable.

RealityCheck

jimmmy wrote: »

Thats the way of the world. Were those who bought property before the boom complaining about "capital repayments at slump-time rates" during the tiger era ?

But that misses the point with regard turning the economy around. If wages etc are reduced it will lead to people unable to pay loan repayments on property purchased as well as reducing disposable income. A decrease will lead to lower consumer spending and hence our economy will struggle to recover.

However cuts will have to be made. My own personal take on the situation is that we must do two things:

1. We must reduce wages across the board to improve competitiveness.

2. At the same time we must show some innovation. My own personal opinion is that we should reduce Corporation Tax and Capital Gains Tax to attempt to create economic growth. If realistic growth levels can maintained then the overall tax take will increase in proportion to real economic growth. And hence we would be on the road to recovery.

There is no point cutting public spending if there is no effort put in at being innovative and business friendly. There can be no real recovery without people going back to work. Its simply not a case of just making cuts to balance the books, as without a sizeable effort at increasing output and productivity any cuts will be meaningless.

daithicarr

so we will take from the poorest levels of our society, that will work out great, that wont cause any social or crime problem now would it?

Obviously the people who dream up these ideas have never been on the dole or minimum wage. its no picknick.

and what do people do when their dole gets cut by 60 % to a whopping 80 euro a week, just incase its escaped some peoples notice, there are not a lot of jobs out there.

Its overpaid builders and civil servants and those who have risen the price of goods to exceed that off all our neighbouring countrys who are to blame.

Dropping the incomes of the least well off will acheive nothing positive at all.

jimmmy

daithicarr wrote: »

Its overpaid builders and civil servants and those who have risen the price of goods to exceed that off all our neighbouring countrys who are to blame.

The builders and those who resell goods ....now who among them is overpaid ? Or has a guaranteed pension ? Or security ? Many of them are going out of business / bankrupt.

Blame them if you want but they are not the ones with their snouts in the trough now.

daithicarr

so its the fault of those of us who earn the least or who have lost our jobs ?

we shall be forced to carry this heavy burden, despite having little resources already.

Sure why bother paying them at all, maybe we could just bring in some sort of slave labour or identured slavery and debt bondage.

If the people make even less money and are already struggling what do you expect them to do, live in poverty?

or perhaps they can set up their own companys etc with all the wealth they are greedily hoarding.

snouts in the trough ? what trough, the social welfare ???

murphaph

daithicarr wrote: »

Dropping the incomes of the least well off will acheive nothing positive at all.

It will reduce government expenditure, thereby reducing the cost of government thereby reducing the required tax from businesses and individuals thereby encouraging investment in Ireland.

People need to get it into their heads that unless we start exporting big style again, it's game over. Ireland is a tiny country. The domestic market is almost irrelevant to our prosperity. We must sell goods and services to foreign countries at competitive prices.

We absolutely must try to climb the value chain however but we don't have the luxury of time. We fcuked up big time-we could have been busy investing in research and development and building export led high value industries, but on the whole we didn't bother and now we regret it.

I read a statistic recently. It was about the investment per citizen in R&D in the leading nations. Ireland faired slightly better than the Czech Republic. In top place was the US, followed by Sweden and Finland. Denmark was in fifth place. Three Scandinavian countries in the top five.

Amhran Nua

RealityCheck wrote: »

2. At the same time we must show some innovation. My own personal opinion is that we should reduce Corporation Tax and Capital Gains Tax to attempt to create economic growth. If realistic growth levels can maintained then the overall tax take will increase in proportion to real economic growth. And hence we would be on the road to recovery.

There is no way we are going to see support for innovation with FF and the Greens still chasing the property unicorn around the carousel, no tax adjustments will make a difference if you can't find the seed capital to get your business going in the first place.

daithicarr

yes money needs to be invested in the high end industyrs and services, but those with the least amount of money can ill afford to pay it, if some one is on 500 or 600 a wee or more and have to pay an extra 100 , its a hard blow, but they will surive, some one on minimum wage or more so the dole will not be able to manage, what do those of you who support these cuts propose they do ?

retrain for the high end jobs? where will they get money to do that and how will they get buy in the meantime before those jobs materialize

SkepticOne

What needs to happen is that an independent body should assess the pay and conditions of each public sector position and compare it with the nearest equivalent in the private sector taking into account such things as holidays, job security, pensions and so forth. The ESRI did a study recently but it was based on 2006 data. This needs to be brought up to date as things have changed drastically.

This, of course, was the idea behind benchmarking before it became corrupted. If the unions agreed to agreed to the principle of benchmarking on the way up, they should have no problem with it on the way down.

