I am convinced that Ireland is in Serious trouble

FalconGirl · 23-02-2015 11:08PM

RobertKK wrote: »

Yeah, yeah, Ireland is in trouble...

Apple to invest €850 million in a data centre in Galway.

A room full of servers. Won't be many required to actually work there. Certainly a few hundred but not thousands.

RecordStraight · 23-02-2015 11:12PM

FalconGirl wrote: »

A room full of servers. Won't be many required to actually work there. Certainly a few hundred but not thousands.

When we can't find any bad news, we will p!ss on the good news.

FalconGirl · 23-02-2015 11:19PM

chrysagon wrote: »

I was out with a close friend a few weeks back, she works with a well known agency that tries to help and advise people who are struggling with personal money/debt issues etc.She told me she is as busy as she was 5 yrs ago, and fears the banks are stepping up their repossession orders, even when people are trying to renegotiate.
She told me id be surprised at the people in trouble, isnt just"layabouts" but respected people in the town who are putting on a brave face but behind it all are barely keeping head above water,

Unfortunately the crash and the remnants of it, have affected a wide spectrum of people, and will so for next few yrs.

The banks are stepping up their repossession orders as houses go towards positive equity for many. The banks know they will sell these homes no problem as demand is quite high at the minute. Its sad to see but looks like the banks have been lying in the long grass to reposses for the past few years. They actively refused to do deals or restructure debt with many.

happysunnydays · 23-02-2015 11:26PM

FalconGirl wrote: »

The banks are stepping up their repossession orders as houses go towards positive equity for many. The banks know they will sell these homes no problem as demand is quite high at the minute..

You're way off and have zero understanding. They won't sell these 'houses'..no problem as you say. The majority of these houses are in the ar*ehole of nowhere. Go for a drive down the west of Ireland some time, rows and rows of empty one off two storey houses standing idle , a lot half finished or half built.
Everyone moving to the cities and there is no demand for these properties.

FalconGirl · 23-02-2015 11:28PM

RecordStraight wrote: »

When we can't find any bad news, we will p!ss on the good news.

I've never been unemployed, worked through every day of the recession, got various promotions and a couple of degrees in my spare time and my god I felt more optimistic about the economy in 2011 than I do now.

I can't quite put my finger on it, maybe its the insane house prices or the feeling that Govt figures are overly optimistic, or the fact that our health system is in the pits or our huge government debt with politicians too spineless to ask for a writedown. I don't know what it is.

I feel really uneasy about the positive spin tbh.

happysunnydays · 23-02-2015 11:31PM

FalconGirl wrote: »

maybe its the insane house prices.

You can buy a very nice two storey 5 bedroom house where I live, large front and back garden for round the 100k mark. So what you talking bout? Maybe you still live in tiger years, no?

RecordStraight · 23-02-2015 11:37PM

happysunnydays wrote: »

You can buy a very nice two storey 5 bedroom house where I live, large front and back garden for round the 100k mark. So what you talking bout? Maybe you still live in tiger years, no?

Fair point, but the problem with locations like that is that generally there is no work. The country is full of beautiful one-off houses in the arsehole of nowhere that cost half a million to build, and can be bought for 200k odd. But where do you work once you buy one?

Tedddy · 23-02-2015 11:46PM

Ireland's population is way too dispersed. If you look at any other European country of similar size and population you will see they will have many more large towns. Rural Ireland's decline is inevitable even without the recession, It's just happening at a faster rate.

Tony EH · 23-02-2015 11:57PM

RecordStraight wrote: »

Fair point, but the problem with locations like that is that generally there is no work. The country is full of beautiful one-off houses in the arsehole of nowhere that cost half a million to build, and can be bought for 200k odd. But where do you work once you buy one?

Which is exactly why it isn't a "fair point" at all.

24-02-2015 12:01AM

RecordStraight wrote: »

What is the government supposed to do? Apple don't want a European headquarters in Longford Town, and the people of towns like Longford don't seem to want to start companies like Apple. So do you have a proposal?

We know the SF/AAA proposal - tax the rich, burn the bondholders, jail the bankers. Not sure how any of those would help either...

One small thing that needs to be done is to get a move on with the rollout of broadband to all reasonable areas. From first hand experience its been a major issue in preventing the company I work with from growing any further and has caused a huge amount of expense and lost time.

