The New Generation Leaving Ireland

ei.sdraob

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_08/b4167050028125.htm

i thought people here might find the above article interesting


i wouldn't blame anyone for leaving
especially if they are educated and now cant find a job and realize that if they (somehow) do get a job they might be paying for the rest of their lives for mounting state debts being taken out in their names

One problem is that Ireland got too pricey. The American Chamber of Commerce Ireland estimates that from 2004 to 2008, Irish wages rose 50% faster than the average of advanced European economies. Former Intel Chairman Craig R. Barrett says that of the 14 reasons Intel came to Ireland two decades ago, only one remained: a low corporate tax rate of 12.5%. "Ireland needs a new game plan," he said at a Dublin conference in September.

damn depressing read, and whats worse is the likes of SF wanting to raise this tax removing last incentive for companies to stay here

thebman

The one industry even remotely bucking the trend, IT, FF keep making efforts to sabotage.

Obviously you have to ignore Dell's boxing operation. IT companies will leave soon enough if something isn't done and then we are left with a few phramaceutical companies.

Governments response to poor quality, expensive broadband is to award the NBS to a mobile phone company to shut the public up for a while. Because you know, solving the problem would have required effort on their part.

Welease

thebman wrote: »

The one industry even remotely bucking the trend, IT, FF keep making efforts to sabotage.

Obviously you have to ignore Dell's boxing operation. IT companies will leave soon enough if something isn't done and then we are left with a few phramaceutical companies.

Governments response to poor quality, expensive broadband is to award the NBS to a mobile phone company to shut the public up for a while. Because you know, solving the problem would have required effort on their part.

Well in fairness it's not just the governments fault.. Everyone in this country wants to keep the same level of income they have previosly enjoyed..
Intel etc. can find workers for a fraction of that price elsewhere.. Until people in this country start to wake up to that fact we are screwed..

thebman

Welease wrote: »

Well in fairness it's not just the governments fault.. Everyone in this country wants to keep the same level of income they have previosly enjoyed..
Intel etc. can find workers for a fraction of that price elsewhere.. Until people in this country start to wake up to that fact we are screwed..

I imagine Intel could hire people for a lot less at the moment if they wanted to.

But Ireland looks like a poor place to invest. Look at infrastructure and the governments spiraling debt is likely to lead to tax increases so the price of doing business here will go up despite wages falling if they took on new staff and let poorly performing staff go.

We also have very people able to get IT degrees as most people struggle at maths in this country it seems. I wouldn't attribute that to maths being hard as its logical and just following rules really but apparently Irish people are poor at doing that. Either that or it isn't being taught properly, similar to science subjects or is seen as difficult and people are not seeing that areas requiring maths/science are some of the few areas with jobs available in which case, schools need to educate them better about opportunities after they finish school.

MysticalRain

I would say the shortage of people doing maths and science is down to the points race where people choose the easiest subjects to get the most amount of points and the fact that many science and IT jobs don't actually pay that much. There is plenty of money to be made elsewhere in professions that aren't stuck in a race to the bottom trying to compete with countries like India and China.

Welease

thebman wrote: »

I imagine Intel could hire people for a lot less at the moment if they wanted to.

But Ireland looks like a poor place to invest. Look at infrastructure and the governments spiraling debt is likely to lead to tax increases so the price of doing business here will go up despite wages falling if they took on new staff and let poorly performing staff go.

We also have very people able to get IT degrees as most people struggle at maths in this country it seems. I wouldn't attribute that to maths being hard as its logical and just following rules really but apparently Irish people are poor at doing that. Either that or it isn't being taught properly, similar to science subjects or is seen as difficult and people are not seeing that areas requiring maths/science are some of the few areas with jobs available in which case, schools need to educate them better about opportunities after they finish school.

Without going into too much detail.. I have to charge 4x the cost per hour for my IT folks, than my counterparts in other countries in a breakeven model. (it's not just the wages, its the cost of utilities etc.). The cost is spread out globally to allow us to have a more balanced model, so some countries in reality would be 5-8x cheaper. If you look at companies like Intel who employ about 6.5K people in Ireland.. that's a hell of a lot of extra cost for locating here.

