We are a rich country.

namloc1980 wrote: »

The UK represents 14% of Irish exports. Significant but not a huge amount in the grand scheme of things.

After I mentioned we were over reliant on a few multinationals you pointed out “The vast majority of employment in this country is SMEs not a handful of multinationals”.
When I pointed out SMEs don’t export much and those that do export to UK you then belittled that at 14%. That just further proves my point. Employment doesn’t generate wealth to a country unless it brings money into the country. Ie we need to export goods or services.

Needles73 wrote: »

After I mentioned we were over reliant on a few multinationals you pointed out “The vast majority of employment in this country is SMEs not a handful of multinationals”.
When I pointed out SMEs don’t export much and those that do export to UK you then belittled that at 14%. That just further proves my point. Employment doesn’t generate wealth to a country unless it brings money into the country. Ie we need to export goods or services.

You have to be spoon fed is it? That absolutely does not prove your point. If his figure is correct and UK exports plummet fron that 14% to 0%, which of course it wont but lets keep things suitably simple, then that will still leave 86% of current exports on the table. It ll be a big knock of course. As big a knock as taking 14% from 100% would be i.e. significant but...
Dismissing multinationals AND SMEs and employment in general...where or how else exactly should we be making our capital? Open some diamond mines perhaps?

The hotel in Donegal is on fire at the moment , warm welcome and all that.

Ireland might be a rich country, but we can’t sort out the basics - health, education, childcare, infrastructure. We’re a 2nd / 3rd tier country when compared to other more advance European nations.

Whenever there is any public discussion about wealth and poverty, we are always talking about relative wealth or poverty. By world standards, everyone in Ireland is wealthy. We make the mistake of just comparing groups of people within the country with each other. We define poverty of income as having an income of less than two thirds of the average.
Just as a silly example, if you lived in a village where everyone except you had an average annual income of €1 million and your income was 'only' €500k, then by the current definition of poverty you would be poor.
We are a rich country.....it's just that some of us are richer than others.

snotboogie wrote: »

Yes we are, even the pockets of this country which we consider poor (mostly around the border and isolated parts of Connacht) are nothing remarkable even by Western European standards. The idea that places like Galway, Cork and Kildare are not rich by international standards is laughable

Drive around the most rural parts of county Roscommon, Mayo or Leitrim and on every little country lane you will see big houses with 2-3 cars sitting outside. Graveyards are filled with €5-20,000 headstones..if people are poor here they certainly are getting money somewhere to flaunt.

You don't see entire streets of Irish cities taken over by homeless people or huge communities of trailer parks like you do in the States. I have been to Morocco where it's not uncommon to see huge holes in the roads of major cities and water/sewage flowing down the street. Go to Brazil and it seems there is a favela around every corner of big cities. Visit south Africa and there are huge townships where tens of thousands of people are living in tin huts just miles from some of the biggest tourist destinations on the planet. I haven't even visited anywhere which is considered really poor or in major political strife.

Ireland has it's problems sure but on a global scale the vast majority of our population live in relative comfort if you compare to all but say top 20 nations on Earth.

In comparison to other countrys we are rich ,
we are in the eu, we use the euro.
We dont have large forest fires ,or floods, hurricanes like the usa .
The average price of imported goods in the uk might rise after brexit ,
when britain is no longer in the eu.

_Brian wrote: »

I absolutely agree with this.
I’m not sure what measure we’re holding ourselves to, it’s no UAE but Ireland is a great place to live.

On the whole healthcare, education, employment, freedom of speech, mostly crime is under control. We don’t have natural disasters to worry about.

If you think we have things tough get yourself out to a second or third world country and see how tough things are.

Even compared to the 1970’s when I grew up we have become a staggeringly affluent population with massive uptake in education and increases in life expectancy.

Expectancy in general rightly or wrongly.

Grab All Association wrote: »

I’ve said it before that some of theses people no doubt need asylum. They should be sent to the door of the USA, UK, France, Australia etc who destabilised their countries.

So you're saying that these countries were involved in destabilising Georgia, Albania, Syria, Zimbabwe, Pakistan, Nigeria, South Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Brazil and Algeria......Really? I would have thought they have managed to do a fairly good job of it all on their own.

Grab All Association wrote: »

...The majority of us opposed and protested against military occupation in these countries.

Err.....When exactly were these countries occupied militarily (and by whom) and when did we (THE MAJORITY) protest?


But they are in need of asylum....no doubt!