The Economy - What would YOU do?

[poulgorm]

Forget about NAMA on this thread - Daithi has initiated an excellent thread on that (wish I could understand it all).

We are where we are. What would you do if you were in charge? My suggestions:

1. Leave the Euro and go back to our Punt. Devalue (or let it float) by, say, 20% (or maybe more). Or let it float. This would make our wage rates (relative to other currencies) more competitive and we should start to attract some new foreign investment again. And keep the ones we have.
2. Wage freeze (NOT wage cuts) for 3 years
3 The devaluation will cause inflation, though (imports will cost more). The wage freeze would be painful, but I see no way out of some pain. When the inflation has worked through the system, re-join (possibly) the Euro, at the new, lower exchange rate
4 Without a devaluation, I see no way of not avoiding major wage cuts. Wage cuts will cause major social unrest.
5 Government levies are not wage cuts - even if the effects on the employees are the same.

[daithi81]

Just to note, if you require explanation or links to reading materials on anything I mention in that other thread, just ask.

[diar2me]

Forget about NAMA on this thread - Daithi has initiated an excellent thread on that (wish I could understand it all).

We are where we are. What would you do if you were in charge? My suggestions:

1. Leave the Euro and go back to our Punt. Devalue (or let it float) by, say, 20% (or maybe more). Or let it float. This would make our wage rates (relative to other currencies) more competitive and we should start to attract some new foreign investment again. And keep the ones we have.
2. Wage freeze (NOT wage cuts) for 3 years
3 The devaluation will cause inflation, though (imports will cost more). The wage freeze would be painful, but I see no way out of some pain. When the inflation has worked through the system, re-join (possibly) the Euro, at the new, lower exchange rate
4 Without a devaluation, I see no way of not avoiding major wage cuts. Wage cuts will cause major social unrest.
5 Government levies are not wage cuts - even if the effects on the employees are the same.

Agreed public sector should get a widespread pay cut, from the top down. I really am sick of hearing of the work they do. I'm sure they think the rest of the country get paid for doing nothing.

[jd26]

1. Leave the Euro and go back to our Punt. Devalue (or let it float) by, say, 20% (or maybe more). Or let it float. This would make our wage rates (relative to other currencies) more competitive and we should start to attract some new foreign investment again. And keep the ones we have.

Do you even begin to realise ho catastrophic this would be for the Irish economy?

The immediate reaction would be everybody taking their money out of the country because they know Ireland is about to devalue. Other people would just withdraw Euro cash, which would have the same value if spent in France, Germany or wherever. Irish banks, which are already pretty screwed would go bust.

Our external debts would still be in Euro, but we'd have to pay for them in our new weakened currency. It would be like dropping everyone's salary by 20%, but leaving them with the same debts.

Many of our external purchases would still be in Euro. Inflation would go through the roof as everything would now cost 25% more.

You'd then add overheads on to Irish business. A 3% charge any time they want to sell or buy in the Eurozone. You also force them to change all their accounting systems again, with all the cost that entails.

And what do we get? A small currency that is wide open to attack by speculators. Denmark currently spends 3% of its national income just doing that. The fact is that it's very difficult for a country of our size to have an independent currency.

In fact, we've never had one. We were tied to Sterling til the late 70s. Then we came the closest we were to independent - we tried to maintain a balance between our rate relative to Sterling and the Deutch Mark. By the early 90s, we were tied to the Deutsch Mark alone and finally we were tied to the Euro.

What of interest rates for this independent currency? Well, to make some attempt to stop the flight of capital from the country and to keep rampant inflation under control, we would be looking at interest rates of 7-8% at least. Try explaining that one to mortgage holders who have seen their salaries cut by 20%.

As it is, the Euro is the only thing standing between us and complete economic catastrophe. Should we really drop it just because we started paying ourselves too much?

[leesider]

1. Sorry to be mentioning the banks but with NAMA I would go after the bondholders to a certain degree so that the liability for the taxpayer is not as big
2. Immediately implement the recommendations of An Bord Snip Nua
3. Bord Snip was not allowed comment on pay but there has been recommendations from another report including cutting tds' salaries by 20% so immediately implement these cuts
4. Stop using the CPI for inflation as I think this is the one that includes mortgages, if then it is truely going down by a sizeable amount we can think about reducing social welfare and the minimum wage but not by too much
5. Other public sector reforms such as abolishing quangos etc
6. Do something now about our energy dependence to create sustainable jobs
7. Tackle supermarkets on prices paid to farmers to help out the agri sector and maintain jobs......I see the EC has already started trying to tackle this, the margins are massive and the money is going to the large supermarkets
8. Get those with the skills that were laid off to come together to form new business initiatives......eg lads were let go from a company in Mahon a few years ago and did this very well
9. Reduce the costs for setting up a business and incentivise it.......not too sure on this as I don't know what grants are currently available

[Bennyton]

Make me Minister for transport...

Seriously, I believe a lot can be done about rectifying our economy with some sort of a decent public/private transport system..

