Considering a large part of the cost of living expenses is down to fuel prices, what does he expect the government to do? The exchequer isn’t a bottomless pit, and every tax cut or allowance introduced has to be plugged one way or another. The 3rd band of tax is a great idea.
I’m not hearing any ideas from him.
Seems like Ireland hasn’t stopped getting fucked with housing and cost of living since Lord Mountjoy.
Having lived in arid countries, paying for clean water is only fair. The whole problem was with how fucking sketch the government was about whether they planned to privatize the water supply…
There was a cost of living protest last week. I was there, I’d rather have been chilling, dislike Dublin and the hassle of going in but I put that aside, next time more people can join. Nothing will change unless people make a small time sacrifice to actually get out there and make their voices heard. Complaining on the internet does jack shit.
You would have to assume they want to fix this. All evidence would point to the contrary…
**Is there any serious way Paul Murphy can fix this?**
No thought not.
To everyone suggesting that these issues somehow aren’t within the government’s remit to solve, moronically high insurance costs and legal costs are a huge part of the problem in Ireland, and the government has done absolutely sweet fuck all to solve those. The cosy insurance cartel needs to be smashed with actual real, proper enforcement of anti-fixing laws (we have multitudes of evidence that price fixing is endemic and yet nothing ever gets done about it) and a root and branch of liability laws to remove a lot of self-inflicted injuries through clumsiness or intoxication from the responsibility of business owners. These two things alone would massively reduce costs in Ireland, people have been saying this for years and years, and absolutely nothing meaningful has ever been done about it.
And that’s honestly just for starters, there’s so, so, so much more government could and should be doing about why everything costs so much here.
Seems like some of the issues are complex. Being on an island will inevitably add more cost compared to EU countries who all are on the same land sheet.
That said. I’m shocked about the lack of investment by government in things
As an outside observer – what’s the underlying reason for the expense? Lack of building? Institutional owners? Let’s set aside saying “greed” since that exists in every commodity everywhere. I’m just curious as to what spiraled things out.
Re: suggestions for actually reducing the cost of living
I’d start by taking a leaf out of the American’s book. Haul the bosses of oil companies in front of a committee, either at national or European levels, to question them why their profits are at record highs.
The free market approach to energy simply isn’t working. We were told that the ESB monopoly had to end; the regulator forced higher prices to attract competition into the market, for what end? Renewables are slowly but consistently increasing as a share of electricity production; so why are oil prices still the alleged reason for so many increases?
It’s a similar story with retailers, the big guys are making billions out of this country. Again, similar with the housing situation. We’re handing everything over to massive corporate entities and they’re shafting us.
FFG have fucked us repeatedly and they’re laughing at us. Comrade Murphy won’t do fuck all either, he was laughable on Newstalk this morning, claiming that doctors aren’t leaving Ireland because of money, just working conditions, and that nobody should be allowed earn over €150k here. Fuck everybody.
I haven’t got an ounce of the science of economics, but we’re absolutely squeezed in this country.
I’m sure our politicians can be doing way more but I feel like we’re perpetually stuck like this, I’ve no idea what they can do, and it seems like neither do they.
Prices keep increasing but haribos are still at 1€
We all need to simply recognize, that regardless of country, our governments will always let us down.
The only way this can be fixed by government is in two ways. More competition and relaxation of regulation.
Ireland is too small of a market for many companies to bother with, and the complex regulation makes it hard for companies to operate here.
One bit of advice I have for the government is that you should not respond to every failing with tighter regulation. We, as a country need to accept that the cost of cheaper services sometimes comes with a cost of them failing from time to time.
Guillotines.
They could but they don’t want to
One thing I’ll say in regards cost of living is Irish people as a general are very happy to make a quick buck which really exacerbates the issue. From landlords to publicans to tradesmen. When we see money moving around everyone lashes 10, 20 or 30% on for the craic as Irish people will pay it. I’m not saying this is the sole reason for this crisis and I’m also not suggesting the government are not culpable.
The current govt can do plenty, but they won’t. They’ve had since 2008 – 14 years – to prepare for the next recession or an increase in interest rates, to work towards genuinely affordable housing and living wages, but all they’ve done is tinker around the edges, calling their useless plans nice sounding things like ‘Housing for All’
I mean, salaries are also higher here. However, personally, I don’t like prices for alcohol, transportation, GP visits and taxis. 15 euros to have a 5 mins ride? 10 euros for a bottle of cooking wine? 60 euros to have my GP telling me I need paracetamol? That’s too much.
