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Turned a corner?

2

Comments

  • Closed Accounts Posts: 759 ✭✭✭mrgaa1


    murphaph wrote: »
    Do you have any savings? Would you be happy if the debtor (the bank, credit union etc.) reset their debt to you to zero and your savings vanished?

    and what do you want us all to do? All bank related debt should be wiped. All monies is just virtual - it only exists within computer systems. Wipe out bank debt and government debt. Its not that difficult.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,104 ✭✭✭✭djpbarry


    ei.sdraob wrote: »
    So into what productive areas did our government(s) in the last 3 years "invested" the extra 100 billion or so of new debt they ran, do tell
    You see, what you’ve done there is leaped to the conclusion that I was defending government policy, when in fact I was simply pointing out the flaw in easychair’s argument.
    mrgaa1 wrote: »
    All monies is just virtual...
    So if your employer decides to start paying you with happy thoughts, that’s cool?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,218 ✭✭✭beeno67


    mrgaa1 wrote: »
    and what do you want us all to do? All bank related debt should be wiped. All monies is just virtual - it only exists within computer systems. Wipe out bank debt and government debt. Its not that difficult.

    So like he said. Any savings you have (which is bank debt) would be wiped out. How about debt that is invested in businesses? Just wiped out too?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,050 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    mrgaa1 wrote: »
    and what do you want us all to do? All bank related debt should be wiped. All monies is just virtual - it only exists within computer systems. Wipe out bank debt and government debt. Its not that difficult.
    So say I owe the bank 500k and you have 500k savings with same bank and my debt is "wiped" off their system. Your savings don't sit in the vault of a bank, a bank only has to have a small percent of savings on reserve. If my debt is wiped, so are your savings. It's that simple.

    You want your debt to be wiped, but not the debt of your debtors.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 905 ✭✭✭easychair


    ei.sdraob wrote: »
    So into what productive areas did our government(s) in the last 3 years "invested" the extra 100 billion or so of new debt they ran, do tell


    What would you call a business that borrows lets say 100,000 then blows third of this on wages with no productivity improvements (ps), gives third away (welfare) and spends the remainder on hookers and coke (banks), all while doing only 20,000 in sales

    That's the point. Governments have, misleadingly, said they were "investing" which was always code for spending more and more money. The money was taxpayers money and borrowed money, and even drunken sailors might have been embarrassed at the eye watering tens of billions involved.

    When we examine it, the value for money was appalling, and in boom times few questioned it.

    Anyone can borrow money, throw it at projects, and claim the results as growth.

    And so it now continues, with Ireland bankrupt and the government still having to borrow billions after billions, with Ireland getting more and more indebted, adding to the fact that borrowing today is higher taxation tomorrow.

    I don't claim to have any solutions which might not stoke serious civil unrest, but the longer its put off, the worse the day of reckoning is likely to be.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,582 ✭✭✭WalterMitty


    easychair wrote: »
    The cost to the Irish economy, if the growth figures are attained, will be more tens of billions in borrowings. Anyone can "grow" any business by borrowing billions, the problems occur when it comes to paying it back. It's exactly this principle which was used by Anglo Irish Bank.

    The other part of the picture is what effect inflation will have on the growth. If an economy grows at 1%, and inflation is at 2%, that's a net "growth" of -1%.
    Growth projections and results and generaly adjusted for inflation . Youre right about growth of 1% being nothing when it is being fueled by close to 20billion borrowings which are being injected into economy by gov. Same thing during the boom , the growth figures were stellar but it was all debt fuelled, angloa bank et al were borrowing tens of billions a year and injecting that into Irish economy which gave the massive growth figures. In both cases the borrowings on the balance sheet were being ignored in discussing GNP growth.Your hear people in media refering to GNP as being wealth when its actually more acurate to call it income.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,104 ✭✭✭✭djpbarry


    easychair wrote: »
    That's the point.
    No, it isn't. You are stating that all future economic growth must come on the back of further borrowing. That is simply not true.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 905 ✭✭✭easychair


    Growth projections and results and generaly adjusted for inflation . Youre right about growth of 1% being nothing when it is being fueled by close to 20billion borrowings which are being injected into economy by gov. Same thing during the boom , the growth figures were stellar but it was all debt fuelled, angloa bank et al were borrowing tens of billions a year and injecting that into Irish economy which gave the massive growth figures. In both cases the borrowings on the balance sheet were being ignored in discussing GNP growth.Your hear people in media refering to GNP as being wealth when its actually more acurate to call it income.

