Trade Unions or Government

alias141282 · 24-03-2010 06:26PM

Stark wrote: »

Punitive marginal tax rates reduce the supply of effort and investment meaning less growth and less money for everyone. The marginal tax rate in France is only 40% these days. It used to be 50% in 2002.

The effective tax rate is significantly less than that. http://www.finance.gov.ie/documents/publications/reports/2009/analytaxrestrict09.pdf

The effective tax rate on those over half a million in 2007 was around 20%. Efforts by Govt. to close off loop holes have meant that the effective tax on these high income earners has risen to just over 30%.

alias141282 · 24-03-2010 06:32PM

Stark wrote: »

Punitive marginal tax rates reduce the supply of effort and investment meaning less growth and less money for everyone. The marginal tax rate in France is only 40% these days. It used to be 50% in 2002.

Well people don't seem totally demoralized in demotivated in Sweden, Denmark, Finland, etc. A low tax economy means a hugely unequal society, with more crime and social problems, and poorer education, healthcare and public services and a generally poorer quality of life.

Stark · 24-03-2010 06:44PM

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/05/business/worldbusiness/05iht-labor.4.8603880.html

Ireland is heavily reliant on FDI. Executives they send over here have to pay Irish tax rates. You'll have companies deciding to pass over Ireland if it costs too much to hire executives due to a super tax.

Also, given that the vast majority of Ireland's income tax is paid by a tiny minority of its citizens, any move by top contributors to emigrate would have a devastating effect on the finances.

Degsy · 24-03-2010 08:42PM

Fulton Crown wrote: »

.

The Dell workers paid with their jobs for the incompetence of the regulatory system and the greed of the bankers...why cant the public servants take a little bit of pain ?

The dell workers chose redundancy over paycuts.

Degsy · 24-03-2010 08:52PM

Stark wrote: »

But at least they were voted in democratically and we have the option of voting them out. We didn't elect the trade union leaders yet they see fit to dictate how the country should be run.

The union membership elects the union leaders...usually for thier negotiating skill..thats what unions do..they negotiate not "dictate".
If there was nobody oppsing the govt's wastefull and spitefull measures where would it all end?
Everybody still on the workforce would be literally working for nothing while the govt continues to spunk the cash up the wall on various failed ventures.
Who ever elected fianna fail yet again are instrumental in screwing the country into the ground NOT the union leaders.

Fulton Crown · 24-03-2010 08:56PM

Degsy wrote: »

The dell workers chose redundancy over paycuts.

Incorrect sir - the vast majority were made redundant - no choice.

Degsy · 24-03-2010 09:16PM

Fulton Crown wrote: »

Incorrect sir - the vast majority were made redundant - no choice.

Same as 16 people in my job just before christmas.

squod · 24-03-2010 09:26PM

Degsy wrote: »

Who ever elected fianna fail yet again are instrumental in screwing the country into the ground .

This is the hundreth time I've heard this. Someone votes for them, it sure as hell isn't me. Most likely it's people in the public sector.

brianthebard · 24-03-2010 09:29PM

squod wrote: »

This is the hundreth time I've heard this. Someone votes for them, it sure as hell isn't me. Most likely it's people in the public sector.

:rolleyes: Did they steal your xmas pressies to give to their own kids too?

quickbeam · 24-03-2010 09:31PM

Read the poll wrong and thought it was who do you support, so I voted government. So the results that show should actually be -1 for government and +1 unions.

It would be interesting to know where the poster's work - public or private sector.

Mal-Adjusted · 24-03-2010 09:56PM

squod wrote: »

This is the hundreth time I've heard this. Someone votes for them, it sure as hell isn't me. Most likely it's people in the public sector.

I hear the public sector are all devil worshipers too!and they ran the concentration camps! :rolleyes:

aoboa · 24-03-2010 10:02PM

I find it incredible that more people are annoyed with the unions than the government and 'others' combined.
That's really shockng.

Coriolanus · 24-03-2010 10:08PM

I have to give the unions and taxi drivers kudos for the near incomprehensibly difficult task of actually rallying support around this current, astronomically incompetent Government.
If I wear a tinpot dictator in Farawayistan, I'd seriously consider importing Irish unions and taxi drivers, just to make me look good.

