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Government Spending [See post 106]

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    #62
    Bishop of hope
    Registered Users Posts: 2,927 ✭✭✭Bishop of hope


    facehugger99 wrote: »
    It suits the media, opposition politicians and vested interests such as Unions to portray the country as being in the constant grip of various crises.

    The Govt. of the day then need to be seen to be dealing with whatever the 'current crisis du jour' is.

    It's a thoroughly damaging cycle.

    It leads to unsuitable one-issue candidates being elected. It feeds into the short-term outlook of most Govt policy and planning. It moves focus away from more pressing and important issues.

    Such as?
    The health service, housing, water and other services are in crises, forget about them and let the government do more important other stuff, like what?


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    #63
    flazio
    Registered Users Posts: 12,811 ✭✭✭✭flazio


    Tmdoherty wrote: »
    We should also blame sick people for putting the HSE under pressure.

    Yes and no, it all depends on how they got sick, especially their lifestyle. Chronic genetic hereditary problems, of course you can't blame them. But 40 a day smokers who down 6 pints a weekend regularly and eat pork and cheese pies. You had it coming.


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    #64
    Wanderer78
    Registered Users Posts: 28,805 ✭✭✭✭Wanderer78


    flazio wrote:
    Yes and no, it all depends on how they got sick, especially their lifestyle. Chronic genetic hereditary problems, of course you can't blame them. But 40 a day smokers who down 6 pints a weekend regularly and eat pork and cheese pies. You had it coming.


    Maybe people need help with their addiction problems?


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    #65
    Tmdoherty
    Registered Users Posts: 31 ✭Tmdoherty


    flazio wrote: »
    Yes and no, it all depends on how they got sick, especially their lifestyle. Chronic genetic hereditary problems, of course you can't blame them. But 40 a day smokers who down 6 pints a weekend regularly and eat pork and cheese pies. You had it coming.

    Agreed


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    #66
    Bishop of hope
    Registered Users Posts: 2,927 ✭✭✭Bishop of hope


    flazio wrote: »
    Yes and no, it all depends on how they got sick, especially their lifestyle. Chronic genetic hereditary problems, of course you can't blame them. But 40 a day smokers who down 6 pints a weekend regularly and eat pork and cheese pies. You had it coming.

    But that's nothing to do with the crux of the health service problems as such. That's just a rant at lifestyles.
    While your point is valid health wise, it has nothing to do with how the health service is run, every country's person's have their demons, blaming the sick for the way the service is governed is just blame shifting.
    Would you expect smokers and drinkers and fatties to be thrown one side so that teetotalers and healthier living people be given preference?
    Governance is the biggest problem, hospital and bed closures throughout the last decades is what has caused the problem of overcrowding and waiting lists.
    If you have money or health insurance here it is still quite possible to be treated more quickly for illness.
    Length of time to waiting to get treated for illness while your condition worsens and leads to more outpatient and doctor visits has a lot to do with it.


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    #67
    facehugger99
    Registered Users Posts: 7,216 ✭✭✭facehugger99


    Bishop of hope wrote: »
    Such as?
    The health service, housing, water and other services are in crises, forget about them and let the government do more important other stuff, like what?

    A bit of strategic long-term planning and investment would be far more beneficial to solving such issues than the knee-jerk crisis management that passes for 'doing stuff' in this country.


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    #68
    Tmdoherty
    Registered Users Posts: 31 ✭Tmdoherty


    facehugger99 wrote: »
    A bit of strategic long-term planning and investment would be far more beneficial to solving such issues than the knee-jerk crisis management that passes for 'doing stuff' in this country.

    This is good, everything seems to be a knee-jerk reaction in this country. We just move from scandal to scandal. Even with the same successive governments and the main parties having broadly similar agendas we can't seem to plan ahead.


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    #69
    James Brown
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,015 ✭✭✭✭James Brown


    Harry Palmr wrote: »
    The country is in a permanent state of competence crises.

    Yep.
    NIMAN wrote: »
    Lists like this could be created for any country in the world.

    Many, many countries are much worse than Ireland.

    I think more people should be thankful they live in Ireland.

    And that's why.


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    #70
    Bishop of hope
    Registered Users Posts: 2,927 ✭✭✭Bishop of hope


    Tmdoherty wrote: »
    This is good, everything seems to be a knee-jerk reaction in this country. We just move from scandal to scandal. Even with the same successive governments and the main parties having broadly similar agendas we can't seem to plan ahead.