I have heard that one senior foreign IT figure believed that about 2/3's of maths teachers in Ireland were not qualified to teach the subject.. No opinion myself, but it seems to be a widely held belief amongst some people.

Welease

MysticalRain wrote: »

I would say the shortage of people doing maths and science is down to the points race where people choose the easiest subjects to get the most amount of points and the fact that many science and IT jobs don't actually pay that much. There is plenty of money to be made elsewhere in professions that aren't stuck in a race to the bottom trying to compete with countries like India and China.

Is being competitive always a "race to the bottom?" Do we win anything if we continue to price ourselves out of the market?

With respect, I would suggest you might not know that much about IT if you believe that it doesn't pay that much (of course some low level position won't pay much but that is the same in most industries)...
IT is not about a race to the bottom.. some work is moving to India and China, but only where those companies choose to outsource or have a presence there.. Most other companies keep their IT division close to head office etc. as development and support will be specific to the locations and requirement of their localised business.

To Clarify.. most of the IT departments exist to support a non IT function... It's wages across the board that lose us jobs... when manufacturing/service etc industries relocate out of Ireland, they take their IT divisions with them.

Scofflaw

Welease wrote: »

Is being competitive always a "race to the bottom?" Do we win anything if we continue to price ourselves out of the market?

With respect, I would suggest you might not know that much about IT if you believe that it doesn't pay that much (of course some low level position won't pay much but that is the same in most industries)...
IT is not about a race to the bottom.. some work is moving to India and China, but only where those companies choose to outsource or have a presence there.. Most other companies keep their IT division close to head office etc. as development and support will be specific to the locations and requirement of their localised business.

He's wrong about IT, I would say (I'm in IT) but he's right about science (I was in science). However, I think the perception was that the IT boom finished in about 2001-2002, and since then, as far I'm aware, the number of IT graduates has dropped steadily. People preferred to go into construction.

cordially,
Scofflaw

MysticalRain

Welease wrote: »

Is being competitive always a "race to the bottom?" Do we win anything if we continue to price ourselves out of the market?

With respect, I would suggest you might not know that much about IT if you believe that it doesn't pay that much (of course some low level position won't pay much but that is the same in most industries)...
IT is not about a race to the bottom.. some work is moving to India and China, but only where those companies choose to outsource or have a presence there.. Most other companies keep their IT division close to head office etc. as development and support will be specific to the locations and requirement of their localised business.

To Clarify.. most of the IT departments exist to support a non IT function... It's wages across the board that lose us jobs... when manufacturing/service etc industries relocate out of Ireland, they take their IT divisions with them.

I know about the IT industry because that's the same industry I've worked in since 2003 both here and abroad. I'm just simply calling it as I see it.

Money is the bottom line, and quite frankly, that's all that really matters to many companies. I do believe that Ireland should be copying the lead of other countries like Taiwan and Israel by moving up the value chain and focusing on innovation instead of just providing cheap labor to foreign companies. The current government is hoping that if they drive down wages low enough, then another Intel or Microsoft will come knocking on our door to bail us out. I can't see that strategy working out too well.

newzealander

Hi Guys,I was thinking of getting into IT ,Maybe Network Administration,Would this be a good direction to go?

Welease

MysticalRain wrote: »

I know about the IT industry because that's the same industry I've worked in since 2003 both here and abroad. I'm just simply calling it as I see it.

Money is the bottom line, and quite frankly, that's all that really matters to many companies. I do believe that Ireland should be copying the lead of other countries like Taiwan and Israel by moving up the value chain and focusing on innovation instead of just providing cheap labor to foreign companies. The current government is hoping that if they drive down wages low enough, then another Intel or Microsoft will come knocking on our door to bail us out. I can't see that strategy working out too well.

I don't complete disagree maybe my perspective is different because I have worked in IT since 1988, and the IT world has gone through various iterations since then..

Put simply, Ireland has priced itself out of the market. Companies do look at the bottom line... and that will exclude Ireland from their list of choices.. We need to do something about that...