FYI the data is from 2021.
If you look at the underlying data, the price of tobacco and alcohol products in Ireland has a disproportionate influence on the overall figures given our prices on them are so much higher than in other European countries.
Well good luck with that.
We have a political stasis in this country by virtue of our electoral system and focus on local (as opposed to national) mandates.
Every single government in Ireland is big soft centre – either as a centrist party (Fianna Fáil for most of the 20th century) or the aggregate of more ideologically defined parties.
And that’s not going to change.
Sinn Féin is heading in the exact same direction as Fianna Fáil did in the 1930’s and when it comes to fiscal and monetary policy, the left better prepare to get massively disappointed.
I wish the Irish could just take a leaf out of the French peoples book and riot every Saturday until there’s change like they did, I remember they were going to increase fuel prices over there so that’s exactly what they did, made sure the government knew they wouldn’t tolerate being fucked over, in Ireland we’re just happy to accept everything rising, rent prices, fuel prices, cost of living, etc… “ah sure it’ll be grand” and all that shite, it’s the reason why an increasing number of people are starting to leave and move to more affordable countries where they can actually live a life
More competition. Make Ireland a profitable country to do business. Problem is the same people complaining “rip off Ireland” will also complain against company profit margins. I mean they’re literally called People Before Profit so I really don’t think they have a right to complain at spiralling costs when their mandate is to choke competition in favour of state ownership.
I’m sick to the teeth of this country. The most inhospitable place to live while paying extortionate amounts to live here. The “feather your own nest” mentality is atrocious. Little America. Work my arse off, save and zero affordable houses to buy because a fund has bought them all!! Money just evaporates. Stealth taxes everywhere. Deep down, I love my country, its history, our people, our culture but…It’s time for a serious f#@king reset and we start by getting rid of the arseholes that keep punishing us..FF/FG!
They could reduce excessive taxes and motorists, alcohol. They regulate the insurance industry more tightly while trying to introduce more competition. They regulate landlords and just generally tackle the housing crises
I had been, for the past year, looking at doing my master’s in Ireland. Had put the application through, got accepted and had been sent the procedures for fee payment and Visa. Life got in the way, and in April 2022, I had to let my dream go. A week ago, just as a way of looking back at what could have been, I looked at the rent in Dublin. I was glad I didn’t go. It would cost over £10000 for a year’s worth of accomodation alone, and those were the cheapest places I could find. I’m so glad life intervened.
Name and shame the price gougers. There needs to be a customer strike and a boycott of their products until they bring price back into line with the rest of Europe
They could start with not making the situation worse. Stop subsidising landlords and bring in rent pressure zones everywhere. Stop funding and subsidising private developers and start buildings homes. Regulate and tax airbnb or just get rid of the pricks. Tax Every vacancy and derelict home and put them under compulsory sale orders if they refuse to pay it.
Tax derivatives (profits and or sales of they’re not used) at 90%. Most of the price increases we are seeing is from derivatives not actual oil or commodity prices, were being robbed by these parasites.
Stop giving themselves and senior civil service pay rises.
Tax any earnings over a million on a sliding scale up to 90%
Tax second homes twice the amount, 3rd homes triple etc etc
Legalise weed so we don’t have to worry about any of this shit and not be breaking the law
Forgot to say. Use those taxes to pay for childcare, I don’t even have kids but it’s crippling families I know. Use it to fund cheap reliable public transport. Use it to build houses. Use it get rid of fossil fuels and the scumbags that sell them.
Won’t solve all our problems but housing is a problem we and similar economies have created. It’s entirely ours to fix. So is tax avoidance which we all pay for through high house prices and rents.
Renewable energy even fucking nuclear would be better then begging scum like Putin and Saudis MBS to keep the heating on.
Lots of shit we can do but neoliberals will never do it, so the first step is getting rid of them.
This is what happens when people vote against there own interests.
I am going to get crucified for this comment, but one reason we’re outpacing other countries is because of our high minimum wage relative to other nations. It accounts for a large amount of the cost of living.
I’m struggling to find 2022 data, but 20/21 data suggests we have the 4th or 5th highest minimum wage in the world.
I’m not saying this is a bad thing, but it’s likely the largest contributor.
