Yeah it’s amazing that the Govt can refuse to carry out Troika orders and ignore bailout terms when it suits them….

http://www.change.org/petitions/supporting-the-irish-nation-step-down-from-government?share_id=LpnFLhYHxv&utm_campaign=share_button_mobile&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=share_petition&utm_term=31913167

Sean
The Minister said there would be no increase in INCOME TAX RATES in the forthcoming Budget. Now that you’ve read his undertaking at least once doesn’t it make your rant look somewhat inaccurate.

Paddy do you ever get frustrated defending what government does?

Relax everyone. The extra income tax generated by the 100,000 people,lucky enough to get one of the new jobs Enda promised, will more than cover the shortfall.With all this extra revenue, they might even be able to reduce the tax rates. This government told us they had a five point plan almost two years ago. I’m convinced this plan will save us all. I can’t figure out why they haven’t rolled it out yet though. Ah sure, maybe their holding off until things get really bad!!

Fianna Fail are the ones that screwed ya. These fools are stuck with the FF mess

And they’re handling it in the exact same manner as Fianna Fail would have.

Well I didn’t hear anyone in FG saying stop you spending too much while in opposition,everyone seems to forget that Richard Bruton was advocating benchmarking while in opposition along with his colleagues,if you look at their previous general election pledges during the boom they and labour where pledging to spend more and cut tax rates further,I think if they got in power things could of been even worse,

So do something;
http://www.change.org/petitions/supporting-the-irish-nation-step-down-from-government?share_id=LpnFLhYHxv&utm_campaign=share_button_mobile&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=share_petition&utm_term=31913167

So do something;

http://www.change.org/petitions/supporting-the-irish-nation-step-down-from-government?share_id=LpnFLhYHxv&utm_campaign=share_button_mobile&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=share_petition&utm_term=31913167

Cut services, target the vulnerable as usual, whilst not targeting the rich. People earning over 200k only pay 36% tax. Up it a few percent they won’t miss it. Not to mention the top earners in Ireland.
I was at a conference the other day that highlighted the top 1% seen the earning continuously rise as the rest of us saw out income drop.
If they raise vat again and cut services it’s the least well off will have to pay because they use up all their income. As are they employed in services that will be cut.

Tom. You numbers seem funny. How is it 36%? Besides. even if it is. Isn’t 36% of 200k 62k? That seems like a lot anyway.But I would like to know where you got 36% from please?

You could read this article from another perspective ,,,
“FFG/Labour commit to not creating a third rate of income tax for all those earning 100k,
They commit to heaping disproportionate pain on the families who are suffering the most through in-direct taxation.”

Exactly Cal. Income tax can at least be applied progressively. This is just another cover for fine gael to introduce more measures which hit poorer people harder, like their increase in VAT rates.

I’d say Tom has not included PRSI and USC when he worked out 36%. 36% is the rate of income tax alone that an unmarried PAYE worker earning €200k would pay. But on top of that they would pay approx 4% PRSI and 7% USC which is a total tax rate of 47%. Hardly an insignificant proportion of their earnings. (I do not earn €200k or anything close to it by the way!!! Just think people need to be basing their arguments on actual facts). Do you think that someone who hands over basically half of their earnings to the taxman isnt paying a fair share?

We don’t have many bondholders left to pay, so that slogan is a bit dated.

Norman
I can be hypercritical of Government but for now we need a functioning and decision making Government and Cabinet who will need to be ruthless at certain times to protect us from ourselves because we have but two choices.
The first of those is to revert to type and continue the mindless stupidity of what I call Magic Economics. It doesn’t make any sense but it tries to prevent any confrontation with reality.
The second is to balance our books because the one people prepared to lend us the money we are spending but not earning. You see we’ve really run out of any form of collateral so we are lucky to still have those friends and Germany is the biggest of them.
If we opt for the first position then we will certainly slide into the deepest and darkest pit that could be imagined with all State Social Protection payments at subsistence levels of around ten Euro a week and Services collapsing to the type last seen in the 1920’s.Unemployment would reach fort per cent and public Health Services not exist.
Those are the circumstances in which I support the Government virtually without question. It doesn’t mean I agree or approve of everything they do but the alternative is unthinkable.
To put the shoe on the other foot ………how wrong do you believe I am in the position I adopt?

Joan, the budget shortfall for this year is 18 billion. This year also, we will pay 18 billion to bondholders. Its simple math, no payments to bondholders, no budget deficit for 2012.

werejammin. what about next year though. when no one will buy irish bonds cos we don’t pay out. will we cut spending then?

