Ireland or the banks - your choice

GarlicBread

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2010/0522/1224270888132.html

Here is the truth, plain as day. We cant afford this as a country under any circumstances. I think its time people asked themsleves which they value more - their country or the banks.

Id like to hear from anyone who still thinks we should be bailing out the banks. Do people really think that its ok to inflict this on ourselves when we have other choices?

"But what other choices!?"

(1) Reorganize the whole scenario to limit as best as possible the exposure to the public purse (would save us many important billions).

(2) Completely do away with the bail outs and nama. Isolate the debt away from society in all its forms (would save us vast amounts of many important billions. A figure so big that numbers dont do it justice)

Multiple more choices are available, any of them are better than the current course. Obivously all choices can only happen if we have a prompt election. 2012 is too far away, by then we could be so neck deep in the **** storm there may well be no half decent way out of it.

Id argue to get more numbers outside the dail every tuesday, but many people dislike that idea and understandably so.

Anyone have any ideas about how to trigger an election or about how to deal with the banks in a better way?

Being armchair warriors is not working.

Eliot Rosewater

The elephant in the room is social welfare spending and the public sector wage bill, which together account for some €40 billion per year.

Even if the bank bailout costs €100 billion (once off, remember) that's still only two and half years of the current spending. The bank bailout is not the biggest issue here, yet supporters of the hard Left have wasted no time in using it as an excuse to prop up the unsustainable level of normal government expenditure.


But I can only imagine what would happen if I suggested to those protesting outside the Dail that we cut government spending.

silverharp

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

But I can only imagine what would happen if I suggested to those protesting outside the Dail that we cut government spending.

an excellent observation. the reality is that a lot of people only see the bank bailout as a problem because it might displace their pet spending or welfare project. As such they are not concerned with balanced budgets or fiscal sanity.

Mr.Micro

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

The elephant in the room is social welfare spending and the public sector wage bill, which together account for some €40 billion per year.

Even if the bank bailout costs €100 billion (once off, remember) that's still only two and half years of the current spending. The bank bailout is not the biggest issue here, yet supporters of the hard Left have wasted no time in using it as an excuse to prop up the unsustainable level of normal government expenditure.


But I can only imagine what would happen if I suggested to those protesting outside the Dail that we cut government spending.

Since the Government helped create the massive public sector wage bill to buy votes, by inflating public sector wages massively in the good times, never occurring to the idiots that nothing lasts forever and what happens in a down turn. Added to this letting the banks and developers do as they like. So why should the public worry about it he/she is paying anyway. When has this Government ever worried about unsustainable levels of expenditure ....never. Let FF/GP figure it out and take the blame and make sure that those out of work get their deserved welfare payments and entitlements, and public sector their inflated salaries, after all it just rewards for voting in FF.

Liam Byrne

silverharp wrote: »

an excellent observation. the reality is that a lot of people only see the bank bailout as a problem because it might displace their pet spending or welfare project. As such they are not concerned with balanced budgets or fiscal sanity.

What ? :mad:

People object to the bank bailout because those who took the risks are being reimbursed out of our pockets, and DESPITE riding us up the hole in that way are STILL paying money they can't afford to their head honchos and are charging most people EVEN MORE through interest rates.

silverharp

Liam Byrne wrote: »

What ? :mad:

People object to the bank bailout because those who took the risks are being reimbursed out of our pockets, and DESPITE riding us up the hole in that way are STILL paying money they can't afford to their head honchos and are charging most people EVEN MORE through interest rates.

I dont disagree with what you have written but the question I have is, why "people" will potentially demonstrate against the bailout but not about running €400m deficit per week? whats that €50m+ per day?
While the bailout rates higher on the "injust-o-meter" the inability to run a deficit below say 5% in the medium term will have a larger effect on interest rates and will casue people more real pain in the longer term

GarlicBread

Quotes from the article linked above -

"We have long since left the realm of easy alternatives, and will soon face a choice between national bankruptcy and admitting the bank guarantee was a mistake. Either we cut the banks loose, or we sink ourselves."