Innovation is extremely important, and it's something need to foster.. but here's my problem (or several)..

- Innovation takes money.. and requires a culture that can deal with risk.. We don't have enough companies (or individuals) in Ireland who seem to do Innovation well. There are of course, notable exceptions, but not enough to keep the majority of people in this country employed if the MNC's disappeared.
- Are the Irish innovative? I worked abroad for 20 years and only moved back to Ireland in 2007.. Like the poster on a previous thread who worked in NZ, I have been shocked and dismayed by the attitude of the average Irish workers I have come across since my return.. Innovation is the last thing they are capable of doing in a form that could sustain this country.. Finding new ways of whining and begrudging everything is about as innovative as they get. Sounds harsh, but I work with a lot of Israeli's and their attitude is 1000x more positive and innovative than ours. Simply put.. our Innovative strategies are about as hollow as the governments broadband stragegy.. all talk and very little substance.

I firmly believe (and of course I could be completely wrong, wont be the first time ), our best chance is to get a grip of ourselves and realise we need MNC's here to provide jobs and start working on a plan to entice them back.

MysticalRain

Welease wrote: »

I don't complete disagree maybe my perspective is different because I have worked in IT since 1988, and the IT world has gone through various iterations since then..

Put simply, Ireland has priced itself out of the market. Companies do look at the bottom line... and that will exclude Ireland from their list of choices.. We need to do something about that...

Innovation is extremely important, and it's something need to foster.. but here's my problem (or several)..

- Innovation takes money.. and requires a culture that can deal with risk.. We don't have enough companies (or individuals) in Ireland who seem to do Innovation well. There are of course, notable exceptions, but not enough to keep the majority of people in this country employed if the MNC's disappeared.
- Are the Irish innovative? I worked abroad for 20 years and only moved back to Ireland in 2007.. Like the poster on a previous thread who worked in NZ, I have been shocked and dismayed by the attitude of the average Irish workers I have come across since my return.. Innovation is the last thing they are capable of doing in a form that could sustain this country.. Finding new ways of whining and begrudging everything is about as innovative as they get. Sounds harsh, but I work with a lot of Israeli's and their attitude is 1000x more positive and innovative than ours. Simply put.. our Innovative strategies are about as hollow as the governments broadband stragegy.. all talk and very little substance.

I firmly believe (and of course I could be completely wrong, wont be the first time ), our best chance is to get a grip of ourselves and realise we need MNC's here to provide jobs and start working on a plan to entice them back.

Driving down wages will make us more competitive. But the fact is, we are never going to be able to compete directly with countries like India on cost. An old boss of mine (who used to hire interns from foreign colleges to work for free) told me that an Indian worker could work for a third of the cost of an Irish one. No Irish person is going to be able to own a house and feed his family by competing directly with that.

I agree with you about Ireland lacking a risk-taking and innovative culture. So long as the only ambition of Irish parents is for their children to join a "safe" profession like the civil service, that is always going to be the case.

I worked in New Zealand myself and I did find that there was far less complaining in general. Then again, NZ culture is more about striking a better life/work balance and is a bit less competitive than over here. Kind of like how Ireland used to be before we begin working ourselves to death in the Celtic Tiger years.

Foreign direct investment has been declining since the start of the decade, and I honestly can't see much of that coming back anymore. Our best hope really is encouraging more innovators and entrepreneurs. The best thing the government can do is get the basics right like providing a decent broadband infrastructure and lowering government related costs, like rates and electricity.

View

Scofflaw wrote: »

He's wrong about IT, I would say (I'm in IT) but he's right about science (I was in science). However, I think the perception was that the IT boom finished in about 2001-2002, and since then, as far I'm aware, the number of IT graduates has dropped steadily. People preferred to go into construction.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Spot on. After all, you'd have been mad to go into something dodgy like IT when you could go into something safe like construction. :rolleyes:

Welease

MysticalRain wrote: »

Driving down wages will make us more competitive. But the fact is, we are never going to be able to compete directly with countries like India on cost. An old boss of mine (who used to hire interns from foreign colleges to work for free) told me that an Indian worker could work for a third of the cost of an Irish one. No Irish person is going to be able to own a house and feed his family by competing directly with that.

