Jürgen Stark: Abandon the Croke Park Agreement, cut welfare

Godge wrote: »

No the question is, do you want a consultant-led health service, or do you want nurses doing heart transplants. If you have top-quality people whose services are in demand internationally and who are mobile - think of hospital consultants and research academics - and you need them to provide a health service or an education service, then you have to pay them the going rate, even if it means that others (clerical officers, teachers, guards, social welfare recipients) lose out. you don't think that most consultants are going to hang around out of doing their bit for Ireland?

I mean you say this and then look to take tax breaks and increase taxes on people working in the private sector?? How is it one rule for them and one rule for the private sector..I have a Degree in computer science and could walk away with my tax take if my money keeps dwindling from the tax man taking it...IMO there needs to be cuts all throughout the public service and if people walk away ..good luck to them it means we dont have to pay them a pension and get in new people under revised down terms...As for the going rate we are paying substantially more than the going rate for services

Godge wrote: »

FG/Lab are committed to losing 25,000 public sector workers off the paybill. You are right that there is an upfront cost, when private sector companies do this (say Talk Talk), they have an exceptional item in their accounts that year to account for it. The government is likely to slash capital spending next year (no new roads, no rail projects, only a few schools), the saving in capital spending could be used to pay the one-off bill with the savings in pay bill appearing from 2013 onwards.

Talk Talk are making their workers redundant, whereas the government is just not rehiring after some of its workers retire. Lets not start mixing our apples with our oranges.

sarumite wrote: »

Talk Talk are making their workers redundant, whereas the government is just not rehiring after some most of its workers retire. Lets not start mixing our apples with our oranges.

Fixed that.

Um... Talk Talk is moving its operations abroad - far as I am aware Ireland Inc is staying here.

Godge wrote: »

Have gone into this many times. Reform of the bankruptcy laws is the way to go to deal with those who cannot afford their mortgage.

Also negative equity is a red herring. If you are in negative equity, you can afford your mortgage payment, and the house you bought you intend to live in for twenty years or so, then what is the problem? If you intended to sell sooner, then there was an element of an investment play about it. If there is an employment issue, did you not take out enough insurance?

Reading your posts it strikes me that you are viewing this as a purely economic problem and factoring in that we are dealing with a society.

Godge wrote: »

lucky you, more than my brother got and he is working.

Really - My brother went to Canada, The US, Paris, Milan and Geneva. He's working too.
My sister didn't go anywhere - she's working too.

You begrudge me camping in a field for free with my grandkids for a few days.

Godge wrote: »

A €15 billion budget deficit is an economic problem. The society problem is that we are too immature to face up to that and everyone argues their own corner.

I should be calling for lower income tax, no new taxes on houses or anything else I own, get rid of the levy on private sector pension funds, protect preserved pensions from my previous employment in the public sector and cut everybody else. Instead I list a whole list of things, some of which will hit me very hard in my own pocket.

I am arguing for cuts to be applied across the board. No section to be exempt.
You have argued that consultants and top academics should be insulated or they will leave. I have worked with many of those 'top academics' on full professorial salaries. In fact, I have taught their classes, undertaken their research, proofread their articles/books and seen them teach not ONE class. EVER.

Let them leave.

murphaph wrote: »

Fcuking hell. Me and my GF eat this sort of food all the time and we both work. Be grateful you've got the shagging stew to eat-millions of people in the world TODAY, this MINUTE are hungry, not peckish, actually starving to death. Millions of our forefathers perished or emigrated not all that long ago for want of a few spuds and in 2011 Ireland people on welfare complain about what (perfectly nourishing) food they have to eat.

Get yourself over to Germany where the dole is so low that the government publishes meal plans that can be afforded with the €359 a MONTH you get here (believe me, food is NOT less than half the price it is in Ireland).

If you eat the same 2/3 meals a week you tend to get sick of them, they are nourishing and all 3 members of my household can eat. But you are allowed get bored of the same foods. I cannot afford to go to the butchers and get a T-Bone and yes growing up in a country where there were different food options is the reason I would like to have them!

If I got myself to Germany I doubt their colleges would have forced me to leave due to ridiculously high creche fees and I would be nearly qualified now and not on the SW! But also I studied French not German so it would make looking a job there a bit rough But at least there is a chance to get a job there! I can't find anything here!

murphaph wrote: »

We don't EVER buy T-Bone friggin steak either ffs. It's like €10 for that and when there's pork/mince/chicken/turkey available for €3 for 300g we obviously buy that. I think if you can afford meat all week you're doing rather well. My mother and father certainly wouldn't have had meat more than once a week when they were children. I think it's symptomatic of an entitlement culture when people nowadays feel able to complain about the type of meat they get to eat all week.

I never said I ate meat every day, I said that I tend to buy just cheap chicken and mince as my meats!!!! You know what the say about assumption being the mother of all f-ups!!!! I eat pasta about 3 times a week and stir frys with no meat.

Are you saying a child who is in this position due to a economic downturn should have to suffer nutritionally because you feel he should not get what he needs to develop correctly?

wolfpawnat wrote: »

I never said I ate meat every day, I said that I tend to buy just cheap chicken and mince as my meats!!!! You know what the say about assumption being the mother of all f-ups!!!! I eat pasta about 3 times a week and stir frys with no meat.

Are you saying a child who is in this position due to a economic downturn should have to suffer nutritionally because you feel he should not get what he needs to develop correctly?

I find this hard to believe now. If you were eating pasta and stir fries without meat 4 days + a week then your chilli and stew would surely be something to look forward to and not something you couldn't wait to see the back of?

Anyway, children don't have to eat meat at all, never mind 7 days a week to develop properly. Millions of children in India grow up completely vegetarian and it doesn't seem to prevent them becoming doctors, engineers,.....

sarumite wrote: »

I would much rather that you didn't "fix"my post to reflect an untruth. The fact that Ireland Inc is staying here is not a reflection on the reality of the government finances.

I 'fixed' where you said some retired staff are not being replaced to most. 'Some' implies a lesser number than the more accurate 'most'. How is that an untruth?

bluewolf wrote: »

99c chicken fillets in the butcher is the way forward
and yes I could eat chicken every day

I think I do most days - for medical reasons I cannot eat many carbs and must have protein - so there's chicken curry, chicken in pita bread, piri piri chicken, chicken gujons, stir fried chicken ...

Public service pensions will cost the State €2.9 billion this year, Minister for Public Expenditure Brendan Howlin has confirmed.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2011/0913/breaking61.html

A Primal Nut wrote: »

How much money do you think that would save? It's tiny compared to the amount required.

I often think challenging bonuses, payouts, tax breaks, etc; while justified morally, the motivation to challenge them is political rather than because they will actually generate a significant amount of money (they won't).

Because if you are squeezing the middle - it makes political sense that those who were/are in charge and instrumental in landing the country in the deep doo-doo - many of them the reciepents of the bonuses, pay-outs etc- should be seen to also take a significant financial hit.

It shows we are all in this together - at the moment it looks like the Golden Circle is alive and well and that the government either lacks the will or the ovaries to change things.

There is a genuine anger out there - it needs to be addressed.

sarumite wrote: »

you "fixed" it to

"Talk Talk are making their workers redundant, whereas the government is just not rehiring after some most of its workers retire. Lets not start mixing our apples with our oranges."

Some of its [i.e. the governments workers] are retiring. Most of its workers are not retiring.

I can see now what you were trying to say, it appears you just did a lousy job of editing my post. Perhaps next time it might be better just to reply with a rebuttal.;)

ok - Talk Talk are making their workers redundant, whereas the government is just not rehiring after most of its workers retire.

Howzat?