It's all good news!

ntlbell

So,

before Mick Wallace was on primetime the papers and tv pretty much downplayed how bad things were and since then the papers and RTE are picking up on a lot of doom and gloom stories.

For the layman like myself is there much good happening in the economy at the moment? have we much growth to look forward to in the next 3-5 years?

rediguana

Who's Mick Wallace?

Guys gotta mind their own patch. What do I care if the unemployment rate is creeping up? Long as my job is safe and I'm moving upwards (far too slowly in my case, but that's a different story), the whole economy can crash and burn.

My brother works in construction. Now he's saying work's hard to come by. Whole family been telling him to diversify for years.

People in certain areas get squeezed in a downturn, others just need to readjust to a not-quite-as-shameful-level-of-affluence.

Good as it's ever been, better!. Whole thing is relative.

Ekancone

Builders need to get realistic with their wage demands, the boom is over and it aint coming back. But that doesn't mean we are heading for doom and gloom either, just a sane level of growth.

nesf

Downturns are good healthy things for economies so long as they aren't too deep or too prolonged. The building industry for instance got pretty damn inefficient over the past decade and there were/are a lot of "cowboys" in the industry. Those lads will be squeezed out over the next few years (and unfortunately plenty of good lads who get unlucky will lose their jobs too) but we'll be left with a more realistically sized building industry when the economy picks up again. We've far more people working in construction than we need for the next couple of years and the market will correct that, though not without some pain for people.

Things will be tighter for the next few years and the housing correction will squeeze people's pockets/wealth/spending a bit but these things happen in modern economies, you've just got to accept it tbh, you can't have booms without busts etc. Our economic growth looks to be slowing but we're nowhere close to a seriously bad recession in growth terms.

Économiste Monétaire

No one truly knows the answer to your question OP, you have to look at the indicators and make up your own mind. If you want to look at the data about growth, the current projections for growth in real GDP for 2008 is 2.3% (which is above the 1.7% forcasted growth rate for the euro area) and is supposed to pick up to 3.2% in 2009.

For unemployment the CSO has the Seasonally Adjusted Standarised Unemployment Rate at 5.5% for April, an increase from 5% in January. So unemployment is increasing but keep in mind we're better than the EU average of 7.1% in 07.

I also have no clue who Mick Wallace is.

Heisenberg.

This post has been deleted.

gurramok

That article is based by a govt funded think tank is based on alot of farcical assumptions NS, especially the part about 48,000 houses, bloody hell, a sustainable economy should not be depended on the amount of houses built!!

GNP declined in Q4 '07. Latest indications from retail sales for Jan/Feb/Mar show an approx 2% yoy decline along with the mounting unemployment.

That means the dreaded R word for 2 consecutive quarters of negative growth, we won't know officially till next month for CSO stats on quarter movements but it ain't looking good at all, more like recession.

Économiste Monétaire

gurramok wrote: »

That article is based by a govt funded think tank is based on alot of farcical assumptions NS, especially the part about 48,000 houses, bloody hell, a sustainable economy should not be depended on the amount of houses built!!

GNP declined in Q4 '07. Latest indications from retail sales for Jan/Feb/Mar show an approx 2% yoy decline along with the mounting unemployment.

That means the dreaded R word for 2 consecutive quarters of negative growth, we won't know officially till next month for CSO stats on quarter movements but it ain't looking good at all, more like recession.

1) The ESRI is an independent body. Government funding accounts for only one-third of its budget.

2) The review didn't solely focus on the construction industry. 48,000 is a reduction from 2005 levels of 81,000. Also, could you point me to where the review states that the Irish economy is "depended" on the housing sector? In the Executive Summary it labels the financial sector as key to Irish Economic growth, not the housing sector.