RecordStraight · 24-02-2015 12:02AM

Borders no.2 wrote: »

One small thing that needs to be done is to get a move on with the rollout of broadband to all reasonable areas.

I think the ESB are doing a big broadband rollout shortly.

KomradeBishop · 24-02-2015 01:24AM

KingBrian2 wrote: »

Maybe in your eyes but once again I refer to the actual economic picture. Growth has returned. Wages have improved and employers are hiring more people. If that is not good economic news than what figures you are looking at. Perhaps you would prefer a stagnating economy that is harmful to all citizens.

I can only assume you failed to actually read my post here - as I explained quite clearly, how that 'good economic news' is short lived.

Just a little Samba · 24-02-2015 04:23AM

RecordStraight wrote: »

I think the ESB are doing a big broadband rollout shortly.

Is that pilot scheme from Cavan being expanded?

Using the ESB network to deliver broadband is something that should have been done years ago.

Muahahaha · 24-02-2015 04:47AM

FalconGirl wrote: »

I've never been unemployed, worked through every day of the recession, got various promotions and a couple of degrees in my spare time and my god I felt more optimistic about the economy in 2011 than I do now.

I can't quite put my finger on it, maybe its the insane house prices or the feeling that Govt figures are overly optimistic, or the fact that our health system is in the pits or our huge government debt with politicians too spineless to ask for a writedown. I don't know what it is.

I feel really uneasy about the positive spin tbh.

Nail meet head, very well said.

It;s not that long ago that Eamonn Dunphy resigned from D'OB/Today FM because of what he said was the pressure from his producers to produce "happy clappy radio". A few years on and we have a fully developed happy clappy media who love to report a few jobs here and there and ignore the exodus of emigrants and their parents who would never have known Skype if it wasn't for the mess that our politicians have us in.

To the average Fine Gael voter house price inflation and skyrocketing rents means that we are having an econmic recovery. That's why they keep banging on about 'the recovery' because they feel it in their pockets while the rest of us pay for it. FG and especially Michael Noonan structured things this way, they definitely made 'the hard decisions' and now we all know exactly who those decisions were hard on and who they were soft on, that much has become plainly obvious to everyone at this stage, the only people who actually aren't saying it is the media.

And round we go again, except this time people will call out the lies as they get spoken. Amen to that.

al22 · 24-02-2015 05:26AM

An "imaginative" accountanct\y can do a Profit instead of a Loss. :-)

My opinion - cut incomes/wages half or less and investors will build a lot of a new working places. Instead 12+ million new working places in China each year, a 3-500,000 new working places would be too much for Ireland.

And Chinese people have a big nice cities, modern and reasonable priced apartments, affordable rents, fast and affordablre transport, no social welfare as plenty of work there, etc. There are still poor there, but more than a million people are moved from poor every month.

AngryHippie · 24-02-2015 05:32AM

al22 wrote: »

An "imaginative" accountanct\y can do a Profit instead of a Loss. :-)

My opinion - cut incomes/wages half or less and investors will build a lot of a new working places. Instead 12+ million new working places in China each year, a 3-500,000 new working places would be too much for Ireland.

And Chinese people have a big nice cities, modern and reasonable priced apartments, affordable rents, fast and affordablre transport, no social welfare as plenty of work there, etc. There are still poor there, but more than a million people are moved from poor every month.

But they are completely destroying their environment on this pathway and are just as corrupt as our own mob.
I don't think we should be adopting a Chinese model for economic success. at.all

chrysagon · 24-02-2015 06:12AM

happysunnydays wrote: »

You're way off and have zero understanding. They won't sell these 'houses'..no problem as you say. The majority of these houses are in the ar*ehole of nowhere. Go for a drive down the west of Ireland some time, rows and rows of empty one off two storey houses standing idle , a lot half finished or half built.
Everyone moving to the cities and there is no demand for these properties.

Its being well documented through the media that banks are starting to move faster on repossessions, Donegal being mentioned at the weekend of the amount of repossession orders awaiting the court.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock · 24-02-2015 06:24AM

Muahahaha wrote: »

Nail meet head, very well said.