No we can't... not while everyone feels they should be earning 60-100K, living in 3-4 bed houses and changing cars every 2 years We can't compete because we all expect to earn huge sums and spend spend spend. If wages were dropped back to a competitive European levels then the picture would radically change.. We don't need to be cheaper than GAR economies, but when you are at the top end of local economies with no real other value to offer, then you are in a bad position. If we reign in employment costs and utilities, rates etc.. then we can become more competitive and costs will also drop for us.. It does still leave us with an issue that people owe large sums for houses etc.. but we need a plan to deal with that.. keeping wages/costs artificially high is not the answer.

MysticalRain wrote: »

I agree with you about Ireland lacking a risk-taking and innovative culture. So long as the only ambition of Irish parents is for their children to join a "safe" profession like the civil service, that is always going to be the case.

I worked in New Zealand myself and I did find that there was far less complaining in general. Then again, NZ culture is more about striking a better life/work balance and is a bit less competitive than over here. Kind of like how Ireland used to be before we begin working ourselves to death in the Celtic Tiger years.

Agreed but funnily enough, i feel that people work less hard since the CT years.. Just my opinion of course, but everyone seems to feel they are entitled to "the good life" without actually doing much to get it.. In the '80's in the last recession, people worked damn hard for a lot less money because there were so few jobs around (or at least it seemed, might be a case of rose tinted memories there! )

MysticalRain wrote: »

Foreign direct investment has been declining since the start of the decade, and I honestly can't see much of that coming back anymore. Our best hope really is encouraging more innovators and entrepreneurs. The best thing the government can do is get the basics right like providing a decent broadband infrastructure and lowering government related costs, like rates and electricity.

Agreed... seeing the average price of government provided services rise when other costs have gone down it a real bad sign ...

View

MysticalRain wrote: »

Money is the bottom line, and quite frankly, that's all that really matters to many companies.

That applies to all companies in all industries (not just IT). Any that it doesn't are either Public Service or soon-to-be "former companies".

MysticalRain wrote: »

The current government is hoping that if they drive down wages low enough, then another Intel or Microsoft will come knocking on our door to bail us out. I can't see that strategy working out too well.

The government isn't trying to drive down the cost of wages in IT etc. It has no direct control over these wages.

It does have control over Public Service wages. It has cut them a little. Based on the size of the hole in the public finances, it probably needs to either cut them a lot more or lay off people. Neither option is pleasant and it most likely will just borrow more, raise taxes to cover this and will end up increasing costs for the private sector. This will of course do wonders for the cost of doing business here.

MysticalRain

Welease wrote: »

No we can't... not while everyone feels they should be earning 60-100K, living in 3-4 bed houses and changing cars every 2 years We can't compete because we all expect to earn huge sums and spend spend spend. If wages were dropped back to a competitive European levels then the picture would radically change.. We don't need to be cheaper than GAR economies, but when you are at the top end of local economies with no real other value to offer, then you are in a bad position. If we reign in employment costs and utilities, rates etc.. then we can become more competitive and costs will also drop for us.. It does still leave us with an issue that people owe large sums for houses etc.. but we need a plan to deal with that.. keeping wages/costs artificially high is not the answer.



Agreed but funnily enough, i feel that people work less hard since the CT years.. Just my opinion of course, but everyone seems to feel they are entitled to "the good life" without actually doing much to get it.. In the '80's in the last recession, people worked damn hard for a lot less money because there were so few jobs around (or at least it seemed, might be a case of rose tinted memories there! )





Agreed... seeing the average price of government provided services rise when other costs have gone down it a real bad sign ...

It does make sense to at least make our wages competitive relative to our fellow Europeans. Although I do fear that another property bubble and the greediness of certain sections of our society will prevent that from happening. I don't think even a severe recession will dent Irish people's obsession with the property market.

Welease

MysticalRain wrote: »

It does make sense to at least make our wages competitive relative to our fellow Europeans. Although I do fear that another property bubble and the greediness of certain sections of our society will prevent that from happening. I don't think even a severe recession will dent Irish people's obsession with the property market.

