Austerity stinks and it's a broken policy...

[sinkov]

BT, we were discussing the word "austerity" which is now used. Technically I agree with Sinkov but he must also accept that Ireland and Greece also have not seen real austerity.

I think the Irish themselves would know whether they've seen real austerity or not 59, this is from the Irish Examiner in July 2015,

"There is a dark side to Ireland’s ‘success’ that requires discussion about the most effective responses to financial and fiscal crises.
The eight austerity budgets between 2008 and 2014 involved €18.5bn in public-spending cuts and €12bn in tax-raising (revenue) measures. Key public services, in particular health and housing, have been weakened as a result.
Public service staff have been reduced by 10% (37,500). Health spending has been cut by 27% since 2008, resulting in an 81% increase in the number of patients waiting on trolleys and chairs in emergency departments. One-third of all children admitted to hospital suffering with mental-health difficulties have been put in adult wards and the waiting lists for youth mental-health services have increased to 2,818 people.
Funding for local authority housing was cut from €1.3bn, in 2007, to just €83m, in 2013. This meant a loss of 25,000 social-housing units. This is a major contribution to the homelessness crisis, with 1,000 children and 500 families now living in emergency accommodation in Dublin. Because of the decision to prioritise bank recapitalisation and developer debt write-down, homeowner mortgage arrears have escalated. There are 37,000 homeowners in mortgage arrears of over 720 days, and legal repossession notices were issued to 50,000 homeowners.
The cuts to welfare have had devastating impacts. Affected areas include lone-parent supports, child benefit, youth payments, fuel, back-to-school clothing and footwear, rent supplement, and disability and carers’ allowance. But charges were introduced where they did not exist before — putting a further burden on lower-income households. These charges are ‘regressive’, in that they were not tailored to income level. These include water, property, school transport, prescription, A&E and chemotherapy charges. Fees have effectively been reintroduced at third-level (increasing from €1,000 to €3,000). This will have major implications for participation rates from lower-income households. Funding for local community development, youth organisations, drugs prevention, family support, and to combat rural and urban disadvantage was disproportionally hit. Programme funding was reduced by 50%.
We are likely to see the long-term social impacts of these cuts in the further exclusion from the labour force of youths in disadvantaged areas. Issues of drugs and crime will surely worsen."

Public spending in Eire as a % of GDP, with UK's % figure in brackets after it for comparison,

2010... 65.1% (47.8)
2011... 46,3% (46.2)
2012... 41.9% (46.0)
2013... 40.2% (44.2)
2014... 37.6% (43.2)
2015... 28.9% (42.4)
2016... 27.1% (41.5)


https://tradingeconomics.com/ireland...pending-to-gdp

https://tradingeconomics.com/united-...pending-to-gdp

Public spending reduced from 65% of GDP to 27% in six years, as the Irish Examiner says, 8 austerity budgets between 2008 and 2014. The Republic has seen real austerity, we've just been playing at it. I'm not surprised you're unaware of all this 59, virtually every night for years the BBC banged on about 'Austerity' and Tory cuts, while blithely ignoring what was happening across the Irish Sea, so did the Guardian, it just didn't accord with their lefty agenda, they could hardly bang on about Tory austerity if they mentioned the real austerity being inflicted on the Irish. So if you get your news from the BBC and Guardian, this is what happens, you only get to know half the story...….as I've already pointed out earlier on in this thread.

[sinkov]

I've just checked the Greek spending figures.

They seemed to go on a spending spree between 2009 - 2012, but overall I don't think you can claim that, looking at the figures, there has been austerity there either?

https://www.theglobaleconomy.com/Gre...vernment_size/

I'm astonished that someone as involved in politics as you 59 doesn't think there has been austerity in Greece, try telling that to the Greeks, it's a well known and well documented fact. Just google Austerity in Greece.

[Supersub6]

I'm astonished that someone as involved in politics as you 59 doesn't think there has been austerity in Greece, try telling that to the Greeks, it's a well known and well documented fact. Just google Austerity in Greece.

Just walk around the streets of Piraeus and talk to people and you will soon get the picture!

[footy_le_bordel]

You forgot No Gold Reserves because your mate Gordon sold lots off cheap several years ago. There is a certain meaning in the word 'Reserves' ---as far as gold is concerned it equates to cash which can be used in emergency ---like when you need food banks etc., etc. Such a shame that we have nothing to fall back on.

https://www.ft.com/content/5788dbac-...b-00144feabdc0

[Norder]

You forgot No Gold Reserves because your mate Gordon sold lots off cheap several years ago. There is a certain meaning in the word 'Reserves' ---as far as gold is concerned it equates to cash which can be used in emergency ---like when you need food banks etc., etc. Such a shame that we have nothing to fall back on.

Very interesting affair that Sub....announcing it's sale drove the price down to a twenty year low - official reason was to diversify assets away from Gold - invest in such as the then new Euro.....not join it !....and as I read it - there was also another, intriguing story - a few of the TBTF (too big to fail) Banks were short on Gold - the Treasury was approached by a rep of Goldman Sachs informing them of the shortage - hence it's bargain dump and Bank buy back at profit !

