Amid rising energy costs, it is worth considering how there can be such a severe cost of living crisis in such a wealthy country as Ireland. This is because much of the cost of living crisis is predicated on a cost of decadence crisis. Aspects of this include household decadence such as eating ready meals and takeaways instead of cooking from scratch or growing one’s own vegetables, living in one-off houses and being completely car-dependent, and using excessive electrical appliances. It also entails government decadence such as the expansion of third-level education as well as policies like free school meals.
The building of one-off houses is a symptom of the cost of decadence as the majority of such houses are not built for any agricultural purposes and are essentially a form of suburbanisation. In fact, one is less likely to see vegetables grown by these households than would have been the case among urban or suburban dwellers in previous generations. General problems with one-off housing are that it contributes to the economic unviability of small towns and villages, extends built development into the natural environment, and increases the likelihood of road traffic accidents.
It also makes people completely car-dependent. One-off housing is an inherently expensive way of planning both for the householder and the taxpayer. The householder will have to bear the costs of running a car for every purpose as well as having to install a septic tank instead of having their house connected to a sewer.
There is also the extra cost to the taxpayer in terms of the extra expense of connecting such households with electricity, delivering post, providing school buses, and maintaining roads. One-off householders are also likely to consume more healthcare as they are unhealthier because they are unable to walk anywhere. The public and private costs have now converged with recent fuel cost rises as the car-dependent population requires a reduction of taxation in order to alleviate the cost of driving.
It would be cheaper and more convenient for people as well as cheaper for the taxpayer if all new houses were confined to within a short walking distance to the nearest settlement. The only exception would be for people who are engaged in commercially-viable and environmentally sustainable farming. This would massively reduce the reliance on petrol and therefore the cost of living.
Another cost of decadence crisis relates to formal education. This can be seen in secondary level and especially third level. This policy is another where everything about it is a bad idea whereby it entails a waste of the child’s time, a waste of taxpayer money, the financial crippling of universities, the degradation and overproduction of degrees, and an increase cost to parents. Formal education is seldom an investment but rather a form of consumption. The expansion of third level has not occurred because so many Irish children are above average but rather because policy has turned universities from advanced academic institutions into a general level of education.
Nor has third-level expansion caused the increased wealth in the country over the last thirty years as is sometimes claimed. The causation is the other way around whereby the increasing wealth- which has emanated from foreign direct investment and/or multi-national company tax laundering- has led governments to produce new ways of spending and wasting money.
An examination of why there are extra students compared to thirty years ago shows that we have merely placed into third level subjects such as woodwork, metalwork, culinary, textiles, and nursing which could and should be learned at secondary level. We also send unacademic students to study subjects such as Arts, Business, Computing, and Law with the inevitable high dropout rate and the overproduction of degrees. A government cannot claim it does not have the resources for worthy matters when it wantonly wastes so much money on pseudo-tertiary education. A solution would be if there were secondary technical schools, an Honours Level-only Leaving Cert, and extremely selective universities.
Another example of decadence has been the introduction of “free school meals”. This is another expensive and unnecessary policy. Primary school children do not need a large meal at lunchtime, and it costs next to nothing for their parents to provide a packed lunch. A lack of a child having a packed lunch therefore is the result of negligence. The taxpayer is already paying for schools to have a liaison officer with parents, as well as for Tusla to investigate negligence. In addition to these, children are now given meals that none of them need or should require, and which almost none actually require. These meals are inevitably innutritious as well as being unwanted and uneaten by many children.
Further decadence relates to needless electrical use such as dishwashers, tumble dryers, televisions, and subscriptions. None of these are really necessary and were not used a few generations ago. If the vast majority of a household’s meals were cooked from scratch, then they would save large amounts of money as well as being healthier. Additionally, if people lighted fires to heat their homes, there wouldn’t be a need for home-heating oil. Further decadence can be seen when people take foreign holidays rather than domestic ones.
It is therefore clear that notwithstanding the fuel inflation, much of the high cost of living in Ireland is due to household and governmental decadence whereby both increase consumption commensurate with rising wealth. The cost of living would reduce if people had simpler standards of living.
Good article. Your correspondent should check out the deli counter in his local supermarket, where he will find armies of Billy and Bessie Bunters tucking into their pre school breakfasts as their loving parents look on. Local holidays, a great idea but who could afford that?