Degsy · 24-03-2010 10:39PM

Mal-Adjusted wrote: »

I hear the public sector are all devil worshipers too!and they ran the concentration camps! :rolleyes:

Thats nothing...the public sector destroyed the irish economy and have been living tax-free with the fruits of the poisoned tree.
The public sector are evil..just evil.

squod · 24-03-2010 10:59PM

Mal-Adjusted wrote: »

I hear the public sector are all devil worshipers too!and they ran the concentration camps! :rolleyes:

Someone obviously does vote for them. For example if 300,000 public sector workers voted for another party I'd imagine that Fine Fail would have a hard time getting a Dublin seat, nevermind making government.

Mal-Adjusted wrote: »

I hear the public sector are all devil worshipers too!and they ran the concentration camps! :rolleyes:

Don't accuse me of demonising the public sector. I just responded to a point.
There's an election due soon enough. Let's see then the public sector workers put up or shut up, all 300,000 of them!

Degsy · 24-03-2010 11:16PM

squod wrote: »

There's an election due soon enough. Let's see then the public sector workers put up or shut up, all 300,000 of them!

See we never realised we were the public sector before,i mean we knew but for all practical purposes we were just working stiffs clocking in and out.
As a result of this government we're now scapegoats for the entire country,the bottom-feeders and parasites par excellence.
Believe me..if anybody in the PS voted fianna fail before,they most assuredly wont be doing it again.

Not Kevin Myers · 24-03-2010 11:19PM

The trade unions need to learn that stubbornness is not necessarily a virtuous quality. Stubborn stupidity, by trade unions and management, brought about the death of the great English motor car industry, home of the Rover and Bentley, whereas stubborn brilliance has given us BMW, Audi and Mercedes.

squod · 24-03-2010 11:28PM

Degsy wrote: »

See we never realised we were the public sector before,i mean we knew but for all practical purposes we were just working stiffs clocking in and out.
As a result of this government we're now scapegoats for the entire country,the bottom-feeders and parasites par excellence.
Believe me..if anybody in the PS voted fianna fail before,they most assuredly wont be doing it again.

I'll take up that point with you. I can guarantee most of them will, as they have always done. As their' families have done etc. Twelve months from now it'll be a case of ''but there's no-one else to vote for''.

squod wrote: »

This is the hundreth time I've heard this. Someone votes for them, it sure as hell isn't me. Most likely it's people in the public sector.

I reckon, if you don't want FF in government then vote for the party that won't go into government with FF. Simple as.

dvpower · 24-03-2010 11:31PM

squod wrote: »

I reckon, if you don't want FF in government then vote for the party that won't go into government with FF. Simple as.

FG?

Sizzler · 24-03-2010 11:33PM

Sinead Ryan in The Herald summed it up nicely fair me tonight.

http://www.herald.ie/opinion/columnists/sinead-ryan/sinead-ryan-either-go-on-strike-or-go-back-to-work-2109399.html

wrote:

I imagine there are more than a few people in the queue outside the passport office today that wish the doors were firmly closed and that the staff were all out on strike. Well, at least it would be decisive instead of the mealy mouthed cowardly work-to-rule that is being enforced instead.

Uncertainty is the most unsettling feeling of all -- it's destructive, mean spirited and creates fear.

That people feel they have to queue from the middle of the night to maybe, or maybe not, collect a State document that is theirs by right is appalling. At least a strike would mean people would know where they stood. There would be pickets, an official set of demands and the knowledge that those striking must really have grievances -- because they were prepared to forego their pay for them.

Yet the staff in the passport office don't do this. They want all of the attention and all of the disruption while getting all of their pay. That is not just unfair, but outrageous and doesn't engender any public sympathy toward them at all. We know their pay has been cut back and of course it hurts. They want the cuts from last year's Budget reversed.

We'll here's what else is being cut back in the meantime: children's holidays, people visiting relatives, young graduates emigrating and business trips that might actually result in money coming into the economy rather than public sector employees draining it.

Bully boy tactics of pulling down shutters so they can't hand out passports while allegedly going off to do other administrative duties instead belies the notion that they are 'working'.

