great article

darego

I would like to share this article with you guys and to get some feedback. I really had no clue (and probably still don't) about what is going on but this is a great summary and has really opened my eyes. Stiglitz talks so much sense, it's a pitty we can't and will not do what he says :rolleyes:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2011/0409/1224294304548.html

ei.sdraob

about 211 comments here

Cookie_Monster

For many years, Ireland’s growth was based on fundamentals: investing in education and infrastructure to make the country an attractive place for investment and a gateway to Europe for companies from the US and Asia.

got that far an no more.

Our education system still just about creaks along producing decentish results, grade inflation is rampant and facilities are still disgraceful in many place. And companies are repeatedly stating graduates are nowhere near standards required, not to mention extremely low levels of foreign language capacity

As for infrastructure, its pretty laughable whether it be power, broadband, rail, water, housing or roads...

Scofflaw

darego wrote: »

I would like to share this article with you guys and to get some feedback. I really had no clue (and probably still don't) about what is going on but this is a great summary and has really opened my eyes. Stiglitz talks so much sense, it's a pitty we can't and will not do what he says :rolleyes:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2011/0409/1224294304548.html

It's inaccurate in several respects, some of them basic and factual, such as the claim that "even in more optimistic scenarios, Ireland’s debt to GDP ratio is expected to soar to 125 per cent in 2013" - in fact, 'optimistic scenarios' such as those put forward by the NTMA have debt to GDP topping out at 102.5%. I may not believe those scenarios, but they're there, so claiming that "even rosy scenarios" have a debt/GDP ratio of 125% is false.

The view that it's those providing the bailout who are "asking ordinary Irish workers and citizens to bear the burden of mistakes that were made by international financial markets" is also rubbish. The Irish government took those debts on off their own bat, and the EU/IMF bailout was the result of them doing so. Nobody made the Irish government issue a blanket guarantee, and nobody forced the Irish government to cover the €50-60bn in bonds it ended up covering as a result.

Not that the authors even stick to that line - elsewhere, and more correctly, they say "the international lending terms imposed on the Government and its citizens are onerous in large part due to the Government’s continuing policy of bailing out the Irish banks" - mind you, they fail to mention that the lending terms are onerous in part because the Irish government had previously agreed they should be.

So, again, we have a case where someone pushing the "Ireland must default" line has used incorrect supporting claims and misapportionment of blame to build support for their case. That's not impressive, because it suggests that the case itself is weak.

cordially,
Scofflaw

RichardAnd

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

got that far an no more.

Our education system still just about creaks along producing decentish results, grade inflation is rampant and facilities are still disgraceful in many place. And companies are repeatedly stating graduates are nowhere near standards required, not to mention extremely low levels of foreign language capacity

As for infrastructure, its pretty laughable whether it be power, broadband, rail, water, housing or roads...

Our education system is the way it is because it rewards following a set of rules rather than thinking for one's own self. This isn't really surprising really considering our society. Sadly, the myth of the Irish graduate being world class is a total fallacy. However, some graduates are very good but this is a reflection of their own interest in their area and their own abilities, nothing more.

As for infrastructure, well I wouldn't say it's laughable. It's ok, nothing special but nothing remarkable either. Certainly lots of room for improvement mind.

ei.sdraob

Scofflaw wrote: »

so claiming that "even rosy scenarios" have a debt/GDP ratio of 125% is false.

Do you remember what happened to Greece when they tried to hide debt from official figures?

NAMA which you admire so highly is an SPV (a favoured way of hiding debt from official figures) is 49% owned by the state and 51% owned by Irish Life, New Ireland, and AIB Investment whose parent banks are now owned by the state :rolleyes:. Therefore all of NAMAs liabilities are now one way or another state liabilities.
And then there are the banks which we now own and continue with record losses which we must plugin, and will expect more losses once the mortgage holders get their promised bailout.
All of this while the GDP shrunk as per todays centralbank report for 3rd year running and growth forecasts are being revised down.

Oh dear.

Scofflaw

ei.sdraob wrote: »

Do you remember what happened to Greece when they tried to hide debt from official figures?

NAMA which you admire so highly is an SPV (a favoured way of hiding debt from official figures) is 49% owned by the state and 51% owned by Irish Life, New Ireland, and AIB Investment whose parent banks are now owned by the state :rolleyes:. Therefore all of NAMAs liabilities are now one way or another state liabilities.
And then there are the banks which we now own and continue with record losses which we must plugin, and will expect more losses once the mortgage holders get their promised bailout.
All of this while the GDP shrunk as per todays centralbank report for 3rd year running and growth forecasts are being revised down.