It;s not that long ago that Eamonn Dunphy resigned from D'OB/Today FM because of what he said was the pressure from his producers to produce "happy clappy radio". A few years on and we have a fully developed happy clappy media who love to report a few jobs here and there and ignore the exodus of emigrants and their parents who would never have known Skype if it wasn't for the mess that our politicians have us in.

To the average Fine Gael voter house price inflation and skyrocketing rents means that we are having an econmic recovery. That's why they keep banging on about 'the recovery' because they feel it in their pockets while the rest of us pay for it. FG and especially Michael Noonan structured things this way, they definitely made 'the hard decisions' and now we all know exactly who those decisions were hard on and who they were soft on, that much has become plainly obvious to everyone at this stage, the only people who actually aren't saying it is the media.

And round we go again, except this time people will call out the lies as they get spoken. Amen to that.

That's more FG the party than FG the voter. This idea that you can tell someone's attitude by the way vote (even assuming the vote for a set party) is a bit bogus.

For me, it's not so much the idea or lack thereof of a recovery, it's the fact that neither FF when in power nor FG now have done anything to actually offset the chance of another recession.

Mehaffey1 · 24-02-2015 06:45AM

If I got offered my job title at home with similar pay and conditions I'd be on a flight home next week. Not likely to happen as I wasn't hearing back from applications for roles such as Mushroom Grader before I left

24-02-2015 07:16AM

Nobody is suggesting that the country is in a great place, but things are improving dramatically. There were two positive announcements yesterday to illustrate this:

Apple to invest €850m in new Galway data centre

Liffey Valley shopping centre to undergo expansion

Grandeeod · 24-02-2015 07:52AM

chrysagon wrote: »

Its being well documented through the media that banks are starting to move faster on repossessions, Donegal being mentioned at the weekend of the amount of repossession orders awaiting the court.

Only a few weeks ago there were 90 cases listed for hearing on one particular day in Naas court.

The_Kew_Tour · 24-02-2015 07:59AM

I honestly see plenty of jobs about.

I see buses full of people going to work where I work.

Plenty of Non Irish nationals have jobs in Ireland from what I see. Fair play to them. Willing to work and appreciate a job.

AudreyHepburn · 24-02-2015 08:51AM

Just a little Samba wrote: »

I'll inform the 290,000 odd people in the register that they have a real chance of getting that customer service job in topaz Rathkeel!

Case in point....I'm sure that it's a perfectly good job but because it's Topaz people will turn their noses up at it.

If people are as desperate for work as they make out then surely they should be willing to do any decent job that comes their way.

Just a little Samba · 24-02-2015 08:59AM

AudreyHepburn wrote: »

Case in point....I'm sure that it's a perfectly good job but because it's Topaz people will turn their noses up at it.

If people are as desperate for work as they make out then surely they should be willing to do any decent job that comes their way.

And wosh, the point of 290,000 on the register vs 10,000 jobs (which isn't actually 10,000 jobs) being posted on a site goes right over your head.

There are 24 applicants to every job opportunity. So even if 1 in 24 get a job, there are still the other 23 left unemployed.

There's not enough Topaz shops in all the land for the magic job fairy to sort everyone out.

Pinch Flat · 24-02-2015 09:23AM

I work in construction as a project manager, Dublin based. Did well from when in moved back on from the UK in 2000 up to when I was laid off in 2009 just as the sh!t hit the fan. Wife, kid, mortgage etc.

Six months out of work, them back to jobs paying just above what was a graduate salary (I was late 30's at the time). I stuck it out on temporary contracts, sometimes it worked out (was kept on and rolled on a few years), others I was dropped after the 6 months fixed term. Soul destroying stuff.

But my own theory was there was always a job out there - just much much fewer of them. My own attitude was to literally knock in every door and, if that didn't work out, take an unskilled job to tie me over.

Over the past 12 months, if my own sector is anything to go by as a barometer, things are definitely on the up. Get a call or email about once a week from a job agent since late 2014 - all roles based in Ireland (used to be middle east / Canada). Mates I was in college with who emigrated are moving back lock stock and barrel - wife, kids, house etc.

Things are definitely on the up, albeit in Dublin - it will take a long time to trickle down, but if you're happy to follow the work, there's opportunities.