The only work that matters in Molesworth Street is making sure that customers (an alien term in the civil service, admittedly), get what they need. It is, after all, the customer who pays them.

Nowhere in the private sector is a work-to-rule like this allowed operate.

Ransom

People would be fired, and justifiably so. Where workers believe they have legitimate cause to down tools, they do so under the auspices of a union, agree a date, notify the public and close the doors. Everyone is annoyed and their lives disrupted for a bit, but at least they know the score.

How dare the passport office hold the public to ransom like this? They may not believe it's important what people think, or that their job will be affected by this action, and indeed, they may seem buoyed by a disinterested Government who have other things on their minds, but union leaders such as the smug Blair Horan (whose €120,000 a year pay hasn't been touched, you'll be happy to hear) would do well to stop throwing threats around and instead broker a deal.

It is, after all, his job.

The passport office workers should get back to work and stop annoying the rest of us. There will always be some people who don't 'get' the financial mess the country is in. They don't bother to inform themselves, or even find out what they could do to help. Instead they just want to cry and wail at the rest of us that it isn't fair. Well, life isn't bloody fair, and neither is queuing for seven hours in the middle of town for travel papers.

Union leaders have a duty at a time like this and they are not doing it. It's not always about cowering to members' perceived grievances -- it's about telling them when they don't have a legitimate one and to get over it. Now is that time. If the passport workers won't do their job, Mr Horan, why don't you bloody well do yours?

squod · 24-03-2010 11:44PM

dvpower wrote: »

FG?

Abba solutely no fuhken way! Monster raving looneys of the Irish political system IMO.

Edit; They still would go into government with FF given half a chance.

dvpower · 24-03-2010 11:51PM

squod wrote: »

Abba solutely no fuhken way! Monster raving looneys of the Irish political system IMO.

Edit; They still would go into government with FF given half a chance.

You don't want FF or FG in government?
You know you're going to be disappointed after the next election?

alias141282 · 24-03-2010 11:55PM

Stark wrote: »

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/05/business/worldbusiness/05iht-labor.4.8603880.html

Ireland is heavily reliant on FDI. Executives they send over here have to pay Irish tax rates. You'll have companies deciding to pass over Ireland if it costs too much to hire executives due to a super tax.

Also, given that the vast majority of Ireland's income tax is paid by a tiny minority of its citizens, any move by top contributors to emigrate would have a devastating effect on the finances.

In 2009 the IDA companies shed 18,000 jobs in Ireland. In 2009 total permanent jobs at IDA supported companies fell below the 1999 level of 126,000 and this year the total may fall below the 1998 level of 117,000. In other words FDI has created zero net new jobs in over 10 years. Therefore relying on FDI to get us out of this mess is a lost cause. Not going to happen. Also our low tax model has been replicated by many other countries, e.g. the tax package a company could get in Singapore would be more attractive than Ireland.

As for rich people emigrating if we ask them to pay tax, well f*ck them. If that is all the loyalty they have to this country and they don't feel they should give anything back then let them go and good riddens to them.

Look, none of the old strategies of low tax, FDI, etc are going to work now. The whole thing needs to be overhauled and a sustainable model for fair and equitable society put in place. That means taxing the rich substanially more.

Coriolanus · 25-03-2010 12:04AM

That's the problem, any of them would jump at a chance in Government, even with FF. We need to vote for the party that FF won't go into Government with.

Shít... Are the shinners our only hope?!

Degsy · 25-03-2010 12:10AM

Sizzler wrote: »

Sinead Ryan in The Herald summed it up nicely fair me tonight.

http://www.herald.ie/opinion/columnists/sinead-ryan/sinead-ryan-either-go-on-strike-or-go-back-to-work-2109399.html

See,she doesnt realise there's more than one way to skin a cat.

Fcuck her anyway,i bet she bought in docklands too.

alias141282 · 25-03-2010 12:17AM

Sizzler wrote: »

Sinead Ryan in The Herald summed it up nicely fair me tonight.

http://www.herald.ie/opinion/columnists/sinead-ryan/sinead-ryan-either-go-on-strike-or-go-back-to-work-2109399.html

This article is good example of how the media portray unions and it goes along way to explaining the antipathy people feel towards unions.