    You make an interesting point, and "growth" fuelled by borrowing is phantom growth, as borrowing today is higher tax tomorrow, and higher tax tomorrow means lower growth.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,510 ✭✭✭Max Powers


    On reflection, Im worried that the government is hiding behind increased export taxes and will not do what needs to be done to bring out budget back to surplus.

    I dont see the necessary cuts being made,
    • Croke Park doesnt go far enough,
    • no getting rid of quangos,
    • no talk of gettin rid of the Seanad (I thought that the referendum was going to be held with the preisdent election)
    • no major reduction in SSB bosses, judiciary and politicians wages
    What i do see is loads of Stealth taxes (water charges, household charges etc) that will stop any spending.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,258 ✭✭✭Tora Bora


    easychair wrote: »
    Of course. If the Irish Government doesn't borrow the €14 billion or so it needs to keep paying all the salaries of those dependant on the public purse, the effect on the economy will be to take €14 billion out of the economy, which would be €14 billion less spent in the economy. That would have the effect of very negative growth.

    Minus the the amount which gets brought to Newery, to be spent there;)


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 587 ✭✭✭fat__tony


    This was posted in the comments section of the Indo website on Bredan Keenan's piece; Targets are Sacrosanct but look reachable

    http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/brendan-keenan/brendan-keenan-targets-are-sacrosanct-but-they-look-reachable-2896142.html
    Is this some sort of zen exercise at hitting targets? These are the same targets we have been trying to hit for nearly 4 years now. We have not reduced the deficit by a red cent and that is the reality.

    The whole rotten edifice that is the public sector and its unions are being protected by the government while the rest of the economy is left swinging in the wind. It is funny to hear Howlin use words like "sacrosanct" we all know what is and is not sacrosanct, that which falls within the Croke Park agreement is sacrosanct the rest of your contracts and jobs are up for grabs!

    As for reform, the person Brendan Howlin is appointing to "reform" the public sector will be on a years probation, yes probation, and is expected to operate within the system of benefits that he is trying to "reform". How can you reform something, when there is an agreement in place that says, you cannot reform anything if it costs our members money.
    Their hands are tied, they cannot reduce salaries, reduce pensions, sack pen pushers or people for whom there are no jobs. This is all about preserving the status quo in the face of massive borrowing from bailout funds. The fact of the matter is that we were borrowing 20bn three years ago and are still borrowing 20bn now. We are being told if we did not have to put 3bn into banks the deficit would be 17bn. The government took over and now own the banks so the tax payer is now on the hook like it or not. BoI is also on life support from the ECB and Irish Central Bank and would collapse in the morning if the ECB said we want our money.

    This job should have been given to a complete outsider come in do your job, be hated and get out. This is not a job for another insider which is what you do when you want to talk the talk but not walk the walk. They simply can not get from where they are to where they need to go without "strikes" and with a softly, softly approach. Croke Park is a sell out to the rest of the population it is weekly insult to every one of the 450,000 people on the dole and comes too late for the 300,000 who have had to emigrate. I will tell you what "sacrosanct" really means, it means keeping his fingers crossed while his arrows go everywhere except into the target!

    Pretty much sums up the state of the country.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,458 ✭✭✭OMD


    fat__tony wrote: »
    This was posted in the comments section of the Indo website on Bredan Keenan's piece; Targets are Sacrosanct but look reachable

    http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/brendan-keenan/brendan-keenan-targets-are-sacrosanct-but-they-look-reachable-2896142.html



    Pretty much sums up the state of the country.