Tony EH · 24-02-2015 09:25AM

Just a little Samba wrote: »

And wosh, the point of 290,000 on the register vs 10,000 jobs (which isn't actually 10,000 jobs) being posted on a site goes right over your head.

There are 24 applicants to every job opportunity. So even if 1 in 24 get a job, there are still the other 23 left unemployed.

There's not enough Topaz shops in all the land for the magic job fairy to sort everyone out.

...And, as I've said before, you probably wouldn't even get a sniff of a Topaz job unless you had prior experience in job like it.

You cannot simply flip into any old job in this country. By and large it just doesn't happen.

KomradeBishop · 24-02-2015 09:27AM

Yes the same posters, as usual banging on about there 'being jobs available', while ignoring that there are not nearly enough jobs available - with, as mentioned above, 24 unemployed people per job vacancy.

I wonder what posters need is, to try and put a positive spin on a really shít situation - if people don't stay realistic about this, and actually face up to the darker reality, looking at the massive hurdles we're going to be slamming into (deflation), then they're just fooling themselves and others, into thinking everything is ok - when it's not, it's very far from it, and we're actually nowhere near the path to recovery (because the hurdles - deflation - will be blocking/reversing any current progress we're making).

Pretty much nothing is going to change while people are fooling themselves like that - we'll just be walking blind into yet more future crises, wondering why we never have any actual economic recovery - and we'll end up going on in this state for decades.

Pinch Flat · 24-02-2015 09:30AM

KomradeBishop wrote: »

Yes the same posters, as usual banging on about there 'being jobs available', while ignoring that there are not nearly enough jobs available - with, as mentioned above, 24 unemployed people per job vacancy.

I wonder what posters need is, to try and put a positive spin on a really shít situation - if people don't stay realistic about this, and actually face up to the darker reality, looking at the massive hurdles we're going to be slamming into (deflation), then they're just fooling themselves and others, into thinking everything is ok - when it's not, it's very far from it, and we're actually nowhere near the path to recovery (because the hurdles - deflation - will be blocking/reversing any current progress we're making).

Pretty much nothing is going to change while people are fooling themselves like that - we'll just be walking blind into yet more future crises, wondering why we never have any actual economic recovery - and we'll end up going on in this state for decades.

Depends on what type of persona you are I guess. If you're generally negative and full of doom and gloom, it will come out in every aspect of your life. If you're positive and tend to make the best of a bad situation, well you might fair better.

What do you suggest we should do given the current situation?

KomradeBishop · 24-02-2015 09:33AM

There is a difference between unrealistic optimism (damaging), realism/skepticism/pragmatism (smart), and unrealistically negative (again, damaging - may have its use as a 'devils advocate' view).

Being 'positive' all the time, is basically fooling yourself with bullshít all the time - being realistic and skeptical of our 'recovery', facing up to the real hurdles we face (deflation), allows us to actually inform ourselves properly of just how bad our situation is and what needs to be done to fix it, and makes the most sense - and is nowhere near being unrealistically negative.

'Positivity' in short, is usually bullshít - as it largely involves ignoring reality. I suggest we learn about our actual real problems, so we can then think of how to fix them, instead of fooling ourselves.

Pinch Flat · 24-02-2015 09:46AM

KomradeBishop wrote: »

There is a difference between unrealistic optimism (damaging), realism/skepticism/pragmatism (smart), and unrealistically negative (again, damaging - may have its use as a 'devils advocate' view).

Being 'positive' all the time, is basically fooling yourself with bullshít all the time - being realistic and skeptical of our 'recovery', facing up to the real hurdles we face (deflation), allows us to actually inform ourselves properly of just how bad our situation is and what needs to be done to fix it, and makes the most sense - and is nowhere near being unrealistically negative.

'Positivity' in short, is usually bullshít - as it largely involves ignoring reality. I suggest we learn about our actual real problems, so we can then think of how to fix them, instead of fooling ourselves.

Hey look we all know there's spin going on in the media, and manipulation of jobless figure / emigration etc. We all get it.

The problems you have outlined are real, macro issues. They are issues that the country faces long into the future.

But on a micro / ordinary Joe level, like myself, adopting a positive approach will go a long way to making a good lot out of a bad situation.

I am convinced that Ireland is in Serious trouble

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