Ireland's political and cultural magazine
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By Sinead Pentony. Is Ireland’s level of debt sustainable? The Troika drew attention to our high public debt in their final review of Ireland’s bailout programme. The first few weeks of 2014 have seen good news on Ireland’s cost of borrowing on the bond markets and the decision by Moody’s ratings agency, after all the […]
By Ronan Lynch. Administration and ‘process’ not innovation drive Irish operation It’s been a bad twelve months for Google. It began with the growing awareness of Google’s tax avoidance, and continued with Google being forced to deny that it participated in the PRISM spying project. It also suffers ballooning costs and falling ad rates. So […]
Dear Mr Desmond, You never go to Davos. Why’s that then? I’ve been going for more than a decade, cruising in on the old Gulfstream. I love to put myself about. I had them eating out of my hand with my clever stock tips: “I am positive about 2014, but it will not be like […]
By Sinead Pentony ‘Employment in construction is now just 37.5% of its June 2007 level but increased by 51,300 over the last six years in the areas of health and social work, information and communication, and education’. ‘The main policy measures aimed at increasing employment include the Action Plan for Jobs which aims to have […]
With employment rising, property prices on the mend, mortgages arrears stabilising, Exchequer returns surging and business and consumer confidence regaining pre-crisis highs, Ireland might easily be mistaken for an Asia-Pacific economic dynamo. Alas, once the official hullabaloo about the return to growth is stripped back to the bare facts, it becomes clear that Ireland is […]
By Frank Armstrong ‘The term “gatherer-hunter” is less often used although more accurate’. ‘On a moral level, all animal use is the same. It is wrong’ ‘I believe that human beings can tolerate a small amount of animal flesh in their diet but there is no NEED for it’ What prompted you to become a […]
Taxes can serve all sorts of positive policy goals including redistribution through a tax on property, which constitutes three quarters of private wealth. by Michael Smith Learning to love property tax requires a perspective on the purposes and types, of taxation. The purposes of taxation include financing government spending; and promotion of greater equality, […]