3) Unemployment is 5.5% as of April 2008. There is no change from March and a .5% increase from the start of the year. That hardly constitutes "mounting unemployment".

gurramok

gurramok wrote: »

That article is based by a govt funded think tank is based on alot of farcical assumptions NS, especially the part about 48,000 houses, bloody hell, a sustainable economy should not be depended on the amount of houses built!!

The fact that you don't even know who the ESRI are would lead me to suggest that your opinions aren't quite as well informed as perhaps Prof. Frances Ruane, Dr. Sean Lyons or Prof. Toll.

Armchair economists strike again!!

gurramok

UCD_Econ wrote: »

1) The ESRI is an independent body. Government funding accounts for only one-third of its budget.

Hence it depends on govt funding even if it's only one third. They have been wrong before, did they forecast the downturn as severe as it is?

Forecasting for 2010 and beyond is reckless especially based on alot of assumptions that may or may not happen, no-one knows what exactly will happen beyond then.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

2) The review didn't solely focus on the construction industry. 48,000 is a reduction from 2005 levels of 81,000. Also, could you point me to where the review states that the Irish economy is "depended" on the housing sector? In the Executive Summary it labels the financial sector as key to Irish Economic growth, not the housing sector.

If the Irish economy is so resilient, why did they mention 48,000 houses then?
An economy should not be dependent on how many houses are built. You don't hear any other western economy so focussed on construction for its growth.
And the financial sector which some of is linked to construction(that €100bn that developers owe banks) is the source of growth in a credit crunch?

22% of Irish GNP depends on construction, Finfacts do a good review on the Irish economy and its problems, have a look at their website.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

3) Unemployment is 5.5% as of April 2008. There is no change from March and a .5% increase from the start of the year. That hardly constitutes "mounting unemployment".

No change from March was Easter arriving early. It doesn't take an economist to know that there are too many employed in construction and that sector will lay off as the downturn bites.

Deleted User wrote:

The fact that you don't even know who the ESRI are would lead me to suggest that your opinions aren't quite as well informed as perhaps Prof. Frances Ruane, Dr. Sean Lyons or Prof. Toll.

Err, just stated above that they are not wholly independent. It seems you do not know who funds them?

Deleted User wrote:

Armchair economists strike again!!

Ain't we all.:D

UCD_Econ

UCD_Econ wrote: »

1) The ESRI is an independent body. Government funding accounts for only one-third of its budget.

2) The review didn't solely focus on the construction industry. 48,000 is a reduction from 2005 levels of 81,000. Also, could you point me to where the review states that the Irish economy is "depended" on the housing sector? In the Executive Summary it labels the financial sector as key to Irish Economic growth, not the housing sector.

3) Unemployment is 5.5% as of April 2008. There is no change from March and a .5% increase from the start of the year. That hardly constitutes "mounting unemployment".

1) I know from experience working in these types of areas just how "independent "they can be

2) Over a quarter of a million jobs depend on construction

3) Unemployment is rising at an increasing rate. Just as Construction is slowing...

Économiste Monétaire

gurramok wrote: »

Hence it depends on govt funding even if it's only one third. They have been wrong before, did they forecast the downturn as severe as it is?

No matter how much you try to bend the facts, the ESRI is not a government body and is not solely dependent on government funding. 2.3% of a decrease in retail sales is not evidence of a severe downturn.

Forecasting for 2010 and beyond is reckless especially based on alot of assumptions that may or may not happen, no-one knows what exactly will happen beyond then.

Pleas list the variables they used in their forcast and how they constitute as reckless. It is in their educated guess from evidence available what might happen. It is not a crystal ball for the future, ether believe it or don't.

If the Irish economy is so resilient, why did they mention 48,000 houses then?
An economy should not be dependent on how many houses are built. You don't hear any other western economy so focussed on construction for its growth.

The figures are used for comparison because the industry has got so much attention in the media the last few years. There was one line in the executive summary about housing. Please point me to where the ESRI (not an Rte report) states that the Irish economy is so dependent on the construction industry.

