The Way Forward for Ireland

Zynks

The sometimes controversial Dave McWilliams made an excellent point in the SB Post today regarding Ireland's need for an increase in qualified immigrants and the missed opportunity on Chinese graduates leaving our universities.

"At the moment, we have the rather ludicrous situation where we are putting Chinese students through our universities, educating and training them and then asking them to leave the country when they qualify. If we are prepared to have them working for Spar, why not for Intel?"

Full article here:
http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/wholestory.aspx-qqqt=DAVID%20MACWILLAMS-qqqs=commentandanalysis-qqqsectionid=3-qqqc=5.2.0.0-qqqn=1-qqqx=1.asp

J.S. Pill

Whatever about the substance of that article, it reads like it was just assembled from little pieces of 'the pope's children'. I think Mr. McWilliams was getting close to a deadline, panicked and just started copying and pasting.

Stop behaving like a first year arts student you ginger twat

Sleepy

It was very close in content to an article he wrote the other week for the SBP where he advocated forging tighter links with China and trying to become the same foothold in Europe for them as we have been for the US for the last decade or so.

In a media thread, I might have a go at him for being a bit lazy but I do think he's right. We've no natural resources to speak of, our infrastructure verges on third world and our wage platform is too high to compete in the manufacturing sector. We need to focus on the high-tech, high-income service sector and, in fairness, we've been pretty good at it to date. McWilliams is suggesting the next logical step in the riverdance that has been the Celtic Tiger.

As long as our property bubble doesn't take down our whole economy when it bursts, we can continue to be a successful country if we continue to invest in educating our population and fully utilizing the skills of those flocking into our country.

banaman

All very well except that the vast majority of those "flocking to Ireland" are vastly over qualified for the jobs they take. So rather than utilising their skills we merely use their labour to do the jobs we no longer wish to do.

As for becoming the Chinese foothold in Europe surely that just means more of the same empty rhetoric about "Celtic Tiger" success due to education, prudent economics etc. when the reality is we allow the foreign multi-nationals to export the wealth (through low corporation tax), our kids are still being educated in pre-fabs and in class sizes over thirty.
There are vast inequalities of provision and uptake of third level education.
Our health system is a sick joke.
And despite all this we are still asking for more of the same AND a give-away budget.

In the 1970s and 1980s the UK had a bonanza of North Sea oil revenues which the then Govt used to finance its dole queues rather than invest in the infrastructure and well being of its people.
The result? Is the UK today. Low social welfare, underfunded/underequiped NHS, poor transport infrastucture, creaking education system and ghettoisation.

What long-term benefits has the Irish Govt of the last 10 years put in place for the future citizens of this country?

Zynks

Many issues there, but I would like to comment on a few:

banaman wrote:

All very well except that the vast majority of those "flocking to Ireland" are vastly over qualified for the jobs they take. So rather than utilising their skills we merely use their labour to do the jobs we no longer wish to do.

That's what happened to Germany in the 50's and 60's. Some of the better qualified workers from the South of Europe went to work in Germany and ended working in building sites (also making loads of money compared to what they would make at home). In my view it is valid as a "catch-up" measure such as rebuilding the country after the war or, in the case of Ireland, trying to get closer to average ratios of houses per head of population. However, as a long term strategy it is as good as taking the wrong bus just because it is for free.

banaman wrote:

As for becoming the Chinese foothold in Europe surely that just means more of the same empty rhetoric about "Celtic Tiger" success due to education, prudent economics etc. when the reality is we allow the foreign multi-nationals to export the wealth (through low corporation tax), ..

But that is exactly why they are here! We can only have one of them: higher taxes OR foreign multinationals. I know which one I would choose.

banaman wrote:

...our kids are still being educated in pre-fabs and in class sizes over thirty.
There are vast inequalities of provision and uptake of third level education.
Our health system is a sick joke.

Yep, and voters that keep the same kind of people in power over and over. Maybe we deserve to have our money wasted in such an incompetent manner after all....

banaman wrote:

What long-term benefits has the Irish Govt of the last 10 years put in place for the future citizens of this country?

In my view absolutely none. That would take vision, and that is a feature in very short supply in our government.