    If you mean the person writing the piece is talking total ill informed nonsense and Irish people generally talk in a totally incorrect and ill-informed way, then yes it does sum up the country.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 587 ✭✭✭fat__tony


    OMD wrote: »
    If you mean the person writing the piece is talking total ill informed nonsense and Irish people generally talk in a totally incorrect and ill-informed way, then yes it does sum up the country.

    What is incorrect about the person who posted the comment then?

    He hits the nail right on the head.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,458 ✭✭✭OMD


    fat__tony wrote: »
    What is incorrect about the person who posted the comment then?

    He hits the nail right on the head.
    well for starters the neighbouring thread will help explain we have reduced the current deficit by a "red cent".
    http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056410652


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 20,397 ✭✭✭✭FreudianSlippers




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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 905 ✭✭✭easychair



    I think you'll probably find that it's more as a result of a return to emigration, than any "green shoots" in the economy. It would be wonderful to think it's because the economy is about to blossom and flourish, but reality suggests otherwise.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 20,397 ✭✭✭✭FreudianSlippers


    easychair wrote: »
    I think you'll probably find that it's more as a result of a return to emigration, than any "green shoots" in the economy. It would be wonderful to think it's because the economy is about to blossom and flourish, but reality suggests otherwise.
    Still a positive in my book. We have historically been a big exporter of educated people and this country filled up with skilled and unskilled workers... maybe it's time we export our abundance of them to places where they are needed.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,050 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    Still a positive in my book. We have historically been a big exporter of educated people and this country filled up with skilled and unskilled workers... maybe it's time we export our abundance of them to places where they are needed.
    I doubt the unskilled are the ones leaving the live register for other lands. Most likely we are losing skilled people who can find work abroad.

    My mother works in a county council office and she tells me that the planning department have literally got absolutely nothing to do and have had virtually nothing to do for 3 or 4 years now. The taxpayer pays the wages of 20 architects in this department to drive around in nice Audis instead of making them redundant, which is what they are!

    The CPA is a sham designed to fcuk the non-PS part of the population over. No more and no less. If people in the PS are surplus to requirements or are overpaid relative to their private sector counterparts they should be made redundant or have their wages reduced respectively.

    The politicians won't do it mainly because their pay and pensions are linked to the PS rates, simple as that.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 20,397 ✭✭✭✭FreudianSlippers


    murphaph wrote: »
    I doubt the unskilled are the ones leaving the live register for other lands. Most likely we are losing skilled people who can find work abroad.

    My mother works in a county council office and she tells me that the planning department have literally got absolutely nothing to do and have had virtually nothing to do for 3 or 4 years now. The taxpayer pays the wages of 20 architects in this department to drive around in nice Audis instead of making them redundant, which is what they are!

    The CPA is a sham designed to fcuk the non-PS part of the population over. No more and no less. If people in the PS are surplus to requirements or are overpaid relative to their private sector counterparts they should be made redundant or have their wages reduced respectively.

    The politicians won't do it mainly because their pay and pensions are linked to the PS rates, simple as that.
    Australia currently has high demand for unskilled and skilled labourers.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,476 ✭✭✭ardmacha


    The taxpayer pays the wages of 20 architects in this department to drive around in nice Audis instead of making them redundant, which is what they are!

    Surely people in a planning dept are planners not architects?
    The CPA is a sham designed to fcuk the non-PS part of the population over. No more and no less.

    This is a bit simplistic. The CPA sweeps away an accretion of limiting structures in many parts of the PS, the removal of this is of real value and will be of long term benefit. It is not a sham.

