Irish Miracle ?

[LeftEyeNine]

Louis,

Tribesman, as an Irish, you don't call it miraculous then ?

[lugh]

1) The returning diaspora wasn't that big a factor, in the last decade it's been far outweighed by eastern european and se asian immigration.

2) EU money helped develop a third world infrastructure into . . . a third world infrastrucure. It's one of the peeves I have about EU money, if their going to give it out, keep control of it and ensure it's spent wisely. We blew buckets on idiotic schemes and over paid contractors etc etc. Not money well spent.

3) The real key was the economic climate. We have one of the lowest corporation taxes in the english speaking world. Major companies like Microsoft, Coca Cola etc have used Ireland as a Euro-Afric-Mid East HQ for years, allowing them to play with their books and declare as much as much of their profits in Ireland as possible. The pay lower taxes, Ireland gets billions in tax revenue that we wouldn't otherwise see.

4) Investment in education has all been in the lower levels. Clerical and production line stuff benifitted but our R&D sector suffers because thrid level institutions are not funded enough.