"Responsibility is evaded by all bar those on whose shoulders it ought to rest. The gold panic of 1999 was expensively paid for by the British public"


Revealed -- Why Gordon Brown sold Britain's gold at a knock-down price. ...

http://www.gata.org/node/11541

[Supersub6]

Norder--it was another example of politicians looking after themselves and it all backfired because of the way the banks continued along their merry way. Not only did it cost us at the time, we also ended up bailing out a couple of banks and we, the British public, suffered again.

Sorry footy ---I am not subscribing to the FT to read something ----are you a rep for them?

[1959_60]

I think the Irish themselves would know whether they've seen real austerity or not 59, this is from the Irish Examiner in July 2015,

"There is a dark side to Ireland’s ‘success’ that requires discussion about the most effective responses to financial and fiscal crises.
The eight austerity budgets between 2008 and 2014 involved €18.5bn in public-spending cuts and €12bn in tax-raising (revenue) measures. Key public services, in particular health and housing, have been weakened as a result.
Public service staff have been reduced by 10% (37,500). Health spending has been cut by 27% since 2008, resulting in an 81% increase in the number of patients waiting on trolleys and chairs in emergency departments. One-third of all children admitted to hospital suffering with mental-health difficulties have been put in adult wards and the waiting lists for youth mental-health services have increased to 2,818 people.
Funding for local authority housing was cut from €1.3bn, in 2007, to just €83m, in 2013. This meant a loss of 25,000 social-housing units. This is a major contribution to the homelessness crisis, with 1,000 children and 500 families now living in emergency accommodation in Dublin. Because of the decision to prioritise bank recapitalisation and developer debt write-down, homeowner mortgage arrears have escalated. There are 37,000 homeowners in mortgage arrears of over 720 days, and legal repossession notices were issued to 50,000 homeowners.
The cuts to welfare have had devastating impacts. Affected areas include lone-parent supports, child benefit, youth payments, fuel, back-to-school clothing and footwear, rent supplement, and disability and carers’ allowance. But charges were introduced where they did not exist before — putting a further burden on lower-income households. These charges are ‘regressive’, in that they were not tailored to income level. These include water, property, school transport, prescription, A&E and chemotherapy charges. Fees have effectively been reintroduced at third-level (increasing from €1,000 to €3,000). This will have major implications for participation rates from lower-income households. Funding for local community development, youth organisations, drugs prevention, family support, and to combat rural and urban disadvantage was disproportionally hit. Programme funding was reduced by 50%.
We are likely to see the long-term social impacts of these cuts in the further exclusion from the labour force of youths in disadvantaged areas. Issues of drugs and crime will surely worsen."

Public spending in Eire as a % of GDP, with UK's % figure in brackets after it for comparison,

2010... 65.1% (47.8)
2011... 46,3% (46.2)
2012... 41.9% (46.0)
2013... 40.2% (44.2)
2014... 37.6% (43.2)
2015... 28.9% (42.4)
2016... 27.1% (41.5)


https://tradingeconomics.com/ireland...pending-to-gdp

https://tradingeconomics.com/united-...pending-to-gdp

Public spending reduced from 65% of GDP to 27% in six years, as the Irish Examiner says, 8 austerity budgets between 2008 and 2014. The Republic has seen real austerity, we've just been playing at it. I'm not surprised you're unaware of all this 59, virtually every night for years the BBC banged on about 'Austerity' and Tory cuts, while blithely ignoring what was happening across the Irish Sea, so did the Guardian, it just didn't accord with their lefty agenda, they could hardly bang on about Tory austerity if they mentioned the real austerity being inflicted on the Irish. So if you get your news from the BBC and Guardian, this is what happens, you only get to know half the story...….as I've already pointed out earlier on in this thread.

Morning Sinkov.

It's a minefield looking at these charts.

I now see that I was looking at the spending for Northern Ireland - my apologies.

[sinkov]

No worries 59, it is a minefield, the stats are often incomprehensible, and you can't trust the media, virtually all of them have an agenda. For what it's worth, in a day I might swop between the BBC, Skynews, Al Jazeera, RT, Telegraph, Guardian, Staggers, Spectator and Guido Fawkes in an attempt to get a fuller picture, and even after that lot I doubt I know the half of it.

[footy_le_bordel]

@Sinkov

Per capita public spending in ROI (excluding interest payments) was €14,502 in 2016. This was the 2nd lowest among the 11 ‘peer countries’, only exceeding levels observed in the UK (€14,306). The population-weighted average was €17,112 or €2,610 higher than spending in Ireland. Per capita spending was 84.7% of the peer country population weighted average. Scaled over the Irish population this amounts to a relative shortfall in expenditure of €12.3 billion.

so even after all that austerity they're still spending more per head than Uk.

https://www.nerinstitute.net/blog/20...eland-compare/

[alfinyalcabo]

Ah Flooty ..The voice of reason. Lol