Wait til the economy crashes, the interest on the national derbt increases and countless other chickens come hope to roost. That should be fun
Very stupid article
Totally agree. It seems the simplest of Marxist morons has been allowed to write for the Burkean. The invasion is still ongoing.
Totally agree. It seems the simplest of Marxist morons has been allowed to write for the Burkean. The invasion is still ongoing.
Despite the ai saying otherwise this is a new comment.
Why are communists allowed to write for the Burkean now?
“General problems with one-off housing are that it contributes to the economic unviability of small towns and villages,”
Nonsense. It increases the viability of villages.
“extends built development into the natural environment,”
It is perfectly possible for the built environment to complement the natural environment. My one off house does.
” and increases the likelihood of road traffic accidents.”
Nonsense. Death on the roads is due to carelessness and malice. Plenty of it in the cities.
“It also makes people completely car-dependent”
Nonsense. There were plenty more one off houses before the car was even invented.
Sewerage is also nonsense. Compost toilets are a thousand times more efficient and eco-friendly than the satanically insane notion of pumping clean water for miles, crapping in it and then pumping the sewerage for more miles. What happens to your sewerage system when the electricity fails?? Dublin will be knee deep in sewage.
(I have a tiny one off cottage for a tiny rent available, five miles from Sligo. Get in touch.)
Otherwise, some good points in the article.
Diarmuid: fatal crashes are disproportionately more common on rural roads in Ireland. While rural roads account for the majority of the nation’s road network, they are the site of a vastly disproportionate number of fatal collisions, some 85% between 2019-2023. Ireland has the third-highest proportion of road deaths on rural roads in the EU (67% between 2020-2022), significantly above the EU average of 52%
Killing people on the roads is encouraged and promoted by the Gardai and judicial system. Using higher death rates on rural roads to argue against one off housing is nonsense and faulty logic.
If you report dangerous driving to Leitrim cops, they will not investigate it and will turn nasty on you. Phil Faughnan, of Carrick on Shannon tidy towns reported that only last week, at 1am, crowds of boy racers tore up the town. The cops cowered in the cop shop and did nothing. The more people killed on the roads, the more overtime for them. They welcome it.
Two irishmen, Ger Mayock and Dammo from Dublin were passengers in van driven by an Englishman in north Leitrim. He crashed, survived, but his passengers died. His excuse was that he was so drunk and drugged that he didn’t remember driving his van. Cops, DPP and judges all agreed that he could not be prosecuted.
The local lumpen proletariat scum do doughnuts at the Five Roads outside Dromahaire. Their parents are part of the Covid power structure locally, so the cops allow it. One boasted to my face: I have my tax and insurance. I don’t care if I kill somebody.
If you are one of the protected class in rural Ireland, you can kill people on the road and the Gardai, DPP and judges will cover up for you. It’s one of the perks of the job.
Two white people were killed in Sligo by Pakistani drivers. One was given a token fine, the other, a female health care worker, was filmed giggling with laughter after killing a little old Irish lady. The cops boasted to me that they allowed her to flee the jurisdiction and they won’t bother extraditing her.
Micky Green, Anglo-Jewish drug dealer killed a Dublin taxi driver and got away with it.
The Gardai will take great pleasure in taking car off an Irishman who is a day out on his insurance payments but they will happily ignore complaints of dangerous driving by protected scum.
I invite you try to report dangerous driving to the gardai: At best, they will do nothing, at worst they will start harassing you.
Higher death rates on rural roads are NOT caused by one off housing. They are caused by protected scum who perceive that they can kill others with impunity. Which they can.
☘️☘️☘️
A Globo Commo Decadent Rant N Rave
Ushering in their 15 minute City Controlled Prison Slums or Last Centuary Living as an
alternative lifestyle…NO NGOV BLAME.
Everything now is Our Fault not Government
Our Existance, Our Presence, Our Eating Living Working Schooling Sick Daily Strife is
not blamed on incompetant unaccountable
overpaid and tax funded wasters n parasites
that created THEIR DECADENT LIFESTYLE
…no No NO…it is You and Me…Our Fault For
Being Born in Their Irish Dump They Created
Agreed. How was this allowed on the Burkean? Utter drivel.
The only comment I have to make is that the vast majority or rural dwellers are hopelessly equipped for rural living. Very few rural homesteads produce their own firewood, their own vegetables or possess the knowledge or tooling to carry out basic DIY tasks. Living in the countryside just so they can look at it, not partake in it.