    This is not to say that the planners in your mothers council are not benefiting unduly from the CPA, but there is work that they might usefully do and they should clearly be asked to do it.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,050 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    ardmacha wrote: »
    Surely people in a planning dept are planners not architects?
    The mother says they're mostly qualified architects. The non-architects in the department also have SFA to do, but are still being paid (well enough to drive very nice cars) by the public purse for doing it.
    ardmacha wrote: »
    This is a bit simplistic. The CPA sweeps away an accretion of limiting structures in many parts of the PS, the removal of this is of real value and will be of long term benefit. It is not a sham.
    Come on Ardmacha, put a "dollar amount" on how much you think these changes will make, bearing in mind my story of planners and architects twiddling their thumbs in one of dozens of planning departments across the country. Will the CPA see these planners working in the DSW (or whatever it's called today)? No chance.
    ardmacha wrote: »
    This is not to say that the planners in your mothers council are not benefiting unduly from the CPA, but there is work that they might usefully do and they should clearly be asked to do it.
    They won't be and I think we both know it. The mother tells me lots of stories about the council workers and how they feel "snowed under" if they have more than one thing to do. The culture is alien to what most people would understand as "real work".

    The HSE is stacked full to the gills of these people as well. The PS expanded far more rapidly during the Ahern years than it needed to. FF bought successive elections in doing so, just as they increased SW payments well above the rate of inflation for the same end.

    The CPA protects one group (a minority) in society at the expense of the rest. There is no getting away from that. There should be no guaranteed job for life in the PS if there is nothing for you to do or you're not qualified or not willing to do the work that needs doing. Do you agree with me on that much?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,476 ✭✭✭ardmacha


    They won't be and I think we both know it. The mother tells me lots of stories about the council workers and how they feel "snowed under" if they have more than one thing to do. The culture is alien to what most people would understand as "real work"
    .

    I have a friend who works in a local authority and sadly this is true, although the work gets done by asking more of the people who are working rather than those who are not.

    But there are two issues here. The CPA allows people be asked to work, but in many cases they still have not been. On the radio recently a union person was talking about hospitals. In one hospital they had problems, shifts were changed and an agreement reached and things were mitigated. In another hospital they had similar problems, but management had never even proposed a plan to address the issues under the CPA!!

    As always in such matters people condemn the whole thing rather than insisting that the government implement it.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,050 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    ardmacha wrote: »
    As always in such matters people condemn the whole thing rather than insisting that the government implement it.
    To be quite honest, I can't see it being implemented by the gimp management that exists within the PS, mostly promoted due to length of service rather than managerial ability.

    Without effective management, the CPA can't succeed. I really want the CPA to deliver what it promised and would be delighted if it could genuinely save enough money not to have to make a load of people redundant in the end (hatchet job) but I fear what has happened in Greece will happen in Ireland...the CPA won't deliver the savings needed and the government will end up just making 50k public servants redundant, including probably mostly last in first out which will likely leave the dead wood in the councils and the HSE well alone.

    The replacement of the PS management with outsiders is key IMO but sure Howlin has already appointed another insider as the chap in charge of PS reform......not a great start!


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 587 ✭✭✭fat__tony


    Still a positive in my book. We have historically been a big exporter of educated people and this country filled up with skilled and unskilled workers... maybe it's time we export our abundance of them to places where they are needed.

    How on earth is forced emigration of skilled and educated young people deemed to be positive?

    What an utterly ridiculously thing to say.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 20,397 ✭✭✭✭FreudianSlippers


    fat__tony wrote: »
    How on earth is forced emigration of skilled and educated young people deemed to be positive?

    What an utterly ridiculously thing to say.
    We've always had a high education standard and exported more educated people because we didn't have enough places for them.

    Nobody is forcing anyone to emigrate...


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,104 ✭✭✭✭djpbarry


    fat__tony wrote: »
    How on earth is forced emigration of skilled and educated young people deemed to be positive?
    Educated young people will always be inclined to migrate - there's only so much you can do with yourself in Ireland, regardless of the prevailing economic conditions.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,895 ✭✭✭✭Sand


    Still a positive in my book. We have historically been a big exporter of educated people and this country filled up with skilled and unskilled workers... maybe it's time we export our abundance of them to places where they are needed.