Your right about the deficit, its really bad and cuts and tax increases are coming at us all no matter what. But why on earth make a bad situation into an outright catastrophe by lumping the bank bailout numbers on to the national debt?

"Adding these bank losses on to the national debt means we are facing a debt by late 2012 of 115 per cent of GDP. If we are lucky."

We can talk on and on about the boogyman in the public sector and the parasites on the dole, but they are not stealing anything from anyone.

The Banks are apart of the national debt that we can pick up, and throw out the window(lol cya!) if only we had the political will to do it. Lets not forget that this is only being done because of corruption, not because we need them to lend, not because its our debt and not because its a good idea. ****ing corruption in its rawest most overt form.

Mister men

People have already chosen between the two.

Liam Byrne

Liam Byrne wrote: »

What ? :mad:

People object to the bank bailout because those who took the risks are being reimbursed out of our pockets, and DESPITE riding us up the hole in that way are STILL paying money they can't afford to their head honchos and are charging most people EVEN MORE through interest rates.

Do you not realize though that even though these banks are barely lending new lending at the moment,that their existing non nama lending is what keeps bread on the table for the rest of us.

Who in the banks are benefiting if thats the point ? who is it thats riding us up the hole? Anyone thats half good at the top of the banks that is still there could walk away and get a job outside the country or in the private sector here.
The heads of Anglo are ruined.
The big shareholders of BOI and AIB are also ruined.

So who is riding who up the hole exactly?

ednwireland

people chose in 2007

Ahem!

Good Grief.

The level of economic illiteracy in here is just too insanse to ignore.

Mr Rosewater - Are you seriously suggesting savings of 40m p.a. on government spending? Should we just close the schools, hospitals, gardai, army, and not pay welfare of pensions for the next two and a half years and give the money to the bondholders in the banks instead?

There are not endless savings that can me made in public spending to cover the cost of the bank bailout. Half a billion here, a billion there is as Morgan Kelly points out, essentially re-arranging chairs on the titanic while doing nothing to address the iceberg size hole below the water line caused the massive failure of these hitherto private enterprises. THIS IS THE ELEPHANT!!!!

Also, in what sense is it a once off cost? Are you suggesting it will be paid off this year? It is going to be a feature of our fiscal planning for decades to come.............

Terrifyingly, a spokesperson for the DoF was widely quoted in the media in response to Dr Kelly yesterday saying that the option of whether to allow banks to default on their debt was essentially a philosophical question. And that they, FF, (philosophically) answer in the negative.

Now that's scary. It's nothing to do with economic or financial realities, then, but basically just a matter of ideology. Interesting too that the same FFers have had no such ideological or philosophical problems cutting carers allowances, blind-persons allowance, hospital beds and services for children with special needs. And yet the bondholders are sacred.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

Banned Account

OP,

you have told us nothing about how this is to be achieved. You have simply said the following:

You - "This is not on, boo, down with this sort of thing - lets do something else."

Us - "sounds good, what do you suggest?"

You - "loads of things - lets do it!"

Us - "Erm, you still haven't said what you suggest"

You - "Yes I have - there are loads of things - boo, down with this sort of thing ... "

Rather than say "isolate society from the debt" may I ask that you also tell us how this is to be accomplished, once this is followed by a full cost/benefit analysis, then we can assess it's true utility. Until then, it's just rabble, rabble, rabble really.

gandalf

donegalfella wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

That's the problem this doesn't factor into their train of thought. All these gains occurred because of the activity that they are complaining about! Therefore they should realise that part of the fix is reversal of some of these ill-gotten gains.

To protest about the crazy ill responsible property bubble and related bad behaviour but want to keep the gains from that activity is hypocrisy of the highest order.

Eliot Rosewater

Ahem! wrote: »

Mr Rosewater - Are you seriously suggesting savings of 40m p.a. on government spending?

Of course not. I was merely pointing out that at current government spending levels and over a 10 year timescale the cost of the public sector wage bill and social welfare will be four times that of the bank bailout. This number is based on two assumptions:

• We will get nothing in return (financially) from the bank bailout, which is apparently unlikely.
• The bank bailout will cost €100 billion. At the moment it has cost less than half of that, I believe.

