The proper meaning of class, as it is used in an analysis of political economy and sociology internationally, is not much discussed in Ireland either in academia or more broadly, despite the overriding fact that so much of how the economic crisis has played out and how the government here has chosen to deal with [...]

Since the 1990s, anthropologists working in Ireland have increasingly concerned themselves with ideas of class and class relations. Previously, the central themes were rural life, community, kinship and social structure. In 1932 Conrad M. Arensberg and Solon T. Kimball undertook a two-year study of small communities in Co. Clare. The resultant publications, An Irish Countryman [...]

Sometimes, something happens that takes your breath away. The chain store Boots is engaged in a deplorable assault on their employees’ wages and working conditions - employees who are some of the lowest paid in the economy. Not only that, it constitutes an assault upon other enterprises, the Exchequer and the Irish economy.
Let’s do some [...]

In 2003 the Bare Necessities report by independent think-tank Democratic Dialogue revealed that nearly 30% of Northern Ireland’s households were poor. According to the report, in 2002-03 half a million people in Northern Ireland were living in poor households of whom148,900 were children (37.4 per cent of all children).According to the report, “based on the [...]

What kind of recession are we having - or rather, how is it impacting on different sectors of the labour force? Some time ago we heard talk of a middle-class recession - how particular ‘middle class’ occupations were being badly affected. Architects were one such profession and clearly there’s not much use for this group [...]

John McHale of NUI Galway has produced an outline for a fiscal plan. It is well worth reading. It’s a serious treatment. It’s also an unnerving treatment. For it has the capacity to wreck the Exchequer’s finances with little ‘stimulating’ effect on the economy.
On the way to presenting his fiscal plan John makes some highly [...]

Last month, Seán O’Riain wrote a post for progressive economy, which used the Quarterly Household Survey (Q1 2009 ) to throw some light on the class aspects of the recent rise in unemployment in Ireland.
the major trend that stands out is the disastrous collapse in working class employment with growing differences between the position of [...]

There are strong structural differences in employment between the public and private sector - a fact that is recognised by some, and ignored by others.
The structural differences relate to the types of occupation, education standards, and length of service - all of which affect wage levels. The length of service of those in the public [...]

Income is not a determinator of class, and to think of class in such terms is to miss the point that class is a social relation, not a category. Income, however, can be used as an indicator of class relations, as wage levels are usually, although not always, related to the types of positions people [...]