    :rolleyes:
    We've always had a high education standard and exported more educated people because we didn't have enough places for them.

    Nobody is forcing anyone to emigrate...

    Thats not true - its always been a clear part of the government strategy that insiders will be protected (The Croke Park agreement) whereas the outsiders, (foreigners and Irish alike) are expected to either **** off back where they came from or in the case of the Irish to do their part as we "export our abundance of them to places where they are needed".

    I'm trying to think of successful economies which viewed brain drain as the secret to their economic success...the last economy I can think of is West Africa, back around the 1600s-1700s.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 20,397 ✭✭✭✭FreudianSlippers


    Sand wrote: »
    :rolleyes:



    Thats not true - its always been a clear part of the government strategy that insiders will be protected (The Croke Park agreement) whereas the outsiders, (foreigners and Irish alike) are expected to either **** off back where they came from or in the case of the Irish to do their part as we "export our abundance of them to places where they are needed".

    I'm trying to think of successful economies which viewed brain drain as the secret to their economic success...the last economy I can think of is West Africa, back around the 1600s-1700s.
    It's very common and has been for years that the best doctors trained in this country have moved to very successful positions in the US, UK and Canada... are you saying this negatively impacts us?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,050 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    It's very common and has been for years that the best doctors trained in this country have moved to very successful positions in the US, UK and Canada... are you saying this negatively impacts us?
    Of course it does. We pay to train them and then they practice elsewhere. How could this possibly be viewed in a positive light?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 20,397 ✭✭✭✭FreudianSlippers


    murphaph wrote: »
    Of course it does. We pay to train them and then they practice elsewhere. How could this possibly be viewed in a positive light?
    The more people that leave the less bitching we have to listen to. Sure, half the people on the dole are builders and labourers, not professionals anyway.
    Those who can't hack it will leave and the rest of us will be better off without them.

    The professionals that leave were always going to leave because we have an oversupply - recession or no, it always happens.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 905 ✭✭✭easychair


    The more people that leave the less bitching we have to listen to. Sure, half the people on the dole are builders and labourers, not professionals anyway.
    Those who can't hack it will leave and the rest of us will be better off without them.

    The professionals that leave were always going to leave because we have an oversupply - recession or no, it always happens.

    What an extraordinarily intemperate post, and full of clichés, implying as you do that those who emigrate, for whatever reasons, indulge themselves in more "bitching " than anyone else, that 50% of people on the dole are professionals and the rest builders and labourers, and that the reasons people emigrate from Ireland is because they can't "hack it" in Ireland.

    The governor of the Bank of England said yesterday "This is the most serious financial crisis we’ve seen, at least since the 1930s, if not ever.”

    We have to wake up to the fact that Ireland is in a double bind, and is in a precarious position. Not only are the governments finances in a worst state that virtually any other country, and those bad, and worsening, finances are deteriorating, but outside Ireland there is a world recession which, according to Mervyn King, is worse than any before.

    This thread asks if we have turned a corner, and the answer must be that "we" in Ireland have definitely not turned a corner, and "we" in the rest of the world have also definitely not turned a corner, and are unlikely to do so for a time.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,104 ✭✭✭✭djpbarry


    murphaph wrote: »
    Of course it does. We pay to train them and then they practice elsewhere. How could this possibly be viewed in a positive light?
    Because many will return with a wealth of experience. Ireland is a very small economy – emigration will always, always be a part of life there. Besides, it makes absolutely no sense for anyone, regardless of qualifications or experience, to sit around on the dole when work could be obtained elsewhere.
    easychair wrote: »
    ...that 50% of people on the dole are professionals and the rest builders and labourers...
    That’s actually a huge underestimate. According to CSO figures, only about 5% of those unemployed in the period April – June 2010 had a third-level degree.
    easychair wrote: »
    Not only are the governments finances in a worst state that virtually any other country, and those bad, and worsening, finances are deteriorating...
    How could the public finances be considered to be worsening when the deficit is being reduced?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,050 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    djpbarry wrote: »
    Because many will return with a wealth of experience. Ireland is a very small economy – emigration will always, always be a part of life there. Besides, it makes absolutely no sense for anyone, regardless of qualifications or experience, to sit around on the dole when work could be obtained elsewhere.
    Absolutely, but it is certainly not a positive that people must leave to find work. It is a sign of a weak economy when citizens must emigrate. Denmark is also a small economy, but the citizens don't generally have to leave the country to find work. There are many more examples like Denmark but emigration has been a handy safety valve for Irish politicians for so long now that people just accept that.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 587 ✭✭✭fat__tony