Sadly I agree.

MysticalRain

View wrote: »

That applies to all companies in all industries (not just IT). Any that it doesn't are either Public Service or soon-to-be "former companies".



The government isn't trying to drive down the cost of wages in IT etc. It has no direct control over these wages.

It does have control over Public Service wages. It has cut them a little. Based on the size of the hole in the public finances, it probably needs to either cut them a lot more or lay off people. Neither option is pleasant and it most likely will just borrow more, raise taxes to cover this and will end up increasing costs for the private sector. This will of course do wonders for the cost of doing business here.

The government don't have direct control over wages in the private sector, but it is an official government policy to increase our competitiveness by driving down wages. Unlike many other countries, Ireland did not have any real stimulus measures to reduce unemployment. I think that was a direct measure to achieve that goal.

K-9

Points will go up for Maths and Science as they become more sexy.

As for people leaving, meh! Some will be a loss to us, some we'll be glad to see the back of.

View

MysticalRain wrote: »

The government don't have direct control over wages in the private sector, but it is an official government policy to increase our competitiveness by driving down wages.

Well, if you have an official government policy document that states this feel free to share it. Offhand, I'd say that even if the government privately thought this was the way to do, they'd be stupid to make it an official policy for obvious electoral reasons.

MysticalRain wrote: »

Unlike many other countries, Ireland did not have any real stimulus measures to reduce unemployment. I think that was a direct measure to achieve that goal.

Ireland is bordering on bankruptcy. We are spending around 50Billion a year and have around 30Billion a year in income. We borrow the balance. Remove that "artificial" additional cash input to the economy and we'd need to do wholesale lay-offs of public servants, mass closure of schools, hospitals etc. That borrowing is the stimulus measure we have - we can't afford it, hence the cut backs. The government doesn't have financial room for "goals" - it is in survival mode.

MysticalRain

View wrote: »

Well, if you have an official government policy document that states this feel free to share it. Offhand, I'd say that even if the government privately thought this was the way to do, they'd be stupid to make it an official policy for obvious electoral reasons.
.

Have you actually listened to a single government minister or backbencher interviewed in the last year or so? "Increasing competitiveness" and "reducing costs" are well-worn mantras repeated by the government at every available opportunity.

Ireland is bordering on bankruptcy. We are spending around 50Billion a year and have around 30Billion a year in income. We borrow the balance. Remove that "artificial" additional cash input to the economy and we'd need to do wholesale lay-offs of public servants, mass closure of schools, hospitals etc. That borrowing is the stimulus measure we have - we can't afford it, hence the cut backs. The government doesn't have financial room for "goals" - it is in survival mode

Yeah, I get the budgeting aspect of this. But at some point the government are going to have to tackle their own costs. Perhaps we'll have to wait until the economy finally starts to pick up when tax revenues begin to increase again. But the government are going to have to deal with it at some stage. Not that that's going to be of much help in the meantime to the two dozen or so small businesses going bankrupt every single week.

kuntboy

K-9 wrote: »

Points will go up for Maths and Science as they become more sexy.

As for people leaving, meh! Some will be a loss to us, some we'll be glad to see the back of.

What an attitude. Irish people are lazy as sin and just want to get down the pub to slag off the "nerds" that countries like Israel and Taiwan are full of.

thebman

K-9 wrote: »

Points will go up for Maths and Science as they become more sexy.

As for people leaving, meh! Some will be a loss to us, some we'll be glad to see the back of.

I believe it just being poorly taught here and those people will just end up dropping out.

Hell even just basic maths used in first year programming caused over half our class to drop out in the first month when I was in college.

Very few people seem to have an aptituide for maths/science in this country and the reasons for this need to be investigated.

View

MysticalRain wrote: »

Have you actually listened to a single government minister or backbencher interviewed in the last year or so? "Increasing competitiveness" and "reducing costs" are well-worn mantras repeated by the government at every available opportunity.