22% of Irish GNP depends on construction, Finfacts do a good review on the Irish economy and its problems, have a look at their website.

You trust Finfacts before the ESRI? The construction sector accounts for 9.4% of GNP, not 22%.

http://www.cso.ie/releasespublications/documents/economy/current/qna.pdf

It is you who needs to read the figures.

No change from March was Easter arriving early. It doesn't take an economist to know that there are too many employed in construction and that sector will lay off as the downturn bites.

You already said there is a "severe downturn". Hence, if there was then unemployment would have risen further than .5% from the start of the year.

Find some figures for your opinions, otherwise it's just dribble.

Blindjustice wrote:

2) Over a quarter of a million jobs depend on construction

3) Unemployment is rising at an increasing rate. Just as Construction is slowing...

You assume every person in the construction will lose their jobs.

Again, the unemployment figures and their increases don't constitute being called severe. It has risen .5% from the start of the year.

Edit: Have you worked for the ESRI? What 'types of areas' are you referring?

BigglesMcGee

Just a reminder for those who were in nappies in the 80's.

Things are not bad now. Things are bad when NOBODY you know has a job. When people are drawing the dole and supplement ing it with the under the table day or 2 a months work they get shovelling ****.

nesf

Deleted User wrote: »

1) I know from experience working in these types of areas just how "independent "they can be

Then why were they saying in 2005 that a soft landing was unlikely? If they were in the pocket of the Government, banks or the builders they'd have been presenting it in a much rosier light like the banks and builders were doing.

Deleted User wrote: »

2) Over a quarter of a million jobs depend on construction

Sure, but how many of those are transient and how many of those people will simply move to the London for the Olympics building or similar? Losing so many people from one are will impact on the public finances but conversely if the financial services industry continues to grow we will have a stream of immigrants looking for jobs in that. That, and how many of the people in construction are trapped there? Can they reskill and move to a different sector?

Deleted User wrote: »

3) Unemployment is rising at an increasing rate. Just as Construction is slowing...

Yes, because of course the only factor we need to take into account when predicting unemployment figures is one sector. If employment in construction goes down but financial services or any other sector goes up, we could have a stabilisation of unemployment figures or even a reduction below 5% again (though this is unlikely and also, perhaps, not welcome).

Ekancone

gurramok wrote: »

Hence it depends on govt funding even if it's only one third. They have been wrong before, did they forecast the downturn as severe as it is?

Forecasting for 2010 and beyond is reckless especially based on alot of assumptions that may or may not happen, no-one knows what exactly will happen beyond then.

Do you even know what economic, or even scientific, modelling entails?

gurramok wrote: »

If the Irish economy is so resilient, why did they mention 48,000 houses then?
An economy should not be dependent on how many houses are built. You don't hear any other western economy so focussed on construction for its growth.

Thats funny, a downturn in the housing market in the United States was a sufficient determinant for a recession to ensue.

gurramok wrote: »

And the financial sector which some of is linked to construction(that €100bn that developers owe banks) is the source of growth in a credit crunch?

There is no credit crunch in Ireland, nor will there be. I suggest you start reading beyond pop economics and do some actual research into this matter.

gurramok wrote: »

22% of Irish GNP depends on construction, Finfacts do a good review on the Irish economy and its problems, have a look at their website.

No, why don't you explain it in your own words.

Ekancone

Deleted User wrote: »

1) I know from experience working in these types of areas just how "independent "they can be

2) Over a quarter of a million jobs depend on construction

3) Unemployment is rising at an increasing rate. Just as Construction is slowing...

Wow, how insightful.

daithifleming

daithifleming wrote: »

There is no credit crunch in Ireland, nor will there be. I suggest you start reading beyond pop economics and do some actual research into this matter.

Nice, how insightful...care to explain it further? Or are you afraid it will go over all our heads? Why will there be no credit crunch in Ireland? How come many loan products are being removed?