    The more people that leave the less bitching we have to listen to. Sure, half the people on the dole are builders and labourers, not professionals anyway.
    Those who can't hack it will leave and the rest of us will be better off without them.

    The professionals that leave were always going to leave because we have an oversupply - recession or no, it always happens.

    Your ignorance and attitude is pathetic.

    Easy to see you have a cushy job untouched by the current economic climate.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,104 ✭✭✭✭djpbarry


    murphaph wrote: »
    Absolutely, but it is certainly not a positive that people must leave to find work.
    Ok, but I would be hesitant to conclude that everyone who is leaving the country is being forced to do so.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,895 ✭✭✭✭Sand


    djpbarry wrote: »
    Ok, but I would be hesitant to conclude that everyone who is leaving the country is being forced to do so.

    If you mean "forced" as in being kidnapped and dragged in chains to the airport and deported, no, theyre not being forced.

    On the other hand, when options are being pursued so that the interests of insiders are prioritised, so that very few outsiders with skill and ambition will actually be given any opportunity to work in Ireland then yes, they are being forced to leave. Much as refugees from any disaster zone - economic or otherwise - are forced to leave by the circumstances they are forced into.

    And in difficult times, thats always been the response of "official Ireland". As Lenihan Snr said back in the 1980s, this island isnt big enough for all of us...only the insiders. None of the Lenihan clan will ever have to leave Ireland to find work. Only outsiders.

    Interestingly, just to demonstrate a point I googled the phrase "emigration will solve our problems". Which is the spoken, and unspoken, policy in Ireland in response to unemployment.

    Heres the first post that came up .... recognise the arguments and views? How emigration is viewed as a fact of life, a certainty, a postive thing for all concered. Almost like reading a thread on Ireland and how we do our bit to "export our abundance of them to places where they are needed". Thats where we are at, socially and economically when its claimed that habitual emigration is in someway postive.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,491 ✭✭✭Yahew


    Emigration in Ireland is not that big of a deal anymore, is it? A person leaving London for Dublin after work on Friday will get there before someone from Donegal leaving Dublin gets home. he might get home before some Dubliners get home.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 5,700 ✭✭✭irishh_bob


    Yahew wrote: »
    Emigration in Ireland is not that big of a deal anymore, is it? A person leaving London for Dublin after work on Friday will get there before someone from Donegal leaving Dublin gets home. he might get home before some Dubliners get home.

    agreed and with modern communications , email , mobile phone , social networking sites like this , the world is a tiny place , one big village , i lived in new zealand for around six months in 1998 , back then the internet was in its infancy , most people didnt have mobile phones and texting wasnt even invented , i remember only talking to my folks every few weeks for ten mins on a payphone on some street and i only spoke to one off my mates by phone during my entire time away


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 11,786 ✭✭✭✭whelan1


    going on a different tangent, agriculture is booming , why oh why wont the government do something to promote it and get more jobs in the industry :confused:


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,895 ✭✭✭✭Sand


    As someone who picked ragworth and stones from fields across Ireland as a child and a teenager, Id point out:

    - For labour intensive tasks theres always some ****ing dumb Dub cousins down for the summer to pick ragworth and stones. Or slave labour.

