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A GROUP REPRESENTING Irish businesses has said there are clear signs that the economy has picked up in recent months.
IBEC said it was “cautiously optimistic” that economic indicators will continue to get better in the second half of the year and off-set the bad figures from the start of 2013. The group said that trading has improved in recent months and said the good weather which saw heatwaves across large parts of the country in recent weeks should help.
Figures from the Central Statistics Office show Ireland officially re-entered recession at the end of June as the economy shrank for the third quarter in a row.
“It was a difficult start to the year, but there are signs of renewed economic momentum in the economy,” said IBEC’s chief economist Fergal O’Brien. However he warned that consumers remain cautious about spending money.
IBEC has called on the Government to drop plans for €500 million in tax increases to be included in Budget 2014 in a bid to increase consumer confidence and help business.
“The tough austerity programme of recent years means we now have choices that we previously didn’t,” said O’Brien. “Irish taxpayers deserve a break.”
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Who cares what ibec think and say. ibec are only happy when employees are downtrodden and conditions reduced. pack of cronies the lot of them.
This must be the first time there has been a report on ibec where they aren’t actually moaning about something maybe next week they will be moaning about days lost to people taking holidays
Quantitative easing. The government pumped tens of thousands of cheap menswear garments into the market. After years of rationing, the Strategic Penneys Reserve was tapped and shorts flooded into the shops.
So….when a bit of sunshine increases spending (aggregate demand) it’s….oh, the economy is picking up…
But, when the Troika tells our spineless (minus a smidge for Gilmore’s latest objection) government to reduce spending by €3 billion Euro per year, they still expect growth, or spin some ‘growth friendly consolidation’ cr@p at us.
Funny that, they never seem to notice the contradictory reasoning.
We have got away so far with GDP stagnation so far because:
Our GDP is massively skewed by the foreign MNCs booking sales thru’ Ireland. It rebounded after the original financial sector shock, but has little affect on our real domestic economy which has been strangled. The ‘rebound’ is finishing as the rest of Europe is being strangled by austerity, now reaching to the core economies like Germany itself.
A couple of things have helped stem the reduction in domestic demand spending.
One is that banks’ were forced to hold off dealing with mortgage arrears, so people used that ‘arrears’ facility to maintain spending in other areas. This, inevitably is not sustainable. The arrears situation will be resolved in the next year or so, therefore we will see a much greater effect from this coming soon.
Substantial net emigration has not only made the unemployment figures look artificially better, but unemployment benefit spending has been lower than it would have been.
All things combined, and with further crises developing in Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, Greece (again, austerity is killing them & any ability to pay) the inherent store of resilience we’ve had is going to run out & the effects of austerity are going to become much more severe if we keep cutting budgets.
The sun is going to save the economy yeah ok.. And I suppose the man in the moon is going to create jobs . fair play to them
Its true that on warm sunny days people spend more money. Its not make believe, its proven economics. The figures will speak for themselves :-)
Not everywhere. Our sales go through the floor when it’s sunny, it’s always been that way, the last place people want to be is in a shopping centre or supermarket, they head for the beach or parks. I guess icecream men and shops near the tourist hotspots do ok.
Why can’t IBEC be called a union representing business instead of a group, Be like an employee union called a group
There should be no personal taxes set by this islands single government.
We should be split into five provincial government areas and each is responsible for that area’s taxes and expenditures along with utilities management.
There should be two-yearly elections for each administrative province and a four yearly election for a federal country government.
Dublin should be the fifth province and again, its budget and taxes determined by its directly elected provincial government.
Commercial rents too high in Dublin? Galway wants more business ? Fine, Galway enacts lower taxes and commercial business rates. Dublin has to act or face losses.
It creates healthy competition which at the moment is seriously lacking and is currently determined mostly by gombeen corruption with no consequences for poor performance.
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