Darren, our ability to borrow money and at what rate is determined by the markets perception of our ability to pay it back in the future. This is why we were priced out of the bond markets as soon as we accepted banking debt on the sovereign with the guarantee. Removing that link leaves us in a better position to repay bonds, thereby lowering the rates available to us.

Do you mean payments to bank bondholders or government bondholders? Assuming it’s the latter then there’s absolutely no logic to your argument. Those bonds are effectively what fund most government expenditure.

You’re also setting a precedent that, if you’re having trouble repaying debts, you might be inclined to default, which could be argued, will mean even higher rates than we have at the minute. That’s assuming of course, that people would even be willing to buy our bonds.

The only ‘precedent’ is the subversion of capitalism by a government covering private banking losses on the backs of its citizens. The markets will lend to the sovereign, the rate being determined by our ability to repay our own debts, not private entities.

@ Europe has in no way made Idiots of the Irish people. Either the Irish government of the time, or the Irish electorate, in their voting choices in elections or referendums, has brought us to the stage we’re at. Passing the buck didn’t help before and it won’t help now. We’re not victims, we were willing participants.

Mark, if you don’t know what you are talking about then you would be better off saying nothing.
SF voted against the bill when it was introduced. You said they voted in support of it. Is this what FFg/FF/Labour are reduced to? Putting out suggestions that are totally incorrect?

SF did vote tentative support of the preliminary bank guarantee bill when it came into the Dail for first reading. But when FF brought in the bill for final ratification and included that all the bond-holders should be paid, SF voted against it.

Did you not know that, or was your comment meant to be mis-leading? I would love to hear your answer.

Matt
If you made that statement in Germany you would be arrested and charged under their strict anti Nazi code and in the context in which you use the term you would deserve the same here as an incitement to hatred. If you used some common sense and some degree of logic you might actually be aware that without Frau Merkel and her Government we would be reduced to the poverty levels of Albania or North Korea. We haven’t yet put the brakes on our overspending as a Nation and we never hear whingers like you say where you would cut the twelve billion we borrow every year from our friends if Angela and the others decided to say enough is enough.
So Matt let’s say you bet what you want and then we cannot borrow any more……how would you balance the books?

@ Paddy – No Matt wouldn’t. He used the same lazy Nazi comparison many do, which just shows a lack of wit and imagination and originality. But the word “Führer” is perfectly acceptable in German; it doesn’t mean “boss” or “dictator”, it just means “guide”. A travel-guide, like a Lonely Planet, is a “Reiseführer”. So, Matt made a stupid comment that could be considered offensive to Germans due to its ignorance, and you replied with a stupid comment that could be offensive to Germans due to its ignorance. I reckons you’re both even, so. Better to have a blanket agreement to not use cheap, lazy Nazi references in the first place.

Don’t know about day to day Germany, but on the internet reductio ad hitlerum is generally the sign of a beaten debater.

Yeah. Let’s make sure we penalise success so we can keep high and never ending welfare payments. That will keep money flowing in the economy.

I think the point is that we will like the result of defaulting more than they won’t like the result of defaulting, as, without the bail-out cash coming in, we won’t have money for public sectors workers, including the front-line workers that we needed. Think a little more on the results.

Those results are far starker now than they would have been in 2008.

Yes, they are. Of we were to opt out if the Euro and/or the “close” position we have in the EU, the time to have done it would have been before the bail-out as an alternative to the bail-out. The reason not to default isn’t that we must remain loyal, it’s that, no matter what, we’ve the best part of ten hard years ahead of us, but those hard years would be far worse if we defaulted. That is only my opinion, but I’d need to see a lot of serious data before I’d change my mind. ( And please don’t mention Iceland, :-) The reasons why the comparison diesn’t work have been done to death here… )

Mark, straight answer requested to a straight question …
Did SF vote for the final bill?
The provisional bill when it was introduced was only mean to guarantee private/company deposits up to 100k.
SF voted in support of that Bill. Labour voted against it (but only on a technicality), go research that if you dont believe me

When the final Bill was introduced to the Dail, SF and Labour voted against it, as it approved securing the Bond-holders. However, even though Labour voted against the Bill (while in opposition), they have since completed another of their famous turn-arounds and supported every payment (BILLIONS) through the Dail (including a 1 billion paymnent just as recently as 3 weeks ago to totally unsecured bond-holders).

So, in summary, Labour are no different to FFG/FF, They have supported every effort to pay unsecured Bondholders. Yet you make the insinuation that SF supported this, when it is totally and utterly inaccurate.

Please respond to my post with actual facts in support of your argument, or say nothing at all.

FFG/Labour/FF self serving Ireland for decades, at the expense of the Irish people.