Stop issuing new taxi plates from today, stop issuing new hackney licences for 5 years(old ones can still be renewed like), Limit the rates for taxi's, they're extortionate and more people would use em' if they were at a reasonable price.

One set level of income tax per driver of each taxi/ same deal for a hackney driver.

Limit all bus fares in city's to 1 euro, 50 cent for Pensioners and kids up to 16.

Bring it down to 1.50 for travel from rural areas to city's.
City to City travel should be a tenner.

Introduce Cheaper monthly ticket prices in schools and Colleges for kids and students.(or give it to em for free with their registration fees, charge em for parking)

Set up an sms service where a passenger waiting for a bus texts the number of the bus he/she intends to travel on to a premium rate(30 cent) service run by Bus Eireann...a text is sent back to the phone with a message saying where the bus is now and when the bus will reach the stop that the passenger is at...very basic idea and could generate millions.
(advertise it at bus stops...)

The state should pick up any deficit, a decent system of public transport helps the economy if people are able to travel further to work economically and in decent time..


Take away the flying tax, it doesn't make any sense and is literally crippling the airline industry.

Reinstate Aer Rianta, The DAA is taking the piss at the moment...anyone see this shit about the duty free's in Irish airports being called "The Loop" total bollocks...what D4 wanker came up with that one?...makes no fucking sense and is a waste of money when Cork and Shannon are both going down the shitter...they should have spent the money on improving the type of products sold there and not just another re branding...



Benefits

More young people taking the bus means less cars on the road, lower national carbon emissions, sell the credits to Portugal..

Less crashes on the road, less dead youngins.

Helps students and kids get where they need to go, "knowledge economy" and all that.

Helps people get to work in decent time, at a decent rate, ie. worthwhile for them to get off the dole and work a few hours.

Let Aer Rianta cover Cork Airports Debt, which It could do quite easily, set a uniform level of flying fee's between the 3 main airports and let Michael O' Leary go suck a lemon.

Capital costs are minimal,

Less people on social welfare,

Less people driving,

Less parking and congestion problems,

More money put into the economy,

Better for tourism...


I mean really "there's-a-er...€10 leaving town tax"

"Who the fuck are you, mayor Quimby!?"


....just off the top of my head at the moment like...if I'd four years I'm sure I'd find more stuff...

[irishmonkey]

decent public transport would help but good luck trying to sort the bus service.
you cant get to where you want to go from where you are and you cant do it during a reasonable time and a reasonable cost.
I can drive to Dublin cheaper and faster than a train.
I can travel on a Sunday without a problem ( good luck doing that on a bus )
I can visit people in the country - buses only stop at town and villages and maybe a hidden bus stop in a random ditch.
public transport is a joke

i would cut the amount of managers and committees in the hse - as in cull them.
committees are only set up to avoid responsibility - the committee made the decision.
any manager that has not made a decision or proposal by themselves in the last year please queue up outside the dole office.

half the number of TDs and senators
all expenses require receipts.
all flights are by comerical aircraft only
no using guards to drive cars
all state cars are driven by state personnel and no chauffeurs.
only emergency vehicles are allowed to brake the speed limit.

build a super prison on spike island
remove all sky boxes from prisons - TV with the bogger channels only will be provided in community areas.
all TVs will be removed from Cells and sold/raffled
All assets taken from criminals by the state will be sold at auction.
All prisioners must work in order to be fed and taken care of. be it cooking meals for other prisoners etc. no work - go sleep in the yard.

all public departments are allowed a rolling budget.
ie if you do not spend your budget by the end of the year it is added to your budget next year
this will stop wasteful spending.

remove car tax but increse fuel tax - these should balance
no more car tax offices needed ,guards no longer need to check tax disks etc.no time taken up in court

cut RTEs funding.
remove the TV license and increase tax on TVs- again so they balance out taking into account most houses have multiple TVs
no license inspectors, no time taken up in court. eases the load on the post office.

all cop cars to be fitted out so that prisoners can be chucked in the back safely, so the prisoner cannot attack the driver.
currently it takes 3 guards to transport 1 prisoner.

All state assets being decommissioned will be offered to other departments if no uptake, sold/ raffled.

Banks will pay for army protection for the transport of cash- unsure who foots the bill currently.
Increased legislation for fraud, facilitating tax evasion. - prison time for any one found doing white collar crimes.

the navy to be increased by recrutment and buying more ships for patrolling for drugs and protect fishing grounds.
EU funding will be sought - ships will be bought from other navys or shipyards with a proven record.
small ships similar to our current class of ship.

leaving country tax abolished replaced with a 10 euro sub for any one entering the country.


ciggi tax to be reduced - only fuels the illegal trade

Increased number of pub licenses but more pub regulation.

[johnmcork]

the euro is the only thing seperating ireland from being like 1990's argentina economic basket-case.
i think we should stage a fake coup like they suggested recently on theonion.com and the new regieme could renounce the old capitalist pigdog international debt.
then, invade greenland; lots of resources, improving clmate, no army.