    Kneejerk? Lol.
    None of these things started this week, it's been going on for years, the health service has been in crisis in decades, getting worse all the time, a decade or more of the housing crisis and still getting worse, water, they've been at that for decades too and it's getting worse, as are most public services.
    Now I don't believe the populist nonsense about quick fixes we hear so much about either, but I'd like to hear honest comment from those governing us rather than the populist spiel they throw out, just to counteract the others.
    Lies answering lies isn't helping anyone.


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    #71
    Tmdoherty
    Registered Users Posts: 31 ✭Tmdoherty


    Bishop of hope wrote: »
    Kneejerk? Lol.
    None of these things started this week, it's been going on for years, the health service has been in crisis in decades, getting worse all the time, a decade or more of the housing crisis and still getting worse, water, they've been at that for decades too and it's getting worse, as are most public services.
    Now I don't believe the populist nonsense about quick fixes we hear so much about either, but I'd like to hear honest comment from those governing us rather than the populist spiel they throw out, just to counteract the others.
    Lies answering lies isn't helping anyone.

    Kneejerk as in this week they had record people on trolleys, so the government throw 27million at it for the winter. Someone dies on the street and the government reacts with a few notions of fixing the problem. Nothing meaningful actually gets done. It all gets put on the back burner again until the next inevitable problem arises and the circle continues.


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    #72
    James Brown
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,015 ✭✭✭✭James Brown


    Rodin wrote: »
    Plenty of empty houses around the country.
    The hotel-housed "homeless" don't want them....

    Time to turn off the life support.

    The social welfare bill is the great unspoken scandal of the country.

    New here are ya?


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    #73
    James Brown
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,015 ✭✭✭✭James Brown


    Bishop of hope wrote: »
    Such as?
    The health service, housing, water and other services are in crises, forget about them and let the government do more important other stuff, like what?

    TBF, we haven't had a clock in the liffey in ages.


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    #74
    matt360
    Registered Users Posts: 124 ✭✭matt360


    Who's protesting against vulnerable women?


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    #75
    boardise
    Registered Users Posts: 3,402 ✭✭✭boardise


    It's worth noting that the NHS system in the UK is in a permanent state of 'crisis' -with mostly the same problems as here --incl. staff shortages and long waiting lists. Most analysts agree that there are forces afoot in society that cause this increasing pressure on health -especially hospital- services i.e.growing population ,people living longer, unhealthy lifestyles ( drug/alcohol abuse , obesity , diabetes epidemic etc) and the huge costs of technological medical gadgetry and pharmaceuticals. Money has been pumped in but it's at best running fast to stand still.
    Nobody anywhere it seems has the capacity to bring about meaningful rationalisation of the top heavy bureaucracies that bedevil the health systems in both countries.
    One can talk of 'crisis'-but in effect we're looking at the new normal for some time to come.


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    #76
    Rodin
    Registered Users Posts: 3,130 ✭✭✭Rodin


    Tmdoherty wrote: »
    We should also blame sick people for putting the HSE under pressure.

    Who else is putting it under pressure?
    Lifestyle illnesses form a major part of the HSE's budget.

    But for....


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    #77
    Liberta Per Gli Ultra
    Registered Users Posts: 258 ✭✭Liberta Per Gli Ultra


    It shouldn't be a surprise or a mystery that many of the public services in Ireland are in bad shape when the party in government is ideologically opposed to the principle of public services. The party in power before them, who drove this country off a cliff to keep their private construction boom going, claim to be less right-wing yet privatised public services to the benefit of their friends in business.


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    #78
    Bishop of hope
    Registered Users Posts: 2,927 ✭✭✭Bishop of hope


    Rodin wrote: »
    Who else is putting it under pressure?
    Lifestyle illnesses form a major part of the HSE's budget.

    But for....

    Lots of things, budgeting that's not realistic for stuff that has little to do with health care as such, children's hospital for instance.
    Specialists who couldn't give a damn about Joe soaps condition unless he has vhi or big bucks.
    Longfingering illnesses that should be treated faster and prolonging their treatment adds to the crowding leading to repeated visits to emergency wards and daycare appointments.
    The closure of so many rural emergency departments and small hospitals has lead to the overcrowding of the ones still open.
    The waste that goes on in the health service just from an administrative perspective is obscene when compared to actual patient care imo.
    And here you are saying its sick people that are the cause of the problems, you're right of course, but in a laughable way.
    What type of people should be treated other than sick people, should there be a court type system whereby they should have to prove they're worthy of care?


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    #79
    McGiver
    Registered Users Posts: 4,366 ✭✭✭McGiver


    NIMAN wrote:
    Many, many countries are much worse than Ireland.
    This is not helpful and is symptomatic of the Irish psyche and reflective of its political culture. If you don't admit, recognise and identify the issues, you can't fix them - ever. You can't really run a successful country for a long time with the "ah sure it will be grand" attitude - unfortunately, that's what FF and FG have been doing.