The Center for European Policy Studies reckon:

A downturn in
housing prices might depress consumption somewhat, but not construction investment. By
contrast, in Spain and Ireland, construction investment has increased to levels (18-20% of GDP)
not seen in any other OECD country except Japan. In these two countries, lower housing prices
are likely to be associated with a sharp and prolonged drop in domestic demand.

http://shop.ceps.eu/downfree.php?item_id=1545

Économiste Monétaire

Deleted User wrote: »

Nice, how insightful...care to explain it further? Or are you afraid it will go over all our heads? Why will there be no credit crunch in Ireland? How come many loan products are being removed?

Because Irish banks have not (so far) been exposed to American mortgage backed securities. This isn't Econ101. You may want to read why the 'credit crunch' in America came about and then look for comparisons to Ireland.

Also, why would you quote something you don't understand? A link to the full article would help, not just a paraphrased section.

Ekancone

Deleted User wrote: »

Nice, how insightful...care to explain it further? Or are you afraid it will go over all our heads? Why will there be no credit crunch in Ireland? How come many loan products are being removed?

The credit crunch stem from a lack of funds being available on the inter-banks market, because banks are unable to tell which banks are having either liquidity or solvency problems. Neither of these problems apply to the Irish banking system, as Irish banks are amongst the most highly capitalised in the world, and recent stress tests have shown that their loan-loss ratio would have to increase by a factor of six before the Irish banking system would run into trouble, so I'm afraid your little fantasy about the Irish banking system hitting the rocks is just that, a fantasy.

Deleted User wrote: »

The Center for European Policy Studies reckon:

Right, which is discussing the construction sector, would you care to expand your analysis?

UCD_Econ

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Because Irish banks have not (so far) been exposed to American mortgage backed securities. This isn't Econ101. You may want to read why the 'credit crunch' in America came about and then look for comparisons to Ireland.

Also, why would you quote something you don't understand? A link to the full article would help, not just a paraphrased section.

added a link
Your right its not econ101, its alot more than a one sentence answer
Which is WHY is asked for further explanation!!

daithifleming

daithifleming wrote: »

so I'm afraid your little fantasy about the Irish banking system hitting the rocks is just that, a fantasy.

Where did I say here that they were about to hit the rocks?
I added to this thread simply that there were over 250,000 construction jobs and that the rate of unemployment was increasing

and everybody goes over the top about doom and gloom and fantasies about banking systems hitting the rocks!!!!!!! :eek:

Ekancone

Deleted User wrote: »

Where did I say here that they were about to hit the rocks?
I added to this thread simply that there were over 250,000 construction jobs and that the rate of unemployment was increasing

and everybody goes over the top about doom and gloom and fantasies about banking systems hitting the rocks!!!!!!! :eek:

You asked me why there would be no credit crunch in Ireland, and I explained that. I think it is a prime case of how having an oligopoly can actually be a good thing sometimes.

nesf

Deleted User wrote: »

Nice, how insightful...care to explain it further? Or are you afraid it will go over all our heads? Why will there be no credit crunch in Ireland? How come many loan products are being removed?

Go read the minutes of the ECB meeting from the past year. Across the Euro-zone the credit markets haven't tightened to the extent that the US has. Anyone telling you that we, in Ireland, are going through the same credit crisis that the US banks are at the moment is either lying to you, doesn't know what they're talking about or haven't bothered to even check the figures for what's been happening in Europe.

Loan products are being removed because of a declining property market, banks are tightening their lending in response to that. Regardless of what was happing in the US this would happen when the correction started in the Irish housing markets. There is some upwards pressure on Irish bank interest rates because of rising rates on the Inter-bank funds markets but it's 1) not been that severe and 2) been limited because the models used in Irish banks for the most part source more of their funds from other sources than the inter bank markets, versus say Northern Rock who ran into a lot of trouble because of their over-reliance on the inter bank markets and the inflexibility of their business model.