So my figure of 4 is highly conservative.

The bank bailout has become the greatest red herring in political debate of late. It is argued that public servants and social welfare recipients should still be getting bloated payments on the basis that we are giving money to the banks. My point is that the cost of the bank bailout is shadowed by other spending.

Also, as donegalfella has pointed out, the rationale for a bank bailout is far stronger than that for the maintenance of the current high levels of public sector wages and social welfare payments.

Sea Sharp

My theory is that when the sh1t hit the fan in 2008, the government didn't understand what was going on and decided to do what they always do and copy the actions of the UK failing to realize that the British course of action relied on quantitative easing.

The banks failed due to Irish citizens borrowing more money than they could afford to pay back and the government's solution is for the country to borrow more money than we can afford to pay back.

thebman

GaNjaHaN wrote: »

My theory is that when the sh1t hit the fan in 2008, the government didn't understand what was going on and decided to do what they always do and copy the actions of the UK failing to realize that the British course of action relied on quantitative easing.

The banks failed due to Irish citizens borrowing more money than they could afford to pay back and the government's solution is for the country to borrow more money than we can afford to pay back.

I think the real reason is that people have all their money in banks, even more than they realise in many cases.

Deposits everyone knows about, how many peoples pension funds are invested in banks?

How many people voluntarily invested in banks? How many of those were politicians?

The reality is almost everyone in society has loads to lose if the banks were allowed to go under.

GarlicBread

Fitzcaraldo wrote: »

OP,

you have told us nothing about how this is to be achieved. You have simply said the following:

You - "This is not on, boo, down with this sort of thing - lets do something else."

Us - "sounds good, what do you suggest?"

You - "loads of things - lets do it!"

Us - "Erm, you still haven't said what you suggest"

You - "Yes I have - there are loads of things - boo, down with this sort of thing ... "

Rather than say "isolate society from the debt" may I ask that you also tell us how this is to be accomplished, once this is followed by a full cost/benefit analysis, then we can assess it's true utility. Until then, it's just rabble, rabble, rabble really.

D'uh, anything is better than the current plan. Make a state bank and put some money in that. Save AIB or BoI and let the rest go. Protect peoples private savings with a bailout. Do absolutely anything other than give the banks all of our ****ing GDP. Any of the above options would only be a fraction of the cost.

Its not even that we dont want to pay it, its that we cant.

Scofflaw

GarlicBread wrote: »

D'uh, anything is better than the current plan. Make a state bank and put some money in that. Save AIB or BoI and let the rest go. Protect peoples private savings with a bailout. Do absolutely anything other than give the banks all of our ****ing GDP. Any of the above options would only be a fraction of the cost.

Its not even that we dont want to pay it, its that we cant.

"Anything" is clearly not better than the current plan, unless you support measures like, say, a mass forced donation of saleable property from everyone in the country, or leasing Poolbeg as a spot to build experimental nuclear reactors, or applying to rejoin the UK - and if you don't mean that anything at all is better than the current plan, then you need to start outlining what actually falls into the "anything better".

cordially,
Scofflaw

Fitzcaraldo

Fitzcaraldo wrote: »

OP,

you have told us nothing about how this is to be achieved. You have simply said the following:

You - "This is not on, boo, down with this sort of thing - lets do something else."

Us - "sounds good, what do you suggest?"

You - "loads of things - lets do it!"

Us - "Erm, you still haven't said what you suggest"

You - "Yes I have - there are loads of things - boo, down with this sort of thing ... "

Rather than say "isolate society from the debt" may I ask that you also tell us how this is to be accomplished, once this is followed by a full cost/benefit analysis, then we can assess it's true utility. Until then, it's just rabble, rabble, rabble really.

Damn right...RABBLE, RABBLE!!!

20goto10

Make profit illegal! Take the money from the rich and give it to the poor and shoot anyone who can't get the trains to run on time!