Neo-liberalist government policy guarantees that profit and growth are all the matter, not the welfare of the ordinary hard working person. Fairness is not part of the free market equation. That is why unregulated, unfettered capitalism doesn’t work for the majority; because we have no representation. This has been 40 years in the making since Reagan and Thatcher sent the West on this journey of greed. We are regressing as a society now consequently. There is plenty of money to fund public infrastructure, hospitals, housing etc. and salaries could be fair. The idea that there isn’t enough money is an absolute myth. The problem is that money is in the pockets of the few.
Needs to be a complete absolute disaster of a riot before this country changes, everyone’s too soft I’m honestly down to set up a huge protest outside the dail and just make an absolute mockery of this government and get them to change
There’s more of us then there is of them, they are not going to stop
The sad truth is that there isn’t a whole lot the government can do. Murphy knows this, he is just playing to his audience.
The government could stop wasting public money on only expensive, inefficient capital projects, it could disband loads of useless NGOs and get rid of a lot of the top of the civil service. And put the money saved towards housing, social protection, et cetera but that’s not going to happen!
I find his comparison to the water charges protests interesting. The water charges protests were great and focused when they were locally organised. However, along came the far left with right to water and other co-opted groups. All of a sudden the protests also about calling for open borders, universal basic income, et cetera. The same thing would happen again. Certain political actors and activists would use this as a vehicle to sell their socialist utopia.
(Ironically, it’s open borders immigration thats driving up the demands for rental places and thus prices contributing to higher inflation) that’s a different topic.
One of the demands people are making is a massive increase in the minimum wage to help people cover rising costs. On the face of things, this seems reasonable. But when you study it a little deeper, many businesses will need to raise their prices to cover the extra wage costs…… adding to inflation.
The government could and should look at cutting the excise duty on fuel, fuel costs are part of everything, be it through the construction, production or delivery costs of an item. That could help.
But there are no easy solutions, we no longer have independent central bank that can control interest rates and the money supply.
Ireland is the California of Europe lmao
I guess letting tech companies settle there with low taxes has consequences for everyone not working for those tech companies
36 comments
Considering a large part of the cost of living expenses is down to fuel prices, what does he expect the government to do? The exchequer isn’t a bottomless pit, and every tax cut or allowance introduced has to be plugged one way or another. The 3rd band of tax is a great idea.
I’m not hearing any ideas from him.
Seems like Ireland hasn’t stopped getting fucked with housing and cost of living since Lord Mountjoy.
Ireland and Denmark.
https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2022/0621/1306070-ireland-and-denmark-most-expensive-countries-in-eu/
Having lived in arid countries, paying for clean water is only fair. The whole problem was with how fucking sketch the government was about whether they planned to privatize the water supply…
There was a cost of living protest last week. I was there, I’d rather have been chilling, dislike Dublin and the hassle of going in but I put that aside, next time more people can join. Nothing will change unless people make a small time sacrifice to actually get out there and make their voices heard. Complaining on the internet does jack shit.
You would have to assume they want to fix this. All evidence would point to the contrary…
**Is there any serious way Paul Murphy can fix this?**
No thought not.
To everyone suggesting that these issues somehow aren’t within the government’s remit to solve, moronically high insurance costs and legal costs are a huge part of the problem in Ireland, and the government has done absolutely sweet fuck all to solve those. The cosy insurance cartel needs to be smashed with actual real, proper enforcement of anti-fixing laws (we have multitudes of evidence that price fixing is endemic and yet nothing ever gets done about it) and a root and branch of liability laws to remove a lot of self-inflicted injuries through clumsiness or intoxication from the responsibility of business owners. These two things alone would massively reduce costs in Ireland, people have been saying this for years and years, and absolutely nothing meaningful has ever been done about it.
And that’s honestly just for starters, there’s so, so, so much more government could and should be doing about why everything costs so much here.
Seems like some of the issues are complex. Being on an island will inevitably add more cost compared to EU countries who all are on the same land sheet.
That said. I’m shocked about the lack of investment by government in things
As an outside observer – what’s the underlying reason for the expense? Lack of building? Institutional owners? Let’s set aside saying “greed” since that exists in every commodity everywhere. I’m just curious as to what spiraled things out.
Re: suggestions for actually reducing the cost of living
I’d start by taking a leaf out of the American’s book. Haul the bosses of oil companies in front of a committee, either at national or European levels, to question them why their profits are at record highs.