    - For all other tasks its capital intensive - machinery- not labour intensive.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 11,786 ✭✭✭✭whelan1


    there was no where near the amount of places for agricultural students this year for the amount of people who applied ... for a booming part of the economy the government again has let us down


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,895 ✭✭✭✭Sand


    If there is that much return on it, the agricultural students would pay for their education. The truth is they dont see it worthwhile to pay for an agricultural qualification...why should the government?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,104 ✭✭✭✭djpbarry


    Sand wrote: »
    If you mean "forced" as in being kidnapped and dragged in chains to the airport and deported, no, theyre not being forced.

    On the other hand, when options are being pursued so that the interests of insiders are prioritised, so that very few outsiders with skill and ambition will actually be given any opportunity to work in Ireland then yes, they are being forced to leave. Much as refugees from any disaster zone - economic or otherwise - are forced to leave by the circumstances they are forced into.
    Right. Whatever you say Sand. My peers and I were "forced" to leave Ireland, never to return, and we are poorer for it. I mean, it's not like there are any jobs in Ireland or anything.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,895 ✭✭✭✭Sand


    djpbarry wrote: »
    Right. Whatever you say Sand. My peers and I were "forced" to leave Ireland, never to return, and we are poorer for it. I mean, it's not like there are any jobs in Ireland or anything.

    If you were reviewing the CVs I've been reviewing lately for temporary, practically unpaid intern positions....in Ireland....then youd know that what you consider to be irony isnt actually too far off the truth. Who knows, maybe from abroad it looks rosier.

    Also I dont think emigrants are the poorer for leaving Ireland. If they cant find jobs in Ireland, then theyre probably richer for leaving Ireland as opposed to sitting on the dole. Practically by definition. However, I think Ireland is the poorer for exporting its young people where the skills and educations paid for by Irish taxpayers benefits the economies of other, non-Irish countries. The the critical issue from an Irish economic point of view - resources poured into education are wasted when our young, educated workforce up and move to the US, the UK, Australia or New Zealand.

    Irelands not the only country to try kid itself that habitual emigration is somehow normal or beneficial. Many other failed economies and societies try to rationalise their failure in such a way.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,491 ✭✭✭Yahew


    Sand wrote: »
    I

    Irelands not the only country to try kid itself that habitual emigration is somehow normal or beneficial. Many other failed economies and societies try to rationalise their failure in such a way.

    Horsepoo. Quite the opposite, Ireland - like your rant - massively fetishes the óchon, the historical destructiveness, of emigration. Something deeply rooted in our history when emigration was final - a death of the emigrant to everybody else ( hence the wake). In general, the sentiment is hostile. Brian Lenihan was ran out of town for saying it wasn't a bad thing, necessarily, in the 80's.

    Even though, as we saw in the 90's - and before RyanAir - people tended to come back when things got good. In short, Irish emigration is now mostly temporary, and emigrants can return at will. I was contemplating watching the match tomorrow in Dublin at a friend's house, but decided against it. So I stayed in the UK. Cost wasn't an issue, laziness was. He asked Thursday. I have turned up in Dublin before when asked at similar short notice, however.

    Compare how sanguinely Australians emigrate to the UK for a few years, and Britons to Australia for good, and no-one gives a sh*te. And thats the other side of the world.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,895 ✭✭✭✭Sand


    Right - given Irish emigrants abroad cant seem to seperate their own anecdotal, individual experience from objective, national exerience lets try a more distant example.

    Lets look at Mexico and the USA.

    Which is the more successful economy? The USA.

    Where are Mexicans famous for migrating to? The USA.

    People emigrate from failed states - economically and socially - to states to where they can succeed economically and socially. They literally vote with their feet. People rationalise failure of course (look at the Nigerian forum I linked to earlier where emigration was similarly defended as a sign of economic vitality and strength, with similar prickliness from Nigerian emigrants), but trying to argue that emigration is a sign of a strong economy is just.... :rolleyes:

    @Yahew
    Horsepoo. Quite the opposite, Ireland - like your rant - massively fetishes the óchon, the historical destructiveness, of emigration. Something deeply rooted in our history when emigration was final - a death of the emigrant to everybody else ( hence the wake). In general, the sentiment is hostile. Brian Lenihan was ran out of town for saying it wasn't a bad thing, necessarily, in the 80's.