RealityCheck

murphaph wrote: »

People need to get it into their heads that unless we start exporting big style again, it's game over. Ireland is a tiny country. The domestic market is almost irrelevant to our prosperity. We must sell goods and services to foreign countries at competitive prices.

It is all the more urgent for us to take immediate action in that regard as other external factors are going against us. The strong euro is causing serious problems for our exports industry at the moment. We are especially vulnerable as our two biggest trading partners are outside of the euro area. The collapse of Sterling and the Dollar have the potential to stifle any export led growth.
People must realise that we are on the perihery of europe (not the heart as Michael Martin might have you believe), this means we have to be extra competitive to match other european countries. If we dont get our house in order there will be no economic growth, no jobs recovery and no improvement in our public finances. It really is as simple as that.

RealityCheck

daithicarr wrote: »

yes money needs to be invested in the high end industyrs and services, but those with the least amount of money can ill afford to pay it, if some one is on 500 or 600 a wee or more and have to pay an extra 100 , its a hard blow, but they will surive, some one on minimum wage or more so the dole will not be able to manage, what do those of you who support these cuts propose they do ?

Look we must strive for economic growth. Its a case of taking short term pain for long term gain. If the cost of doing business here drops then there will be further drops in the cost of living, you can be sure of that. Once we become more competitive it will be possible to attract jobs and hence unemployment will drop and our fiscal position will improve.

If we get it right now then come 5 years time this recession will be a distant memory. If we dont however, we will lose a decade.

cyclopath2001

RealityCheck wrote: »

Look we must strive for economic growth. Its a case of taking short term pain for long term gain. If the cost of doing business here drops then there will be further drops in the cost of living, you can be sure of that. Once we become more competitive it will be possible to attract jobs and hence unemployment will drop and our fiscal position will improve.

If we get it right now then come 5 years time this recession will be a distant memory. If we dont however, we will lose a decade.

This suggests that we should not artificially support property prices (e.g. with NAMA) and if we let prices drop to their true market level, we'll have cheaper commercial properties and houses?

RealityCheck

cyclopath2001 wrote: »

This suggests that we should not artificially support property prices (e.g. with NAMA) and if we let prices drop to their true market level, we'll have cheaper commercial properties and houses?

Yes, NAMA has the potential to hold us back, especially in its current form. Lower land and property prices will improve our competitiveness, meaning there is greater potential for our economy to recover. With NAMA there will be a systematic attempt to distort the market which goes against all economic instincts.

Amhran Nua

RealityCheck wrote: »

Lower land and property prices will improve our competitiveness

Not just that but property adds nothing whatsoever to our economy. Adam Smith got it right centuries ago:

“A dwelling-house, as such, contributes nothing to the revenue of its inhabitant, if it is let to a tenant for rent, as the house itself can produce nothing, the tenant must always pay the rent out of some other revenue.”

Therefore Smith concluded that, although a house can make money for its owner if it is rented, “the revenue of the whole body of the people can never be in the smallest degree increased by it”.

To say that interest and investment in this area should be minimised is an understatement.

daithicarr

Its all well and good to say we must make cuts for the good of the nation, but it seems to me none of the people who propose cutting the minimum wage or social welfare live off either, How do they think people will survive with massive cuts on these when they are already struggling.
It all well and good for those with money to go without a holiday or getting a newer car for a couple of years, but not being able to make basic ends meet for a couple of years?

perhaps it would be more prudent to look at the costs of goods and services, compared to the uk (and many other EU coutrys) the price of our goods and services and 20- 30 % more expensive. and its not from being at the periphery of europe, look at N.ireland
If we could bring costs in line with the rest of europe, then it would be much easier to have 20 - 30 % cuts in minimum wage, social welfare and public sector wage bills, saving the coutry huge amounts of money, while maintaining living standards to a reasonable level

murphaph

daithicarr wrote: »

Its all well and good to say we must make cuts for the good of the nation, but it seems to me none of the people who propose cutting the minimum wage or social welfare live off either, How do they think people will survive with massive cuts on these when they are already struggling.
It all well and good for those with money to go without a holiday or getting a newer car for a couple of years, but not being able to make basic ends meet for a couple of years?

perhaps it would be more prudent to look at the costs of goods and services, compared to the uk (and many other EU coutrys) the price of our goods and services and 20- 30 % more expensive. and its not from being at the periphery of europe, look at N.ireland
If we could bring costs in line with the rest of europe, then it would be much easier to have 20 - 30 % cuts in minimum wage, social welfare and public sector wage bills, saving the coutry huge amounts of money, while maintaining living standards to a reasonable level

As incomes, including social welfare fall, the cost of living falls with it. It's been happening since December in fact. August saw the only month on month cost of living increase. Apart from that the cost of living is down to December 2006 prices and falling!

