Surviving the Recession

I have a novel way to get us through the recession.

Instead of the Irish government asking the little people of Ireland to accept a reduction in their standard of living (in real terms) and in their patriotic duty of course and in the national interest, they should ask the bosses to accept an increase in their income tax for a period of (lets say two years)also no wage increases and no price increases, and ordinary workers would do the same (but without the tax increases).

The government can also force the energy suppliers i.e. Gas Electricity, Petrol, Diesel to not increase their prices and any international cost increases should be absorbed by these companies also for the same two years and in their patriotic duty of course and in the national interest.

This would result in all companies maintaining a status quo, with no increases in salaries for anybody, and would also mean living standards stay the same for everybody until the international economy recovers, it will give time for the housing issue to calm down and ultimately give time to devise a new strategy that will return competiveness to Irish companies. It will also mean the Government can devise policies to address the difference in the cost of living in other EU countries.

The cost of living in other less expensive property countries is the prime issue affecting competitiveness of companies that are relocating to other parts of the world. Within the EU we require every citizen to enjoy a certain standard of living and as such when a small country like Ireland is competing against larger EU countries, we have no chance, unless we can use other means to sell goods and services i.e. Ireland needs to become a knowledge society, however it’s most likely that it will take thirty years to achieve that, but with the governments cutbacks in education it’s an impossible reality this side of the twenty second century.

As an aside but probably the inspiration for this piece was a discussion I had with a lovely person, a senior executive with Diageo, a company with profits of about 2 billion per year. (I’m trying not to generalise about this person as I do not want to identify the person, as I did not ask them if I could quote them, maybe their colleagues know this person because of their views, but I can’t do anything about that) anyway this person told me, they flew their child to America for health services because they were afraid to subject the child to Irish medical standards. On it’s own that speaks volumes, however this person also told me that big international companies would not locate in Ireland because the standard of living / infrastructure such as health services etc, would not allow these companies to locate in Ireland because these companies can not attract the people with the skills the companies need, even the low rate of corporation tax does not help these companies, as there culture is also about the right people to do the job, otherwise there is no point in being anywhere, if logically you can’t get the right people to do the job in that locality and those that they trust will not relocate, then despite the low corporation tax rates means these companies can not do the job in the low tax country, then ultimately they go where they can do the job and get the money. It’s a quite simple logic really.

The real problem for Ireland has been the Irish government’s belief that every American company would want to locate in Ireland, because of the low corporation tax rate. Reality shows these companies that came to Ireland in the 1990s have experienced bad working experiences by their staff who are now advising their friends and colleagues that the standard of living in my Country is way below what they can expect.

Ireland in theory is a great classless society, because in reality even if you have money which can afford you the very best of every public service available, in my mind and in the mind of the Diageo person, the standards in my country are akin to a developing country rather than a country that carries its citizens to the highest standards in the world.

My own opinion is that most people would be horrified to know the same party has been in government in Ireland for 75 of the last 85 years and the standards here are still developing. My reality is that standards in Health services (both public and private) are still way behind the rest of the real world.

I’m sorry to say that but it’s my perception which is my reality, but this was also reaffirmed by the Diageo executive.

World Domination

I,ll come back to this, but it,s an interesting read.