Economically we're dead : Ireland

[limerickman]

Much as I hate to admit it, it looks like my country is economically banjaxed.

In September 2008, the banks of my country ran to the Department of Finance begging for support and the Minister for Finance at that time decided to underwrite all the liabilities of our country's banks.
Except he did so on the blind.

The bill for our banks has grown expotentially from €8 billion to € 25 billion to € 50 billion - and is now at € 70 billion and counting.
To compound our problems, our banks have had a run on it's deposit base which has been filled to the tune €180 billion by the
European Central Bank.
In simple terms, Ireland is fecked.

Rant over

 

[steve]

Originally Posted by limerickman .

Much as I hate to admit it, it looks like my country is economically banjaxed.

In simple terms, Ireland is fecked.

We're going through a similar miss allocation of capital in Australia, everyone here seems to be a property entrepreneur. Lucky for us its different here /img/vbsmilies/smilies/duck.gif

 

[limerickman]

Originally Posted by steve .




We're going through a similar miss allocation of capital in Australia, everyone here seems to be a property entrepreneur. Lucky for us its different here /img/vbsmilies/smilies/duck.gif

We had our property boom here too. House prices increased on average by 200% between 1997-2006.
My house was bought for €65k was selling for €600k in 2006 (I wasn't selling anyhow, so it didn't matter but that gives you some idea of
house price inflation here).
It got to the stage where people were buying second (holiday) homes in Turkey, Bulgaria and Spain/Portugal.

 

[jhuskey]

I think we are not far behind here although you wouldn't notice it the way people are still spending money for vacations and luxury items. Fuel prices may be devastating in th enear future and yes I know Europe has had high prices for years but eveything here gets transported by truck over a long distance. Higher Diesel prices means everything gets priced higher.

 

[overgeared]

blame the euro, the uk is similarly indebted but retaining the option to devalue sterling has made a big difference. hard to see how the euro has helped ireland, i heard that prices went up spectacularly when it was introduced, i certainly noticed it when visiting. some say one of the key factors that gave europe a historical economic advantage, what grew the west as a civilisation ahead of the east, was competition between states. the whole idea of the euro and the EU works to remove that characteristic. not good.