European banks did not get hit by the same liquidity pressures as the US banks for many reasons, one of the easiest ones to understand for non-economists is that the ECB will give loans to banks based on a very broad range of collateral versus the The Federal Reserve whose system (at the point of the crunch) was much more restrictive in terms of the kinds of acceptable collateral and who they gave money to (the Fed's system for instance, was to give loads to a handful of big players with the idea that the smaller players would then borrow off them and liquidity would flow through the system. What actually happened was these big players just hoarded liquidity themselves and didn't loan it out to other people, aggravating the entire problem). The ECB went into this crisis with a much easier way of injecting liquidity into the financial system than the Federal Reserve and one of the outcomes was that the impact of the crisis in Europe was nowhere near as bad in this respect than the initial impact in the US.

That's only one out of many factors at play but honestly, I don't have the time to go into a huge amount of detail here and list them all out. The Economist's coverage of the credit crisis is a decent introduction to it for a non-economist, for a more technical appraisal look at the minutes of the Fed, ECB and Bank of England if you want more detail.

BigglesMcGee

BigglesMcGee wrote: »

Just a reminder for those who were in nappies in the 80's.

Things are not bad now. Things are bad when NOBODY you know has a job. When people are drawing the dole and supplement ing it with the under the table day or 2 a months work they get shovelling ****.

Tell ya what..if we are honest 80s Ireland wasnt that bad either...at least people werent dying of starvation. At least the dole was there to be claimed! Glad I was born in Ireland even with all the giving out I (and most of us give out) do!

Time Magazine

A few points:

1. Lulz at questioning the independence of the ESRI. They're constantly criticising government policy. I know for a fact that some of the people on this forum are in the employ of the ESRI and those of us who don't question their independence are those who are most engaged in economic research.

2. Economic forecasting is always based on assumptions. The primary assumption is "...so long as nothing hugely unexpected happens." You simply can't predict those things though. This is why growth forecasts were constantly revised down post-US credit crunch. Preliminary estimates for growth in 2010 should be considered just that.

3. Our banking sector is in a much less precarious position than USA's.

4. Our economy is so construction-intensive (and thus -dependent) at the moment because although our income exceeds our European neighbours, our wealth certainly does not. We have an infrastructural deficit that requires addressing, which means a lot of construction. The reason you don't see any other Western nation so dependent on construction is because nobody grew as fast as us over the past twenty years. We now need to bring our infrastructure up to speed because we only had halve the time to reach this level of income as other nations. Income can rise very quickly. Infrastructure typically takes a while.

gurramok

UCD_Econ wrote: »

No matter how much you try to bend the facts, the ESRI is not a government body and is not solely dependent on government funding. 2.3% of a decrease in retail sales is not evidence of a severe downturn.

I just dont trust their forecasts as they have been constantly wrong and this forecast just so happened to be released on the week a new Taoiseach comes to power, its damn suspicious nevermind its assumptions

GNP declined from Q3 to Q4 in '07. That's one half of a negative growth scenario to be considered as a recession. We'll know next month from the CSO if Q1 '08 is also declining, the indicators so far say yes.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Pleas list the variables they used in their forcast and how they constitute as reckless. It is in their educated guess from evidence available what might happen. It is not a crystal ball for the future, ether believe it or don't.

Let me see...

ESRI forecast growth for 2008 of 2.3% in Dec 2007. They then revised the forecast in March 2008 to 1.6%

So they couldn't accurately predict growth for one year, and revised their position by a massive 0.7% in 4 months?

And they want us to believe they can predict the next 10 years?

UCD_Econ wrote: »

The figures are used for comparison because the industry has got so much attention in the media the last few years. There was one line in the executive summary about housing. Please point me to where the ESRI (not an Rte report) states that the Irish economy is so dependent on the construction industry.