The free market approach to energy simply isn’t working. We were told that the ESB monopoly had to end; the regulator forced higher prices to attract competition into the market, for what end? Renewables are slowly but consistently increasing as a share of electricity production; so why are oil prices still the alleged reason for so many increases?
It’s a similar story with retailers, the big guys are making billions out of this country. Again, similar with the housing situation. We’re handing everything over to massive corporate entities and they’re shafting us.
FFG have fucked us repeatedly and they’re laughing at us. Comrade Murphy won’t do fuck all either, he was laughable on Newstalk this morning, claiming that doctors aren’t leaving Ireland because of money, just working conditions, and that nobody should be allowed earn over €150k here. Fuck everybody.
I haven’t got an ounce of the science of economics, but we’re absolutely squeezed in this country.
I’m sure our politicians can be doing way more but I feel like we’re perpetually stuck like this, I’ve no idea what they can do, and it seems like neither do they.
Prices keep increasing but haribos are still at 1€
We all need to simply recognize, that regardless of country, our governments will always let us down.
The only way this can be fixed by government is in two ways. More competition and relaxation of regulation.
Ireland is too small of a market for many companies to bother with, and the complex regulation makes it hard for companies to operate here.
One bit of advice I have for the government is that you should not respond to every failing with tighter regulation. We, as a country need to accept that the cost of cheaper services sometimes comes with a cost of them failing from time to time.
Guillotines.
They could but they don’t want to
One thing I’ll say in regards cost of living is Irish people as a general are very happy to make a quick buck which really exacerbates the issue. From landlords to publicans to tradesmen. When we see money moving around everyone lashes 10, 20 or 30% on for the craic as Irish people will pay it. I’m not saying this is the sole reason for this crisis and I’m also not suggesting the government are not culpable.
The current govt can do plenty, but they won’t. They’ve had since 2008 – 14 years – to prepare for the next recession or an increase in interest rates, to work towards genuinely affordable housing and living wages, but all they’ve done is tinker around the edges, calling their useless plans nice sounding things like ‘Housing for All’
I mean, salaries are also higher here. However, personally, I don’t like prices for alcohol, transportation, GP visits and taxis. 15 euros to have a 5 mins ride? 10 euros for a bottle of cooking wine? 60 euros to have my GP telling me I need paracetamol? That’s too much.
FYI the data is from 2021.
If you look at the underlying data, the price of tobacco and alcohol products in Ireland has a disproportionate influence on the overall figures given our prices on them are so much higher than in other European countries.
Well good luck with that.
We have a political stasis in this country by virtue of our electoral system and focus on local (as opposed to national) mandates.
Every single government in Ireland is big soft centre – either as a centrist party (Fianna Fáil for most of the 20th century) or the aggregate of more ideologically defined parties.
And that’s not going to change.
Sinn Féin is heading in the exact same direction as Fianna Fáil did in the 1930’s and when it comes to fiscal and monetary policy, the left better prepare to get massively disappointed.
I wish the Irish could just take a leaf out of the French peoples book and riot every Saturday until there’s change like they did, I remember they were going to increase fuel prices over there so that’s exactly what they did, made sure the government knew they wouldn’t tolerate being fucked over, in Ireland we’re just happy to accept everything rising, rent prices, fuel prices, cost of living, etc… “ah sure it’ll be grand” and all that shite, it’s the reason why an increasing number of people are starting to leave and move to more affordable countries where they can actually live a life
More competition. Make Ireland a profitable country to do business. Problem is the same people complaining “rip off Ireland” will also complain against company profit margins. I mean they’re literally called People Before Profit so I really don’t think they have a right to complain at spiralling costs when their mandate is to choke competition in favour of state ownership.
I’m sick to the teeth of this country. The most inhospitable place to live while paying extortionate amounts to live here. The “feather your own nest” mentality is atrocious. Little America. Work my arse off, save and zero affordable houses to buy because a fund has bought them all!! Money just evaporates. Stealth taxes everywhere. Deep down, I love my country, its history, our people, our culture but…It’s time for a serious f#@king reset and we start by getting rid of the arseholes that keep punishing us..FF/FG!