Obviously the media have a big vested interest here. The people who keep newspapers in business (advertisers) are also big employers and they hate unions.

First off look how biased the article is. She is blatantly anti-union and anti-strike. Referring to staff working to rule instead of going on strike she writes: "Well, at least it would be decisive instead of the mealy mouthed cowardly work-to-rule that is being enforced instead." The reason these people are working to rule rather than striking is that they cannot afford to lose strike pay. These are people on low incomes, typically between 24-35k. No doubt some have mortgages, kids to feed, or a spouse on the dole. Their wages are being cut because the Govt led the county to rack and ruin and what? They are supposed to just sit there and take it. They would be almost as well off jacking in their jobs and going on the dole for all the work they do.

Then this Sinead Ryan goes on about how terrible the public servants are and how dare they go on strike. 'If it was they private sector they would be fired' blah blah. Well thats great Sinead, why don't we just sell our young people to the highest bidder. The only worth people have is what they can fetch on the labour market, which is practically nothing now. Why not bring back slave labour? If Sinead is so keen on the race to the bottom lets see how she feels when her wages are cut and she realises that she can't afford a house or raise kids or have anything like the standard of living her parents had because thats where we are all going and attacking the public sector is only going to make it happen faster.

dvpower · 25-03-2010 12:29AM

alias141282 wrote: »

As for rich people emigrating if we ask them to pay tax, well f*ck them. If that is all the loyalty they have to this country and they don't feel they should give anything back then let them go and good riddens to them.

That's what I've been trying to say; relying on loyalty to the country won't get us anywhere. It is the market conditions that really matter. If the senior people are getting a better deal elsewhere, they will go elsewhere. If the MNCs can't attract these people, they will tend to move elsewhere.

But, yeah, f*ck the senior multinational executives, f*ck those senior chip designers out at Intel; we don't need them - as long as we have our secure public sector jobs and a tenuous grip on reality, we'll all be OK.

alias141282 · 25-03-2010 12:39AM

dvpower wrote: »

That's what I've been trying to say; relying on loyalty to the country won't get us anywhere. It is the market conditions that really matter. If the senior people are getting a better deal elsewhere, they will go elsewhere. If the MNCs can't attract these people, they will tend to move elsewhere.

But, yeah, f*ck the senior multinational executives, f*ck those senior chip designers out at Intel; we don't need them - as long as we have our secure public sector jobs and a tenuous grip on reality, we'll all be OK.

Look, this threat that the very rich throw around "Don't tax us or we'll leave the country" can't continue. They have family and business here. Its not as easy as they make out to up and leave. Some would but not all. What is the alternative? Ordinary PAYE earners to pay for a crisis they didn't create. It is not fair or equitable or sustainable. Rich people have to start paying tax.

You are relying on the old "free market" to solve the problem. The market has collapsed and it will not recover for a generation. The days of intel and hot shot executives and the IDA bringing in thousands of jobs are over. I gave the figures on IDA job creation above. They lost 18,000 jobs in 2009 alone. Employment at IDA companies is now at 1999 levels and falling. Our low tax model has been replicated in many other countries. And people have become very very cheap. India, China, Singapore are churning out graduates. My grip on reality is just fine. You on the other hand believe the "market" will fix everything. No it won't. A generation will have to emigrate. Those who stay will see their standard of living fall dramatically.

squod · 25-03-2010 12:50AM

Nevore wrote: »

That's the problem, any of them would jump at a chance in Government, even with FF. We need to vote for the party that FF won't go into Government with.

Shít... Are the shinners our only hope?!

So everyone can carry on bitching about stuff 'till the cows come home. No strike, protest or rally will change a single thing. These same people who are disgruntled now can get used to the idea of being disgruntled. They're doing it to themselves IMO.

pajodublin · 25-03-2010 10:16AM

Sizzler wrote: »

Sinead Ryan in The Herald summed it up nicely fair me tonight.

http://www.herald.ie/opinion/columnists/sinead-ryan/sinead-ryan-either-go-on-strike-or-go-back-to-work-2109399.html

Oh look at that, utter bile posted by someone who works for..............

You guessed it..... INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPERS....

:rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

Trade Unions or Government

Comments