It don't take an expert to realise that it does depend. Every 10,000 drop in the number of houses built means that GDP declines by 1%.
That is disturbing for a so called non-dependent economy on construction. No other Western economy(maybe bar Spain) is so dependent for its GDP on the amount of houses being built.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

You trust Finfacts before the ESRI? The construction sector accounts for 9.4% of GNP, not 22%.
http://www.cso.ie/releasespublications/documents/economy/current/qna.pdf

It is you who needs to read the figures.

Where did you get 9.4%?(this based on construction ONLY which i'm not talking about)...Finfacts are liars?
Remember, i'm not talking solely about construction, i'm talking about construction and and its related activity in banking(mortgaging, estate agents, insurance and the likes) and retail(furniture stores, hardware stores for example)

UCD_Econ wrote: »

You already said there is a "severe downturn". Hence, if there was then unemployment would have risen further than .5% from the start of the year.

This downturn is time delayed. It takes maybe average 18 months to finish a house.
Peak demand of housing was in mid '06, hence most of that demand is finally being built and the new demand has been slashed since then hence layoffs in construction,finance and retail

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Find some figures for your opinions, otherwise it's just dribble.

Again, you need to look at industries based on construction(banking and retail) where a construction downturn hurts the most.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

You assume every person in the construction will lose their jobs.

No, i do not. There are far too many employed there(from memory, was it one in five men work in construction related activity?)

At the moment, its been trimmed to sustainable levels. FAS themselves have stated that 80,000 jobs there are at risk and thats just based solely on construction itself, nevermind banking and retail.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Again, the unemployment figures and their increases don't constitute being called severe. It has risen .5% from the start of the year.

The rise in unemployment has only started. It ain't no coincidence that the majority of new claimants are men, now how is that?

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Edit: Have you worked for the ESRI? What 'types of areas' are you referring?

No, have you?...Have i touched a nerve ??

Look at their forecasting beyond rose-tinted glassses

Re:daithifleming
Yes, the credit crunch is affecting Ireland. Why?...Just look at the Euribor rates which Irish banks depend on getting money when they are not getting it from customer deposits.
Euribor rates have shot up since the credit crunch hit and that why the likes of new tracker mortgages have been either withdrawn or have their rates raised.
Coupled with Irish developers owe Irish banks €100bn, we have a huge domestic problem in banking as its so dependent on construction related activity.
The US had widespread mortgage fraud in its banking system and thats why a recession might be happening there.(i'm not fully convinced a fully blown recession will bite there, they are no so dependent on construction related activity like us)
We have not have had widespread mortgage fraud other than dodgy 100% mortgages being issued which is not on a similar scale to over there.

Its the domestic issues which i highlighted above which is driving the recession here.

gurramok

Antithetic wrote: »

A few points:

1. Lulz at questioning the independence of the ESRI. They're constantly criticising government policy. I know for a fact that some of the people on this forum are in the employ of the ESRI and those of us who don't question their independence are those who are most engaged in economic research.

2. Economic forecasting is always based on assumptions. The primary assumption is "...so long as nothing hugely unexpected happens." You simply can't predict those things though. This is why growth forecasts were constantly revised down post-US credit crunch. Preliminary estimates for growth in 2010 should be considered just that.

3. Our banking sector is in a much less precarious position than USA's.

4. Our economy is so construction-intensive (and thus -dependent) at the moment because although our income exceeds our European neighbours, our wealth certainly does not. We have an infrastructural deficit that requires addressing, which means a lot of construction. The reason you don't see any other Western nation so dependent on construction is because nobody grew as fast as us over the past twenty years. We now need to bring our infrastructure up to speed because we only had halve the time to reach this level of income as other nations. Income can rise very quickly. Infrastructure typically takes a while.