    Even though, as we saw in the 90's - and before RyanAir - people tended to come back when things got good.

    You're contradicting yourself. You claim emigration is'nt destructive - yet you then go on to claim people come back when they can, when things get good and they can find a job in Ireland. That implies people prefer to remain in Ireland and only leave when they have to, when times are bad and they cant find a job in Ireland.

    Curious - doesnt sound like the joyous occasion you dress it up as. Never mind, keep rationalising it to yourself.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 137 ✭✭TheoBane


    Well i think our biggest problem was that the country was run like a club instead of a business, the people running the country have no idea what to do with our country. They treat everything as relaxed approach that you get in a country club.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,491 ✭✭✭Yahew


    Sand wrote: »
    Right - given Irish emigrants abroad cant seem to seperate their own anecdotal, individual experience from objective, national exerience lets try a more distant example.

    Lets look at Mexico and the USA.

    Which is the more successful economy? The USA.

    Where are Mexicans famous for migrating to? The USA.

    People emigrate from failed states - economically and socially - to states to where they can succeed economically and socially. They literally vote with their feet. People rationalise failure of course, but trying to argue that emigration is a sign of a strong economy is just.... :rolleyes:

    Give over, you are losing. Mexico never had the kind of massive re-immigration of Mexicans from the US back to Mexico in the 90's, nor did it have massive immigration from all over the world in the 2000's. Ireland's population, was at peak, 20% immigrant. It's probably still 15%.

    So the "habitual" immigration you keep harping on about like a broken record IS NOT HAPPENING. What is happening, is a small - and historically trivial amount of immigration ( a term almost ridiculous when applied to the UK) - which will probably reverse when things get better, because that happened before. I doubt if Ireland had more than 2 years of net immigration in the last 20.

    The only "anecdotal" evidence here is yours - I mentioned the differences in the type of immigration TWICE ( which is once too much), and how it is now temporary, like Australia to Britain. You've told stories about CV's.

    You reply with Mexico, a country 4 times poorer than the US. The wage levels between Australia, and Britain; or Ireland and Britain are about the same so people move freely in both directions ( Britons being Ireland's largest immigrant group - another difference from Mexico-America).

    Comparing with Nigeria, and/or Mexico is an abysmal argument.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,491 ✭✭✭Yahew


    Sand wrote: »


    You're contradicting yourself. You claim emigration is'nt destructive - yet you then go on to claim people come back when they can, when things get good and they can find a job in Ireland. That implies people prefer to remain in Ireland and only leave when they have to, when times are bad and they cant find a job in Ireland.

    Curious - doesnt sound like the joyous occasion you dress it up as. Never mind, keep rationalising it to yourself.

    I came over here in the boom. The next week I was at a hurling final. I think Irish people should leave Ireland, and then return if they want. Anything else is pure parochialism.

    I will be back. But wanting to live in Ireland all you life is a parochial attitude.

    And what I was responding to was your argument about how destructive emigration is. It's isnt. Its just a trip. Then you come home, if you want. With experience. We've seen this before. We'll see it again. This is different from the 50's when people did not come back.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,895 ✭✭✭✭Sand


    @Yahew

    - You're talking about emigration as if it was travelling off to India and finding yourself on some world travel experience. Grand. That might be your personal experience. I would say two things:

    A - Moving from Ireland to the UK isnt really "getting out and seeing the world".

    B - This is the forum for discussing the Irish Economy. Not individual world travel experiences and how it broadens the mind. Hence, my focus on the economic impact of habitual emigration and why it is ridiculous to consider emigration as some form of economic strength. You admit as much when you say that when there are "good times" emigrants tend to return to Ireland - not when they want. When there are "good times" and they can find work in Ireland. Emigration occurs from failed countries to successful economies.


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