Staff Shortages in Ireland.

International students make up around 12.4% of the third level student population, according to the HEA, up from 10.3% in the previous academic year. Not a particularly welcome trend… you either increase class sizes and decrease the quality of education to accommodate them, or Irish tax paying citizens miss out.

if jobs that need qualifications and qualified people yet we are not offering the places….

That to me, for a country with a small population is several percentage points too high as regards international students based on the number of third level places available..

id understand to a point if it was just EU and there were other nations reciprocating…at the same level… in one African country I’m reading about there are only 194 international students. There are more then 194 in each University here 🙂

so we should be ensuring a conveyor belt of educated people to enter our workforce. And employers should offer wages commensurate to the necessary skills and aptitude required of the employee…

Jesus, that’s not what I was saying at all.

Thats a bit of a nationalistic point of view as well. We do educate to a pretty high standard but why should someone not be able to leave? Not every highly educated Irish person leaves either, and not every one of them go to low tax countries, I’m in Canada, BC and it’s insanely expensive as well, average house price comes in over a million dollars, or around €750,000. That includes condos and townhomes, not traditional homes.

Do you think charging people for their education more would actually stop them leaving?

What schemes are you referring to here?

'Taxi Drivers - Over regulated industry to keep fares high.'

The fares have to keep up with fuel inflation remember.

Many taxi drivers retrained because of lockdowns.

So taxi drivers got hit with the Covid-Ukraine double whammy.

So you're happy to have unregulated, unvetted drivers picking up our drunken teenagers and our barely dressed daughters and sisters after their nights out and driving them where? You're happy to unregulated, unvetted, untrained drivers picking up people with disabilities, or more likely, turning them away and ignoring them?

Ah that classic argument.

I've used Uber in several countries, never an issue. The drivers are all identifiable on the app, the cars are in excellent condition, spotlessly clean, and poor drivers are quickly identified and can be removed from the system by bad ratings from the users.

There is also an excellent safety feature in Uber where your journey details can be provided to an emergency contact, with estimated time of arrival and also the driver's and car's details.

Then there's additional security in that the app will contact your emergency contact in the event that your journey takes longer than expected, or if your journey ends somewhere that isn't your specified destination (happened me on a recent trip in the US where I asked the driver to let me out about 50metres from where I specified in the app).

As opposed to numerous taxis in Dublin where several drivers use the same car and fold down the driver's identity card and you have absolutely no idea who is driving you.

Also I'm not sure why you're commenting on people being disabled or barely dressed, what does that have to do with Uber?

Because the taxi drivers we have now are highly trained, moral, and head and shoulders above the average Uber driver…give me a break.

What you are suggesting isn't possible. How do you prioritise someone for housing based on their profession? Yes, we need graduate doctors, nurses, teachers etc. But we also need binmen, childminders, blocklayers etc. Are you suggesting asking people in a queue to view an apartment what their profession is and if they aren't on the 'list', they get told to sod off?

I know people say that nurses, doctors, teachers, gardai are key workers but if all the lorry drivers in the country went on strike, you'd soon discover what a key worker is.

If it's a priority occupation it will get paid more. If it's not paid more then it's not a priority.

If you don't like career you've picked either choice or by poor choices to this point. Are not willing to start on the bottom rung or do the grunt work to get off the bottom ladder.

Start your own business and work for yourself. If you don't like the system. Don't be in it.

There has been an awful shortage of dwarves coming up to Christmas

It is working. If you can't get staff the industry will self correct eventually.

We've just got a govt that refuses to stop overheating the market.

People leaving is how it will balance itself.

Ironically all you've done is whinge.

I suggested people going and doing something else if they are unhappy. But some people will not happy working at anything. Maybe become a critic.

The joys of Public sector bureaucracy.

It's not always as simple as suggesting that someone go and do something else if they are unhappy. Especially when you have financial commitments such as a mortgage or a family. Supposing I was unhappy in my job and wanted to go back and train to be a blocklayer. Totally impossible for me because I couldn't pay my mortgage and survive on first, second, or even third year apprentice wages no matter how hard I worked.

But I agree with you, some people won't be happy working at anything.