Tag: Economics

Arthur Griffith and the National System of Political Economy

“Brushing aside the fallacies of Adam Smith and his tribe, List points out that between the individual and humanity stands, and must continue to stand, a great fact – the nation.” – Arthur Griffith, ‘The Resurrection of Hungary’ International Ideology...

/ 16/08/2020

The Overton Hourglass

June, 2003: shortly after take-off, an ultralight aircraft crashes near Caro, Michigan. The pilot is a newlywed man in his early forties. He dies in the wreckage.  His name was Joseph Overton. In the world of politics, however, Joseph Overton...

/ 22/10/2019

EU-Mercosur Deal is a Symptom of Neoliberal Exhaustion

The culmination of twenty years of intermittent trade negotiations, the EU-Mercosur trade deal stands to open up fissures in Irish life. Aiming to liberalise trade barriers between the EU and the four membered South American bloc over a ten year...

/ 04/07/2019

Thoughts on Irish Taxation

There is much discussion about the tax code; whether it is broad based and whether we should be running surpluses. It is assumed that surpluses are the definitive measure of fiscal responsibility, though this isn't always the case. Governments ran...

/ 22/06/2019

A Tale of Neoliberals and Leftists

We often hear the term Neoliberal being thrown about, sometimes as description, more often demeaning, but hardly ever used as a term of self-identification. Before we go further, it is important that we make a distinction here between ‘Leftists’ and...

/ 11/09/2018

Ireland’s Traveller Policy: An Inherent Contradiction

The ‘National Traveller and Roma Inclusion Strategy’ (2017 – 2021), published in June 2017 described Travellers and Roma as “among the most disadvantaged and marginalised people in Ireland”. The Report provides strong evidence for this marginalization citing for example that...

/ 19/08/2018

The Built-In Revolution in Free Markets

Indy100, the Independent’s sort of sideshow for the less literate, was delighted with Ryanair’s woes last month. “Theresa May hails the free market hours after Ryanair cancels flights of 400,000 people,” it crowed, the implication obviously being that if the...

/ 30/10/2017

Abundistan: The Perception of Infinite Resources.

Everything, except perhaps human ignorance, is finite. A telling aphorism for sure, but in the matter of economics and governance, ignorance of finite means to meet our ends is the cause of many bad outcomes. Modern politics in the post...

/ 26/09/2017

Promoting Economic Freedom in Ireland: Challenges and Opportunities

When it comes to economics, we are regularly told by voices on the political left that, since the foundation of the state, Ireland has been dominated by two right-wing political parties and that it is high time that the country’s...

/ 15/09/2017