    Ireland's benchmark should be what Ireland is and wants to be - a developed Western democracy, specifically its EU/EEA peers of similar size such as Denmark, Finland, Norway, Austria etc. or even Scotland.

    No point talking about Africa or failed states. Those are no benchmark for modern Ireland.


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    #80
    Bishop of hope
    Registered Users Posts: 2,927 ✭✭✭Bishop of hope


    I see the hse chief, Paul Reid, is to start a cull of managers and administrators in 2020 in a bid to reform and cost save.
    Good intentions anyway and on the right track imo.
    I see a shift back to regional boards might also be on the cards
    https://www.businesspost.ie/news/exclusive-hse-boss-set-axe-managers-456728


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    #81
    Geuze
    Registered Users Posts: 13,071 ✭✭✭✭Geuze


    Tmdoherty wrote: »
    .
    but the average wage is "39k" and you can only borrow 3.5 times your salary (I know there are exceptions)

    Average earnings for FT workers, incl. overtime, are about 46k.

    Average earnings for mortgage applicants are higher.


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    #82
    lola85
    Closed Accounts Posts: 667 ✭✭✭lola85


    McGiver wrote: »
    This is not helpful and is symptomatic of the Irish psyche and reflective of its political culture. If you don't admit, recognise and identify the issues, you can't fix them - ever. You can't really run a successful country for a long time with the "ah sure it will be grand" attitude - unfortunately, that's what FF and FG have been doing.

    Ireland's benchmark should be what Ireland is and wants to be - a developed Western democracy, specifically its EU/EEA peers of similar size such as Denmark, Finland, Norway, Austria etc. or even Scotland.

    No point talking about Africa or failed states. Those are no benchmark for modern Ireland.

    Denmark, Austria and Norway have more homeless people than Ireland.

    But yeah we should do what they do.


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    #83
    xl500
    Registered Users Posts: 863 ✭✭✭xl500


    The Rural Broadband contract is coming before cabinet today there seems to be no way to stop this and with a General Election expected in the Spring 2020 it will be a major shouting point for rural FG TDs

    It is absolutely crazy to bring fibre to every home in the country regardless of where they are this is a major expense on the taxpayer and we wont even own the infrastructure

    IMO we should run fibre to major towns and after that if you want to live on the side of a mountain or in the most remote place possible then thats your choice and you pay to bring the services to your site why should I as a taxpayer

    There are comparisions being made to rural electrification this in no way compares at the time of that there was way less one off housing in the country

    interestingly if you now decide to build in a remote location you pay to bring Electricty to your site

    This is populism at its worst


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    #84
    Dytalus
    Registered Users Posts: 459 ✭✭Dytalus


    lola85 wrote: »
    Denmark, Austria and Norway have more homeless people than Ireland.

    But yeah we should do what they do.

    Denmark: 6,635 homeless per the most recent figures. 5.8 million population. 0.11% ratio.
    Austria: 14,603 homeless. 8.86 million population. 0.16% ratio.
    Norway: 3,909 homeless. 5.3 million population. 0.07% ratio.

    Ireland: 10,388 homeless. 4.9 million population. 0.21% ratio.

    Only Austria has more homeless total than us per the most recently available statistics, and it's still below us in terms of population ratio.


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    #85
    Dyr
    Registered Users Posts: 23,246 ✭✭✭✭Dyr


    There's an ould adage that if you're in a hole you should stop digging

    Apply that to the housing crisis and you're called a racist (father)


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    #86
    blanch152
    Registered Users Posts: 27,194 ✭✭✭✭blanch152


    Rodin wrote: »
    Plenty of empty houses around the country.
    The hotel-housed "homeless" don't want them....

    Time to turn off the life support.

    The social welfare bill is the great unspoken scandal of the country.
    Matt Barrett wrote: »
    New here are ya?

    Despite the low level response to Rodin's post, he raises an important point.

    Are our social welfare levels high compared to other countries?

    https://stats.oecd.org/viewhtml.aspx?datasetcode=IA&lang=en

    According to this table, for a single person, with housing benefits, we offer the second highest rate in the OECD.

    https://stats.oecd.org/viewhtml.aspx?datasetcode=IA&lang=en

    For a family, only Denmark and Japan are higher.

    What is interesting about these statistics is that they are adjusted for median income. The higher median income in Ireland than in countries like Latvia or Poland show how much higher the rates must be.

    https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=BLI

    53.6% of government expenditure is on social benefits. That is close to the highest, which is 56.9%. When you consider that Ireland has a very young population, there should be alarm bells going off as the current subsidisation of older people is unsustainable.

