For the second podcast from Slugger O’Toole on the Irish Economy Mick Fealty has reconvened most of the panel from last week’s discussion on the economy. The topics include the call for wage cuts in the public sector, how to build towards a recovery in the medium term and support export growth, what economic hope [...]

Finally, some good ol’ fashioned common sense is being spoken - and in the Irish Times, as well.  Prionsias Breathnach of NUI Maynooth takes on calls for wage cuts head on. He does this through this time-tested process of looking up the facts.  In these days, that’s almost a revolutionary act.   He elaborates three reasons why calls for wage [...]

My oh my. My assertion that Ireland is a low-waged economy and that public sector wage cuts will have little impact has generated a lot of comments, some of them challenging my contention and the use of statistics. I had intended to do a piece today on Sean Fitzpatrick’s legacy to our economy but as [...]

Ever get that sinking feeling - like your tied down to the railway tracks and the train is coming around the bend? And your rescuers - they’re actually waving the train on. Yes, in times like these it takes a brave soul who can kick back and party.
In recent days we have been [...]

The late, great monetary economist Hyman Minsky (1986:110), quoting Nobellist James Tobin, once wrote of economics theory that:
“the terms in which a problem is stated and in which the relevant information is organised can have a great influence on the solution”.
Minsky goes on to write:
“But the way the problem is stated and the identification of [...]

The newspaper articles read like war reports - from the economic front-line on which we are all trapped The new CSO figures on unemployment confirm this. Already, leading economists are suggesting the jobless rate could exceed 12 percent by year’s end, making projections made only last week already out of date.
It’s depressing enough [...]

There is much in Michael Taft’s ‘Towards a New Economic Narrative‘ that most socialists can agree with. The state must take measures to protect the majority of its population from the ravages of unemployment and recession.
So, yes, we need a new social housing programme, a school building programme, a conservation maintenance programme for older housing, [...]

Michael Taft’s 10 point plan for addressing the profound problems which face the Irish economy is an excellent starting place for discussion of the response of the left.  Its major strength is that it recognizes that we cannot get beyond the current impasse without a comprehensive list of separate but intimately related changes in the [...]

Did anyone catch it?  Stephen Collins did but he didn’t give us the maths.  When Minister Lenihan introduced the Finance Bill he made a small amendment in the new income levy, imposing an extra one percent on incomes above €250,000.  In doing so he put forward two statistics:  first, that this would net the state coffers €60 [...]

David McWilliams has produced a table.  In fact, two tables (I’ve collapsed it into one).  Standing on these tables he spreads the gospel - in order to avoid bankruptcy and ‘decades’ of misery (decades, mind you) we must rip up the pay agreement and start slashing ‘wildly over-paid’ public sector salaries.  We are on the [...]