Yes, I have - they may talk about "increasing competitiveness" and "reducing costs" but they don't talk about "increase our competitiveness by driving down wages". Given a choice, I'd suspect that most people (and most politicans) would prefer to "increase our competitiveness" by re-organising, eliminating waste, introducing new technologies etc. rather than by cutting wages.

I'd agree that the Government are going to have to tackle their own costs. They have made some effort but it needs to be much, much more.

AARRRGH

thebman wrote: »

Hell even just basic maths used in first year programming caused over half our class to drop out in the first month when I was in college.

Want to know the sad thing?

Colleges are dealing with this by dropping maths classes in their courses. :rolleyes:

thebman

AARRRGH wrote: »

Want to know the sad thing?

Colleges are dealing with this by dropping maths classes in their courses. :rolleyes:

Just the other day my housemate who did the same course as me was saying that he ran into the head of our course who was talking about how difficult our course was at the time.

Now our course was probably one of the hardest in the department at the time but has been canceled since and even when we were doing it there were rumours going round that the reason was the failure rate and that the Computer Science was getting a lot of crap from above for its failure rates on the course.

Sea Sharp

I recently graduated as an engineer. I won't be leaving Ireland in the next two years but I'm giving consideration to moving to Berlin in 2012/2013. I'm going to save up enough to be able to leave the country and leave it in a savings account. Then I'll see how things work out in Ireland.

doc_17

I'm going slightly off topic but anyway here goes. To be a primary school teacher in the colleges of education you need a C in higher level Irish or you won't get in. But you can get in with a D in Ordinary Level Maths. I love Irish but where are our priorities? I teach Maths in second level and it's a piece of cake to get a D in OL maths but yet that person is then responsible for training thousands of others over the course of their working life? And they neither have the interest or the ability in the subject? Ridiculous stuff. Now obviously a large amount of entrants do well in both OL and HL maths but a significant minority are weak at maths and becoming primary school teachers.

The children they teach are the next generation of people who may have to leave the country

thebman

doc_17 wrote: »

I'm going slightly off topic but anyway here goes. To be a primary school teacher in the colleges of education you need a C in higher level Irish or you won't get in. But you can get in with a D in Ordinary Level Maths. I love Irish but where are our priorities? I teach Maths in second level and it's a piece of cake to get a D in OL maths but yet that person is then responsible for training thousands of others over the course of their working life? And they neither have the interest or the ability in the subject? Ridiculous stuff. Now obviously a large amount of entrants do well in both OL and HL maths but a significant minority are weak at maths and becoming primary school teachers.

The children they teach are the next generation of people who may have to leave the country

I agree. I consider myself fortunate for my career that the teacher I had in 6th year of primary school loved maths and spent more time on it a day than any other subject.

When I was in secondary school, the higher level teacher was so poor, I dropped to ordinary after 5th year to get a good result as feared I'd fail honours maths. Went to college and they gave us a two week crash course in higher level maths for those on ordinary and I was able to pick it up without any problems.

Its all in who's teaching you with maths and we are letting the youth down by not requiring higher standards from our teachers.

MysticalRain

View wrote: »

Yes, I have - they may talk about "increasing competitiveness" and "reducing costs" but they don't talk about "increase our competitiveness by driving down wages".

All of which are euphemisms for driving down wages. I just sat through 10 minutes of listening to Billy Kelleher (Min. of State, Dept. of Trade & Employment) on Prime Time arguing for allowing employers to reduce wages by opting out of the minimum wage legislation. He didn't resort to any euphemisms or weasel words to that effect. But I at least appreciate his straight talk on the matter.

Given a choice, I'd suspect that most people (and most politicans) would prefer to "increase our competitiveness" by re-organising, eliminating waste, introducing new technologies etc. rather than by cutting wages.

In the case of the public service, that was just a copout proposed by the unions to avoid having to slash wages or lay people off.

As for the private sector...given that many companies in the current recession are short staffed and over-worked to begin with, there isn't really any other way to reduce labour costs other than cutting wages, and benefits.

BillyBoyBad

Does the State really care? Emigration will lead to less social welfare payments and a reduction in social problems in the short term. Ane that's all they care about, the short term.