Alan Ahearne’s Paddy Ryan Memorial Lecture at NUI (for now) Galway is available below. He gives a rationale for current government banking and fiscal policy (HT Stephen Kinsella).
Alan Ahearne’s Paddy Ryan Memorial Lecture at NUI (for now) Galway is available below. He gives a rationale for current government banking and fiscal policy (HT Stephen Kinsella).
3 replies on “Alan Ahearne Paddy Ryan Lecture”
@ALL
Obviously the Green Party’s input into banking and fiscal policy cannot be ignored. If you wish to see it dicussed go to here:
http://www.politics.ie/green-party/87644-green-party-pictures-14.html
Post 131 on pg 14 gives the traditional policy approach of the Greens.
Post 19 on page 2 is the most accurate depiction of the party’s current policy approach.
Post 24 on page 3 is also insightful.
Alan Ahearne said there was a 5% improvement in unit labour costs in Ireland since the autumn. The unit cost in Ireland dropped 2% in Ireland last year at a time when they increased by 3% in the Euro area. “This is already kickstarting growth. We are starting to gain market share but we need to do more as we lost our competitiveness during the boom years.”
This seems like official spin.
The output increase in the past year came from the capital intensive pharma sector. Besides, as the majority of trade is intra company and destination decisions are generally not made in Ireland, how can the claimed trend be detected so soon?
Allowing for the fact that the media does not always give prominence to caveats, my problem with the coverage of Alan’s and John FitzGerald’s addresses on Monday was that while the expectation of a strong recovery is dependent on exports, there was little focus on the common expectation that the recovery in the US, the Eurozone and the UK will be subpar given public debt problems and the exit from massive support programs.
McKinsey said last week that Japan was the only exception since 1930 where there wasn’t a deleveraging period of 6-7 years after a severe crisis.
The World Bank today said the recovery will slow; ditto Dr. “Doom.”
Forecasts from credible institutions show slower growth in the US and Europe in 2011 than in 2010.
Obama may have to apply a special tariff on Chinese imports in the coming year if China does not unpeg the renminbi from the US dollar and allow a significant appreciation.
As for 2014, nobody knows.
Ireland has little opportunity to take advantage directly of rapid growth in the key emerging markets.
Total exports to India are derisory; trade with China is about 3% of goods exports, below shipments to Switzerland and of that, Irish-owned firms account for 6%.
Rich countries face years of belt-tightening to reduce high debt levels; Deleveraging following crises lasts six to seven years on average:
http://www.finfacts.ie/irishfinancenews/article_1018849.shtml
@Liam Delaney
The Irish Daily Mail doesn’t have a website but poster lostexpectation on politics.ie has kindly retrieved this article which also shed light on current government banking policy.
http://info-wars.org/2009/08/23/golden-circle-builder-paid-e5000-to-meet-brian-cowen/
by Valerie Hanley
The Irish Mail on Sunday
A GROUP of businessmen – including one member of the notorious ‘golden circle’ of secret Anglo Irish Bank investors – paid €65,000 for a private meeting with Taoiseach Brian Cowen, the Irish Mail on Sunday can reveal.
The 13 company directors and property developers met Mr Cowen in March 2008 in the splendid surroundings of the five-star Shelbourne Hotel’s Constitution Room.
Among them were two beneficiaries of the infamous Ansbacher trusts set up by Charlie Haughey’s corrupt accountant, Des Traynor, and one of the 10 Anglo shareholders being investigated by the Garda’s fraud squad for potentially illegal share trading.
Each was charged a fee of €5,000, which allowed them to avoid having to disclose their payment publicly.
Under Standards in Public Office Commission regulations, a donor who gives more than €5,078.95 cash to a political party in any calendar year must be named in the party’s annual donation statement. But because the hand-picked group were asked for €5,000 each only, details about the secret fundraiser never had to be disclosed.
No record of the €65,000 in cash raised at the private dinner – held while Mr Cowen was finance minister and just one month before he was nominated to become leader of Fianna Fail – appears on the register of political donations.
However, the Mail on Sunday has established that among the 13 businessmen present at the strictly invitation-only meal in the luxury diningroom was Dublin estate agent Brian O’Farrell. The Malahide auctioneer was named as one of the 10 Anglo Irish Bank ‘golden circle’ of investors who were given €451m in loans to buy part of business tycoon Sean Quinn’s doomed stake in the bank.
The bank, now owned by the Government and funded with taxpayers’ money, has since
written off €308m for what it called ‘loans to 10 long-standing clients’, which were secured on the now worthless shares they were used to buy.
The Garda Bureau of Fraud Investigation and the Director of Corporate Enforcement are currently investigating the transactions.
This weekend’s revelations about Mr Cowen meeting one of the golden circle at a cash-f or-political-access event just weeks before a follow-up private dinner with the entire Anglo Irish Bank board of directors is sure to raise fresh questions about his apparent political and personal closeness to those involved in the bank.
And it leaves him vulnerable to allegations of having been compromised, as well as to being accused of improperly seeking money for political access.
Speaking to the MoS this weekend, Brian O’Farrell confirmed that he had attended the dinner at the Shelboume.
He said: ‘It was organised by two fellas from Clontarf. It was organised through my office and it was so that Brian Cowen could give his views on the economy.
‘Brian Cowen was minister for finance at the time and I can’t remember what he said because so much has happened since then.
‘It was in March and Bertie [Ahern] had nothing to do with it. I am not in Fianna Fail. There was a question and answer session. It was just like a normal chat.
‘I didn’t hand over a cheque. It was organised through my office.’
However, the MoS has learned that two central characters involved with the €65,000 event were Dublin motor car dealers Peter and John Dennis.
The brothers run the HB Dennis firm in the capital and their father, Brian, was one of the tax dodger Ansbacher names who invested off-shore with former taoiseach Charlie Haughey’s accountant, Des Traynor.
Both Peter and John Dennis denied to the MoS that they knew anything about the dinner but a guest at the event has confirmed to the MoS that he attended only after having been approached personally by the brothers.