There is a new and interesting blog written mainly, but not exclusively, by geographers at http://irelandafternama.wordpress.com/
For a start, people may want to take a look at this map of vacant properties developed after 2006 – the national vacancy rate in 2006 was 15% but this updates the pattern with data on vacancies in properties developed after 2006, with some small areas going above 50%.
Floods do a lot of damage.
Floods also harm production, but Ireland has overcapacity at the moment. Flood repairs are labour-intensive, and a lot of stuff will need to be replaced. This will partly be paid for by the insurance companies, who will in turn get their money back from international reinsurers. Affected households will also tap their savings.
Flood restoration thus stimulates demand.
We don’t want floods. But if we must have floods, and if we could time floods, we would have them in the depths of a recession.
This is no consolation for those affected.
See also the Irish Times
WIllem Buiter has had a varied career in academia and government service. Most recently, he has been a prominent economics blogger via the Maverecon site (hosted by the FT). The Maverecon blog is now ceasing, since he has a new job as chief economist at Citi. See the announcement here.
Governor Honohan made a speech last night on this topic: the text is here.
This blog began on December 2nd 2008. Many thanks to all contributors and commentators for building this site into a useful forum for the analysis and discussion of topics relating to the Irish economy (and beyond).