Economic recovery: are we fooling ourselves?

Franz Von Peppercorn II

Dinarius wrote: »

It was only last November that Pascal found €3bn down the back of a sofa (it was a corporation tax windfall) and gave it to the HSE. The HSE are already over budget this year. Will they be looking for what they got last year and some? Of course they will.

I’ve been a self-employed, sole-trader for 35 years. So, never knowing where next month’s cheque is coming from has made me extremely debt-averse. As a result, the financial behaviour of our political and economic masters leaves me bemused.

When the history (political and financial) of the last twenty five years is written, I think that the sudden and very costly expansion of the EU to the east (at the behest of the Franco/German alliance, and one of the main reasons for Brexit) will be criticised.

D.

Self employed people or small business people are the worst at economics - if a sovereign state balanced its books or cut the fat in a recession it causes more economic crisis.

That said we do need to curtail public spending.

Franz Von Peppercorn II

Geuze wrote: »

The public debt = Govt debt has risen rapidly.

Private debt = household debt has not.

Correct distinction.

( But public debt hasn’t risen rapidly.)

James Brown

XsApollo wrote: »

This country is loaded for the population we have.
We could be one of the best in the world.
But the government chooses to throw the money away on social welfare.
Can’t reform the HSE or any other public service in this country because everybody goes on strike and all they want is more more more.
So they are all money pits.
It’s a bloody joke of a place.
No accountability for the countries accounts and spending, or on the job performance by people working for the state.

I dunno how Any public service can be reformed or streamlined for the better of the people paying for it , when the people working in it won’t let it happen.

The country costs more to run than its taking in,
Nothing to be done about it except make it less expensive to run, except nobody will let it happen.
Bloody madness.

They have to spend on state aid because taxpayers can't afford rent, so they need subsidise. It's a balancing act. The more they pander to the private market, the more the working tax payer needs a dig out.

salonfire

Matt Barrett wrote: »

They have to spend on state aid because taxpayers can't afford rent, so they need subsidise. It's a balancing act. The more they pander to the private market, the more the working tax payer needs a dig out.

How is refusing planning to private developers each and every day pandering to the market exactly?

InTheShadows

JeanL wrote: »

We were always fooling ourselves.

Someone once told me the Celtic Tiger was like a few pigs sitting at a table and the table was heaped with food.

The poor people at the side got loads of crumbs because there was so much food on the table it was falling off. During the crash there was still plenty of food for the pigs but the crumbs were much smaller.

The truly vile thing about it is people blaming each other on the state of the country. Oh it's those on social welfare's fault, it's single mother's fault, it's the public servants fault, it's those in social housings fault etc...Tearing each other apart whilst the crooks at the top make off like gangsters.

Geuze

howamidifferent wrote: »

But we did with the promissary notes which we are now paying back by destroying real money.

Yes, ok, the IBRC promissory notes have cost the taxpayers 30bn approx, real money, and yes, we do "burn" 500m or so every so often.

Sickening.