Oh dear.

None of which has anything to do with my point. If someone claims that "even in more optimistic scenarios, Ireland’s debt to GDP ratio is expected to soar to 125 per cent in 2013" and "under “rosy” scenarios, Ireland’s debt to GDP ratio will quickly reach 125 per cent" when in fact the official scenarios have debt/GDP topping out at 102.5%, then that person is making a completely inaccurate claim, because clearly the official 'main' scenarios don't come anywhere near 125%.

regards,
Scofflaw

later12

ei.sdraob wrote: »

Do you remember what happened to Greece when they tried to hide debt from official figures?

NAMA which you admire so highly is an SPV (a favoured way of hiding debt from official figures) is 49% owned by the state and 51% owned by Irish Life, New Ireland, and AIB Investment whose parent banks are now owned by the state . Therefore all of NAMAs liabilities are now one way or another state liabilities.
And then there are the banks which we now own and continue with record losses which we must plugin, and will expect more losses once the mortgage holders get their promised bailout.
All of this while the GDP shrunk as per todays centralbank report for 3rd year running and growth forecasts are being revised down.

Oh dear.

What has that got to do with the criticism? The issue here is the accuracy of the article, and whether someone who (possibly deliberately) distorts facts to push a particular message deserves to see his article discredited.
Responding to criticism by attempting to blind the point with totally unrelated snippets of fact only adds to my own sense of unease about this article's credibility.

The authors have written a fine opinion piece, albeit emotively, but it appears that their opinions - not least the repeated, and I believe, mistaken, references to the ECB and its activities - are not founded entirely on fact.

ei.sdraob

later10 wrote: »

What has that got to do with the criticism? The issue here is the accuracy of the article, and whether someone who (possibly deliberately) distorts facts to push a particular message deserves to see his article discredited.
Responding to criticism by attempting to blind the point with totally unrelated snippets of fact only adds to my own sense of unease about this article's credibility.

The authors have written a fine opinion piece, albeit emotively, but it appears that their opinions - not least the repeated, and I believe, mistaken, references to the ECB and its activities - are not founded entirely on fact.

It has everything to do with it since Scofflaw decided to pick at the debt figure which is heavily manipulated, our debt is much larger than the headline figure over at the NTMA website.
Now that the banks are nationalised all of these banks (and NAMAs) liabilities and bad "assets" are ours, as we are gently reminded every few months with a few billion here and few billion there being handed over to the banks on a regular basis.

Scofflaw

ei.sdraob wrote: »

It has everything to do with it since Scofflaw decided to pick at the debt figure which is heavily manipulated, our debt is much larger than the headline figure over at the NTMA website.
Now that the banks are nationalised all of these banks (and NAMAs) liabilities and bad "assets" are ours, as we are gently reminded every few months with a few billion here and few billion there being handed over to the banks on a regular basis.

Which is, again, entirely irrelevant.

regards,
Scofflaw

ei.sdraob

Scofflaw wrote: »

Which is, again, entirely irrelevant.

regards,
Scofflaw

You are picking on a figure which of only a part of the picture (deliberately so), if you think that this is "irrelevant" then that makes your post "irrelevant".

Scofflaw

ei.sdraob, I'm not going to bother arguing with you about this, because you're rather clearly just trying to pick a fight (again). If you don't understand the point I made - and you clearly don't - that's not something I propose doing something about, because that's not what you're after.

regards,
Scofflaw

Eliot Rosewater

ei.sdraob wrote: »

You are picking on a figure which of only a part of the picture (deliberately so), if you think that this is "irrelevant" then that makes your post "irreleveant".

ei.sdraob, repeatedly going after the same poster (in this case Scofflaw) is not on. It looks as if, as he says, you're just trying to pick a fight. It makes the forum unnecessarily antagonistic, and it makes it uncomfortable for people posting. So please ease off on it.

/mod.

WalterMitty

People use Stiglitz to support their own agenda. He carries significant weight but he is taking a more global systemic view and not viewing the fiscal issues of IReland. He doesnt seem to know about the massive gnp:gdp gap and its implications for collecting taxes and industrial policy here. He's also a lifetime public servant , make what you will of that.