Stuff became more expensive because wages were high. If all incomes are cut, the costs fall.

daithicarr

well then we should cut all wages and incomes by 30 %, thus reducing prices by 30 % and make our sleves much more competative .

cutting social welfare and minimum wage will have little effect on prices, where there are still hundreds of thousands earning a huge amount more money

murphaph

daithicarr wrote: »

well then we should cut all wages and incomes by 30 %, thus reducing prices by 30 % and make our sleves much more competative .

cutting social welfare and minimum wage will have little effect on prices, where there are still hundreds of thousands earning a huge amount more money

Arrgh, the government has no authority to cut pay in the private sector. The private sector has already dished out 300,000 100% pay cuts in case it slipped past you. In addition, many in the private sector have had no pay rises for quite a few years now and many have taken actual cuts to boot (more to follow no doubt).

The government DOES however have control over its own expenditure (Public sector pay and social welfare). The government has control over the minimum wage and this should also be cut to allow business to cut pay.

Irish people have been overpaid for years now. This is the harsh reality. If you want to see people scrape by, come to Germany and see people on HartzIV welfare payments (€351 per month for everything except your rent, in a small cheap flat, and your medical care). Germany publishes meal guides and things like that to show how a person can cook meals that are nutritionally blanaced, albeit a bit boring, for the money. They have full example budgets for people to try to follow and they don't include a lot of going out drinking etc.

daithicarr

I am all too aware of the Private sector pay cuts, and i for one dont have the resources to spend my new found free time going out drinking, id imagine those that do have moved back in with their folks or have other support. 200 euros a week isn't a lot to live on, when you got to pay all your bills etc.

Germany is much cheaper than ireland in many areas such as housing etc, if we had similar levels of prices, maybe our social welfare could be more similar.

and the government does have control over private sector pay, they can tax them , to reduce the amount of disposable income.

speaking from my own experience, I was supportive of paying more tax when i was earning money , provided it was spent on services in a efficient manner, 100 euros more a week would have been manageable and maybe prices wouldn't have climbed to high. but to remove 100 euros from my current weekly income would be devastating, I couldn't survive, unless i moved into a tent on some commanage.


Why not tax all earners a bit more? since they will still have the means to live ??????

RealityCheck

daithicarr wrote: »

Its all well and good to say we must make cuts for the good of the nation, but it seems to me none of the people who propose cutting the minimum wage or social welfare live off either

I would say the survival of the nation as we know it. We must strive to maintain our economic and political self determination.

daithicarr wrote: »

perhaps it would be more prudent to look at the costs of goods and services, compared to the uk (and many other EU coutrys) the price of our goods and services and 20- 30 % more expensive. and its not from being at the periphery of europe, look at N.ireland
If we could bring costs in line with the rest of europe, then it would be much easier to have 20 - 30 % cuts in minimum wage, social welfare and public sector wage bills, saving the coutry huge amounts of money, while maintaining living standards to a reasonable level

You wont cut the price of goods and services without reducing the cost base. The cost base is made up mainly of wage costs, utilities costs and and the cost of renting or buying premises. It is key that we allow the property market to find its own level and bring down wage and utilities costs.

We also have the disadvantage over Britain due to the fact we cannot control the excahange rates between both countries. The cost of services and goods in Britain are dropping due to the collapse in the pound. This means it is critical that we reduce our costs by cutting wages etc.

MeatProduct

donegalfella wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

All those points are simply a metric of how good people are at doing the leaving certificate and not necessarily a measure of how good they will do in specialised subjects in college.

This is one of the fundamental problems with the whole system to begin with.

Nick

murphaph

daithicarr wrote: »

Germany is much cheaper than ireland in many areas such as housing etc, if we had similar levels of prices, maybe our social welfare could be more similar.

Accommodation in Munich (for example) is as expensive or more expensive than Dublin. In any case, I pointed out that the cost of accommodation is paid separate (just like in Ireland) to the subsistence payment which no matter what way you cut it is €351 per month compared to €900 in Ireland. Germany is not THAT cheap mate-people on welfare here simply have a lower standard of living than people on welfare in Ireland.

daithicarr wrote: »

and the government does have control over private sector pay, they can tax them , to reduce the amount of disposable income.

