The Irish Economy

There is an FT op-ed today by Hau and Sinn, which is mainly about the importance of ensuring sufficient creditor bail-in to limit calls on taxpayers in the event of a crisis. However, it also argues that the ECB has gone too far in providing liquidity against distressed collateral in the periphery. You can find it here.

There is a guest article by Avinash Persaud in The Economist here. Persaud is concerned that a single supervisory mechanism will lead to “one size fits all” regulation of banks across the euro area, so that the response to country-specific asset bubbles may be inadequate. It is not clear to me why a unified approach to regulation is inconsistent with the implementation of country-specific macro-prudential measures.

Conference on Irish Economic Policy

Institute of Bankers, North Wall Quay, Dublin 1

February 1^st

On February 1^st 2013, the Dublin Economics Workshop, in conjunction with Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI), the Department of Economics at the University of Limerick (UL) and the Geary Institute at UCD is hosting a conference on Irish economy policy at the Institute of Bankers.

The conference will explore current issues in economic policy in key areas: Education and Children, Industrial Policy, Unemployment/Social Protection, Economics and Evaluation, and the Political Economy of Austerity. The outline programme is set out below.

The conference aims to provide a forum for discussion of new ideas on the conduct of Irish economic policy, including the extent to which economics and related disciplines can make a greater contribution to the conduct of economic policy in Ireland, and the extent to which policy can be designed more effectively. The speakers and chairs come from a range of institutions and disciplines and there also be online access to presentations to ensure to enable debate through blogs and twitter. There is no charge for the conference. Coffee will be provided free of charge mid-morning and there will be a break at 12.45 to enable participants to take lunch.

To register for the conference, please email: emma.barron@ucd.ie . Advance registration is essential for attendance at the conference, i.e., is required for entry to the facilities.

9.15- 9.45	Registration and Opening
9.45-10.45	1. Education and Children	2. Industrial Policy
	CHAIR: Minister Frances Fitzgerald (D/Children and Youth Affairs) 1. Orla Doyle (UCD/Geary) Experimental Evidence on the Early Effectiveness of Intervention in Childhood 2. Emer Smyth (ESRI) School factors and student outcomes: insights from longitudinal research	CHAIR: Declan Hughes (Forfás) 1. Donal Palcic & Eoin Reeves (UL) Privatisation: past performance and prospects. 2. Fergal McCann SMEs in Ireland: Contributions, Credit and Economic Crisis (Central Bank)
10.45-11.15	Coffee
11:15-12:45	3. The Labour Market	4. Economics and Evaluation
	CHAIR: John McKeon (D/Social Protection) 1. Eilish Kelly (ESRI), Seamus McGuiness (ESRI), Philip O’Connell (UCD/Geary) Activation in Ireland: Are we on the Right Path? 2. Bryan Fanning (UCD) Why did Ireland become so open to immigration? 3. Frank Walsh (UCD) The union wage premium in Ireland	CHAIR: Frances Ruane (ESRI) 1. Ronnie Downes (D/Public Expenditure and Reform) Economics & Evaluation in the Public Service – Capacity and Commitment? 2. Gail Birkbeck (Atlantic Philantrophies) Evaluating Services and Expenditures in the Social sector 3. Helena Lenihan (UL), Evaluating the impact of enterprise/industrial policy supports: developing new methods and approaches
12.45-14.00	Lunch Break
14.00-16.00	Plenary Session: Political Economy of Austerity
	CHAIR: Robert Watt (D/Public Expenditure and Reform) 1. Niamh Hardiman (UCD) The politics of austerity budgets 2. Michael Taft (UNITE) The Great Stagnation 3. Frank Barry (TCD), European Integration and Austerity 4. Colm McCarthy, Dubrovnik International University, What Kind of Banking Union for the Eurozone?

(We’ll be updating the conference programme as provisional titles come in).