Well, i do agree with point 2 and 3 and am suspicious of 1 which i have stated already

On 4, too mnay houses were built here, its gone beyond catchup in my opinion.
Every commentator on the housing front has stated that there is a huge over supply out there. Now to go from here to the next level is the biggest challenge.
The biggest problem is what has happened in the past 6 yrs or so. Most jobs that were created were either in the public/civil service, construction and related financial services and retail. They were not all sustainable and we know what happens when the national accounts go into deficit, public jobs are hit first.
The oversupply of labour in construction and industries that depend on it(some in finance and retail) will decline as they were not sustainable.

The infrastructure deficit will not take up all the downturn jobs been shed, its machines that build roads unlike labour intensive houses.
And regarding financial services as taking up the slack, cost competitiveness here ain't helping matters at all.
Thats why i questioned where is the future growth to come from in the ESRI report.

nesf

gurramok wrote: »

I just dont trust their forecasts as they have been constantly wrong and this forecast just so happened to be released on the week a new Taoiseach comes to power, its damn suspicious nevermind its assumptions

GNP declined from Q3 to Q4 in '07. That's one half of a negative growth scenario to be considered as a recession. We'll know next month from the CSO if Q1 '08 is also declining, the indicators so far say yes.



Let me see...

ESRI forecast growth for 2008 of 2.3% in Dec 2007. They then revised the forecast in March 2008 to 1.6%

So they couldn't accurately predict growth for one year, and revised their position by a massive 0.7% in 4 months?

And they want us to believe they can predict the next 10 years?

Eh, which part of economic forecasting is an inexact science don't you appreciate? Their estimates are best guesses based on economic theory and assumptions clearly laid out in their reports. The forecasts are inexact precisely because forecasting a single headline number like GDP/GNP growth requires forecasting a plethora of out figures from what that headline
is calculated. Any forecast of GDP/GNP figures is only as good as the underlying forecasts and that's where the debate really is if you know how to read these things.

That you're even talking about just the GNP number underlines that you don't grasp what's actually the point of this whole thing is nor the logic that underlays the prediction of these numbers.

Économiste Monétaire

gurramok wrote:

I just dont trust their forecasts as they have been constantly wrong and this forecast just so happened to be released on the week a new Taoiseach comes to power, its damn suspicious nevermind its assumptions

Suspicious? I think it’s time you took yourself to the conspiracy theories forum.

Let me see...

ESRI forecast growth for 2008 of 2.3% in Dec 2007. They then revised the forecast in March 2008 to 1.6%

So they couldn't accurately predict growth for one year, and revised their position by a massive 0.7% in 4 months?

And they want us to believe they can predict the next 10 years?

Ahh now this is just funny. Do you not know what variables used in prediction are? I asked you to tell me the variables the ESRI used in their forecast of growth, and how they are reckless, in your words. I didn’t ask you for their previous forecast figures.

Predictions for GNP and GDP are not an exact science, as nesf pointed out above

It don't take an expert to realise that it does depend. Every 10,000 drop in the number of houses built means that GDP declines by 1%.
That is disturbing for a so called non-dependent economy on construction. No other Western economy(maybe bar Spain) is so dependent for its GDP on the amount of houses being built.

You already said the ESRI focused on housing and how very dependent the Irish economy is on construction, but now you can’t point to that?

Do you know what Irish GDP even is or what it’s based on?

Where did you get 9.4%?(this based on construction ONLY which i'm not talking about)...Finfacts are liars?
Remember, i'm not talking solely about construction, i'm talking about construction and and its related activity in banking(mortgaging, estate agents, insurance and the likes) and retail(furniture stores, hardware stores for example)

Can you not do basic arithmetic? 14064000/151078000 = 9.3% which is actually lower than I said.

151,078,000 = Irish GNP in 2007 and 14,068,000 is construction & building.

You focused on housing, then jumped to overall construction. You never mentioned banking and retail.

