Ireland’s Economic Crisis: What sort of hole are we in and how do we get out? | Ronan Lyons

As Ireland's economic crisis increases we have to find some way out. It entails a lot of pain and hardship which will be heaped upon workers and people on Social Welfare. The 5% to 10% wealthy people in our country will always find ways of not paying, it would probably cost more than we would get to tackle them in the first place. What are we left with, Increased Taxation and Cuts. Obviously we can't go on spending more than we take in ( 15bn - 18bn ), we have to cut this deficit. The Fiscal Treaty is supposed to keep Government's borrowings and Deficits in line. Voting yes will mean austerity for years to come but with some safety nets, voting no will mean austerity for years to come but will cut us off from the ESM ( European Stabilisation Mechanism )  or a second bail-out which we probably will need.

Solutions

1. We have to reduce Public Sector Expenditure more, which will probably cause strikes and chaos.
About €2bn each will have to come from social welfare, public sector pay, investment in infrastructure and almost €4bn will have to come from healthcare, where the odd situation exists that Ireland, by far the EU15′s youngest country spends significantly more per capita on healthcare than any of its peers. A long-term strategy, though, must tackle the reason public spending was able to get so out of control in the first place: public sector organisations got money from an indeterminate central pot and therefore did not have to manage their budgets. Giving public sector organisations responsibility for managing their finances, and their people, must be the solution to sustainable long-term public spending.

2. Our Tax system must be sorted out by  (1) reducing tax credits back into line with countries like France and Germany, (2) introducing a property tax, and (3) ensuring fairness by bringing in a flat income tax of 33% on earnings over €250,000, not unlike the Swiss scheme.

3. Manage our Banking sector so as this reckless lending and borrowing never happens again.

Ireland can and will get out of this mess.