    I am not saying that Rodin is right, but certainly the facts I have set out would lead one to think that there should be a valuable debate around the issue, teasing out some of the factors involved.


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    #87
    Jim2007
    Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators Posts: 9,989 Mod ✭✭✭✭Jim2007


    xl500 wrote: »
    The Rural Broadband contract is coming before cabinet today there seems to be no way to stop this and with a General Election expected in the Spring 2020 it will be a major shouting point for rural FG TDs

    It is absolutely crazy to bring fibre to every home in the country regardless of where they are this is a major expense on the taxpayer and we wont even own the infrastructure

    IMO we should run fibre to major towns and after that if you want to live on the side of a mountain or in the most remote place possible then thats your choice and you pay to bring the services to your site why should I as a taxpayer

    There are comparisions being made to rural electrification this in no way compares at the time of that there was way less one off housing in the country

    interestingly if you now decide to build in a remote location you pay to bring Electricty to your site

    This is populism at its worst

    You seem to forget a lot of little things....

    You would not have the services in the cities etc.... unless the people in the countryside agreed to it over the past 100 years....

    There are enough rural TDs in the Dail to stop tax incentives and spending on the cities etc... why should people in the countryside have to disadvantage themselves for your benefit? Everyone is entitled to good services not just you, they pay their taxes too. You don't like it then think about moving to another country... except you'll be hard pressed to find a single country in Europe where the same principles don't apply TG.


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    #88
    xl500
    Registered Users Posts: 863 ✭✭✭xl500


    Jim2007 wrote: »
    You seem to forget a lot of little things....

    You would not have the services in the cities etc.... unless the people in the countryside agreed to it over the past 100 years....

    There are enough rural TDs in the Dail to stop tax incentives and spending on the cities etc... why should people in the countryside have to disadvantage themselves for your benefit? Everyone is entitled to good services not just you, they pay their taxes too. You don't like it then think about moving to another country... except you'll be hard pressed to find a single country in Europe where the same principles don't apply TG.

    The Vast majority of taxes in this country are paid for by city dwellers and bringing services to remote houses at the expense of taxpayers is crazy cluster housing is the way to go

    Even in Ireland now if you build a remote location you pay to bring Electricty to it and in every other country you pay its crazy to bring fibre to every house in the country

    Dublin and its hinterland massively subsidises rural Ireland and I am from rural Ireland


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    #89
    James Brown
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,015 ✭✭✭✭James Brown


    blanch152 wrote: »
    Despite the low level response to Rodin's post, he raises an important point.

    ....

    It's never discussed is it, on Boards?

    The fact we have made few moves to stop another crisis and sections of society are still reeling from the brunt of Kenny saving us and other sections have gotten increasingly worse, let's look at welfare... Genius.

    The country would grind to a halt without welfare in it's various forms. It's the fuel that keeps this ponzi scheme chugging along until the next crash.
    How will Noonan's vulture fund chums, (or the TD landlord lobby) make any money if the LA's/state stop renting off them or subsidising private rentals?


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    #90
    jm08
    Registered Users Posts: 11,300 ✭✭✭✭jm08


    xl500 wrote: »
    The Vast majority of taxes in this country are paid for by city dwellers and bringing services to remote houses at the expense of taxpayers is crazy cluster housing is the way to go

    Even in Ireland now if you build a remote location you pay to bring Electricty to it and in every other country you pay its crazy to bring fibre to every house in the country

    Dublin and its hinterland massively subsidises rural Ireland and I am from rural Ireland


    Rural Ireland feeds you. Farms of necessity tend to be in remote spots. They need broadband so that they can keep on top of all the rules and regs of providing safe food. The reason why farmers don't contribute more tax is because their incomes are so low.

    Edit: Just so you know, Ireland South EU Parliament constituency (mainly Munster) has the 3rd highest GDP per person in Europe (after London and Luxembourg). Dublin (Leinster) is 5th.

    https://www.irishtimes.com/business/southern-part-of-ireland-third-richest-in-eu-but-west-lags-behind-1.3811364?mode=sample&auth-failed=1&pw-origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.irishtimes.com%2Fbusiness%2Fsouthern-part-of-ireland-third-richest-in-eu-but-west-lags-behind-1.3811364


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    #91
    James Brown
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,015 ✭✭✭✭James Brown


    What ever about costing, every person is supposed to be equal and that's as it should be. Of course we have to make allowances based on practicalities, but Some lad in the middle of nowhere who paid tax all his life deserves consideration. One of the worse things about government is ignoring or dismissing sections of society because they don't have the numbers to upset their political aspirations.
    This is how we have the Healy-Raes, a symptom of that disease if you will.


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