This downturn is time delayed. It takes maybe average 18 months to finish a house.
Peak demand of housing was in mid '06, hence most of that demand is finally being built and the new demand has been slashed since then hence layoffs in construction,finance and retail

Mid 2006 + 18 months = January/Febuary 2008. And how much has unemployment increased since then? Do I need to post that again?

Again, you need to look at industries based on construction(banking and retail) where a construction downturn hurts the most.

Again, post some figures. You’re still dribbling on.

No, i do not. There are far too many employed there(from memory, was it one in five men work in construction related activity?)

At the moment, its been trimmed to sustainable levels. FAS themselves have stated that 80,000 jobs there are at risk and thats just based solely on construction itself, nevermind banking and retail.

That post was in reference to Blindjustice, hence why his quote was above it.

The rise in unemployment has only started. It ain't no coincidence that the majority of new claimants are men, now how is that?

Ahh how could I be so silly. Clearly every male in the country works in construction. How could I be so short sighted? Of course, none of them can leave the country to find new work, nor could any retrain, why thinking like that would be insane.

No, have you?...Have i touched a nerve ??

Look at their forecasting beyond rose-tinted glasses

Again that was in reference to Blindjustice. I know you don’t work for the ESRI, cleaning their toilets could be a possibility for you, though, given your grasp of arithmetic, grammar and (armchair) economics.

gurramok

UCD_Econ wrote: »

You already said the ESRI focused on housing and how very dependent the Irish economy is on construction, but now you can’t point to that?

See below report.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Do you know what Irish GDP even is or what it’s based on?

Most of it is based on MNC's at a time of severe dollar weakness, thats scary.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Can you not do basic arithmetic? 14064000/151078000 = 9.3% which is actually lower than I said.
151,078,000 = Irish GNP in 2007 and 14,068,000 is construction & building.

Thats what i thought you were referring to(construction only figure in CSO stat). One can't focus on one industry and ignore other industries which are dependent on that industry.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Mid 2006 + 18 months = January/Febuary 2008. And how much has unemployment increased since then? Do I need to post that again?

It's only started, it will get worse as the year goes on, related to that time delay thing i had explained.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Again, post some figures. You’re still dribbling on.

Here, have a read by DKM independent consultants of the review of the economy: http://www.environ.ie/en/PublicationsDocuments/FileDownLoad,15353,en.pdf.

Its based on figures from the Dept of the Environment. Thats where the 22% of GNP figure dependent on construction related activity comes from.

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Ahh how could I be so silly. Clearly every male in the country works in construction. How could I be so short sighted? Of course, none of them can leave the country to find new work, nor could any retrain, why thinking like that would be insane.

You said that, i never did. I suggested around one in five, i'll dig up the precise figure when i get time.
EDIT: Here's one link http://www.rte.ie/news/features/webchat/george_lee.html . George Lee had stated it, is he wrong?

UCD_Econ wrote: »

Again that was in reference to Blindjustice. I know you don’t work for the ESRI, cleaning their toilets could be a possibility for you, though, given your grasp of arithmetic, grammar and (armchair) economics.

Personal attacks are very childish.

nesf wrote:

Eh, which part of economic forecasting is an inexact science don't you appreciate? Their estimates are best guesses based on economic theory and assumptions clearly laid out in their reports. The forecasts are inexact precisely because forecasting a single headline number like GDP/GNP growth requires forecasting a plethora of out figures from what that headline
is calculated. Any forecast of GDP/GNP figures is only as good as the underlying forecasts and that's where the debate really is if you know how to read these things.

That you're even talking about just the GNP number underlines that you don't grasp what's actually the point of this whole thing is nor the logic that underlays the prediction of these numbers.

GDP is not real national income. Strip out the MNC's profits and you get GNP which is a truer picture on what people earn.
Again, assumptions like a US recovery in 2010 in the report is like forecasting lotto numbers.

nesf

gurramok wrote: »

Again, assumptions like a US recovery in 2010 in the report is like forecasting lotto numbers.

And you are basing this statement on..