They could reduce excessive taxes and motorists, alcohol. They regulate the insurance industry more tightly while trying to introduce more competition. They regulate landlords and just generally tackle the housing crises
I had been, for the past year, looking at doing my master’s in Ireland. Had put the application through, got accepted and had been sent the procedures for fee payment and Visa. Life got in the way, and in April 2022, I had to let my dream go. A week ago, just as a way of looking back at what could have been, I looked at the rent in Dublin. I was glad I didn’t go. It would cost over £10000 for a year’s worth of accomodation alone, and those were the cheapest places I could find. I’m so glad life intervened.
Name and shame the price gougers. There needs to be a customer strike and a boycott of their products until they bring price back into line with the rest of Europe
They could start with not making the situation worse. Stop subsidising landlords and bring in rent pressure zones everywhere. Stop funding and subsidising private developers and start buildings homes. Regulate and tax airbnb or just get rid of the pricks. Tax Every vacancy and derelict home and put them under compulsory sale orders if they refuse to pay it.
Tax derivatives (profits and or sales of they’re not used) at 90%. Most of the price increases we are seeing is from derivatives not actual oil or commodity prices, were being robbed by these parasites.
Stop giving themselves and senior civil service pay rises.
Tax any earnings over a million on a sliding scale up to 90%
Tax second homes twice the amount, 3rd homes triple etc etc
Legalise weed so we don’t have to worry about any of this shit and not be breaking the law
Forgot to say. Use those taxes to pay for childcare, I don’t even have kids but it’s crippling families I know. Use it to fund cheap reliable public transport. Use it to build houses. Use it get rid of fossil fuels and the scumbags that sell them.
Won’t solve all our problems but housing is a problem we and similar economies have created. It’s entirely ours to fix. So is tax avoidance which we all pay for through high house prices and rents.
Renewable energy even fucking nuclear would be better then begging scum like Putin and Saudis MBS to keep the heating on.
Lots of shit we can do but neoliberals will never do it, so the first step is getting rid of them.
This is what happens when people vote against there own interests.
I am going to get crucified for this comment, but one reason we’re outpacing other countries is because of our high minimum wage relative to other nations. It accounts for a large amount of the cost of living.
I’m struggling to find 2022 data, but 20/21 data suggests we have the 4th or 5th highest minimum wage in the world.
I’m not saying this is a bad thing, but it’s likely the largest contributor.
Neo-liberalist government policy guarantees that profit and growth are all the matter, not the welfare of the ordinary hard working person. Fairness is not part of the free market equation. That is why unregulated, unfettered capitalism doesn’t work for the majority; because we have no representation. This has been 40 years in the making since Reagan and Thatcher sent the West on this journey of greed. We are regressing as a society now consequently. There is plenty of money to fund public infrastructure, hospitals, housing etc. and salaries could be fair. The idea that there isn’t enough money is an absolute myth. The problem is that money is in the pockets of the few.
Needs to be a complete absolute disaster of a riot before this country changes, everyone’s too soft I’m honestly down to set up a huge protest outside the dail and just make an absolute mockery of this government and get them to change
There’s more of us then there is of them, they are not going to stop
The sad truth is that there isn’t a whole lot the government can do. Murphy knows this, he is just playing to his audience.
The government could stop wasting public money on only expensive, inefficient capital projects, it could disband loads of useless NGOs and get rid of a lot of the top of the civil service. And put the money saved towards housing, social protection, et cetera but that’s not going to happen!
I find his comparison to the water charges protests interesting. The water charges protests were great and focused when they were locally organised. However, along came the far left with right to water and other co-opted groups. All of a sudden the protests also about calling for open borders, universal basic income, et cetera. The same thing would happen again. Certain political actors and activists would use this as a vehicle to sell their socialist utopia.
(Ironically, it’s open borders immigration thats driving up the demands for rental places and thus prices contributing to higher inflation) that’s a different topic.
One of the demands people are making is a massive increase in the minimum wage to help people cover rising costs. On the face of things, this seems reasonable. But when you study it a little deeper, many businesses will need to raise their prices to cover the extra wage costs…… adding to inflation.
The government could and should look at cutting the excise duty on fuel, fuel costs are part of everything, be it through the construction, production or delivery costs of an item. That could help.
But there are no easy solutions, we no longer have independent central bank that can control interest rates and the money supply.
Ireland is the California of Europe lmao
I guess letting tech companies settle there with low taxes has consequences for everyone not working for those tech companies