But the private sector is already reducing it's own cost base dramatically. Taxing our way out of a recession won't work.

daithicarr wrote: »

speaking from my own experience, I was supportive of paying more tax when i was earning money , provided it was spent on services in a efficient manner, 100 euros more a week would have been manageable and maybe prices wouldn't have climbed to high. but to remove 100 euros from my current weekly income would be devastating, I couldn't survive, unless i moved into a tent on some commanage.


Why not tax all earners a bit more? since they will still have the means to live ??????

I'd pay more tax. I'm already paying new taxes that were introduced in the last budget. I would expect you to take a 50% cut in your dole money either. I reckon it should be cut by 25% at first and see where that goes. The minimum wage needs to be cut as well you see and if the minimum wage comes any closer to the dole, lots of people will stop working or just stay on the dole. This is a very dangerous situation to find ourselves in.

I'm not saying this is going to be painless. Far from it, but if we defer these cuts we'll make things much worse and recovery may never come. If recovery doesn't come then your dole will be cut eventually but you won't have any hope of getting off the dole and getting a job, because there won't be ANY.

AlekSmart

Irish people have been overpaid for years now. This is the harsh reality. If you want to see people scrape by, come to Germany and see people on HartzIV welfare payments (€351 per month for everything except your rent, in a small cheap flat, and your medical care). Germany publishes meal guides and things like that to show how a person can cook meals that are nutritionally blanaced, albeit a bit boring, for the money. They have full example budgets for people to try to follow and they don't include a lot of going out drinking etc.

Ah so,murphamaph,in essence the German State machinery actually attempts to direct where its financial munificence is spent ?

This is one area where our entire national physche just HAS to change.....currently we as a race will not countenance ANY attempt to tell us how to live our lives even though that very process has brought us to ruination.

irish_bob

daithicarr wrote: »

Its all well and good to say we must make cuts for the good of the nation, but it seems to me none of the people who propose cutting the minimum wage or social welfare live off either, How do they think people will survive with massive cuts on these when they are already struggling.
It all well and good for those with money to go without a holiday or getting a newer car for a couple of years, but not being able to make basic ends meet for a couple of years?

perhaps it would be more prudent to look at the costs of goods and services, compared to the uk (and many other EU coutrys) the price of our goods and services and 20- 30 % more expensive. and its not from being at the periphery of europe, look at N.ireland
If we could bring costs in line with the rest of europe, then it would be much easier to have 20 - 30 % cuts in minimum wage, social welfare and public sector wage bills, saving the coutry huge amounts of money, while maintaining living standards to a reasonable level

you,ve been listenin to fergus ( i dont believe any child should have to wear hand me down uniforms ) finlay too much

while the costs of goods in the republic are 30% more expensive than in northern ireland , the dole in the republic is 300% more than in the north , thats before we even discuss the other add on benefits , no one in ireland will go hungary if the dole is reduced back to 150 per week , that is unless they have addictions , beit alcohol , ciggaretted , gambling or other

irish_bob

murphaph wrote: »

As incomes, including social welfare fall, the cost of living falls with it. It's been happening since December in fact. August saw the only month on month cost of living increase. Apart from that the cost of living is down to December 2006 prices and falling!

Stuff became more expensive because wages were high. If all incomes are cut, the costs fall.

very true but the golden rule is that the cost of living never ever makes the 1st move

zootroid

Interesting quote from insomnia CEO:

But despite Insomnia's value-for-money offers, there are other costs that are beyond Bobby Kerr's control, he says.

Chief among these are the upwards-only rent reviews that are enshrined in legislation. Describing the difficulty this poses for Insomnia and other high street businesses, Kerr says: "I would certainly want upward-only rent reviews to be abolished.

"There was some sabre-rattling about it, but now the Government seems to have gone cold on it. There's obviously a very powerful lobby around property in this country. Let's remember that it was property that caused the problem.

"We're going to have two more years of pain, but if the Government put steps in place that allowed people whose businesses primarily need to be connected to property to pay rents based on turnover, it would help."

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/powerful--lobby-keep-rents-high-says-dragon-1917209.html

I wasn't aware of this legislation. So much for the free market in Ireland, it only exists where there are no powerful vested interests

daithicarr

why not increase tax so wages are reduced by 10 % across all levels, minimum wage payers etc, and a 10% decrease in social welfare, that way everyone shares the burden and its not too much for any one section to carry.
a 25 % decrease in social welfare seems a lot, considering most of those people have already taken a huge hit in their earnings. it would probably provide more money for the state as well that just dropping social welfare.

As for child benefit that should not be dropped, but perhaps be made means tested, a household which has lost one or both wages and has children will be in extremely dire circumstances if they face large reductions in both child benefit and welfare.