[diar2me]

Disband all Unions! Our competitiveness will never improve while they have their toxic grip on society!

[hemlock666]

Run the civil service in the same way a call centre is, constant reviews etc and those who cant or wont perfom get the boot.
Cut ALL government expenses for anyone over 100k. If they cant afford to feed and transport themselves to work on that then they're leeches and need to be got rid of.
Get rid of all the junior ministers etc. They were never needed before and are just "jobs for the lads" bozos.
In exchange for NAMA taking on their debts the companies involved should be used to work on the NDP at a discounted or for free rate to make up the shortfall covered by the taxpayer.
Close half of the banks.
Tax the fuck out of any money being moved out of the country through western union etc.
Legalise dope and slap a nice tax on it.
For minor criminal offences instead of prision put those convicted to work on various NDP projects, like a chain gang.
Everyone on the dole should be available to work 1 day a week on social & community projects like housing etc. That would give the state almost 3 million working hours per week to use on these. Various FAS courses could also be turned into effective ways of training while working on the NDP.
Pour money (saved from the NDP) into the health system instead of the banks, and not admin costs but medical professionals, training and equipment.

Lots of flaws of course but its a start.

[diar2me]

Run the civil service in the same way a call centre is, constant reviews etc and those who cant or wont perfom get the boot.
Cut ALL government expenses for anyone over 100k. If they cant afford to feed and transport themselves to work on that then they're leeches and need to be got rid of.
Get rid of all the junior ministers etc. They were never needed before and are just "jobs for the lads" bozos.
In exchange for NAMA taking on their debts the companies involved should be used to work on the NDP at a discounted or for free rate to make up the shortfall covered by the taxpayer.
Close half of the banks.
Tax the fuck out of any money being moved out of the country through western union etc.
Legalise dope and slap a nice tax on it.
For minor criminal offences instead of prision put those convicted to work on various NDP projects, like a chain gang.
Everyone on the dole should be available to work 1 day a week on social & community projects like housing etc. That would give the state almost 3 million working hours per week to use on these. Various FAS courses could also be turned into effective ways of training while working on the NDP.
Pour money (saved from the NDP) into the health system instead of the banks, and not admin costs but medical professionals, training and equipment.

Lots of flaws of course but its a start.

Exactly, all good points but the key to all of them is to get value for money. Our biggest outgoing as a country is on social welfare and public sector pay. Getting value for money in both these areas are addressed. I was always one for making people on social welfare work for their money. I really don't like this idea of free money for sitting on your ass. There's plenty of work on roads, in charities etc to be done without these fellas sitting on their asses doing nothing and being paid for by taxpayer. I like you would also look at council boards, the hse and basically all these quangos set up during the boom. Get rid of half of them and clear out the pen pushers in the rest and use the money saved there to give more to frontline services. Lower the minimum wage cause the fact of the matter is until we lower the cost of doing business here we will not attract foreign direct investment here! And finally ignore the unions and lock Jack O Connor up! :)

[i_didnt_do_nawtin]

Ask potential tourists why they won't visit Ireland, and fix those points.

[POL]

If I may be serious for a moment, reunification with Britain is the only answer, as a people, we are not capable of governing ourselfs or managing our own affairs

[BangorFeen]

Agreed public sector should get a widespread pay cut, from the top down. I really am sick of hearing of the work they do. I'm sure they think the rest of the country get paid for doing nothing.
And we're somewhat miffed that the private sector seems to think the same of us...

[poulgorm]

If we cannot leave the Euro and devalue (and many posts have given powerful reasons why it would be suicidal), I seen no way out of a 20% (or even more) wage cut across the board, to bring us into line with our competitors.

The guy who said to rejoin the UK had a point: do we have the discipline to run the show ourselves ?

We are heading for a painful 10 years...

[doppellanger]

Instead of charging tax for passengers at airports the Govt should be giving every arrival a €100 hotel voucher.
FÁS should be giving people language lessons so they can get so they can get jobs at places like that new software games localization place in Cork or emigrate to European countries where the downturn is not so bad.
There should be more information and help for people who want to transfer their unemployment benefit to other European countries for a few months.
I agree in principle about cutting out quangos and other wasteful spending but they probably do employ quite a lot of people.

[doppellanger]

Exactly, all good points but the key to all of them is to get value for money. Our biggest outgoing as a country is on social welfare and public sector pay. Getting value for money in both these areas are addressed. I was always one for making people on social welfare work for their money. I really don't like this idea of free money for sitting on your ass. There's plenty of work on roads, in charities etc to be done without these fellas sitting on their asses doing nothing and being paid for by taxpayer. I like you would also look at council boards, the hse and basically all these quangos set up during the boom. Get rid of half of them and clear out the pen pushers in the rest and use the money saved there to give more to frontline services. Lower the minimum wage cause the fact of the matter is until we lower the cost of doing business here we will not attract foreign direct investment here! And finally ignore the unions and lock Jack O Connor up! :)

Biggest outgoing is health.

Making people on social welfare work for their money is counter-productive. If you can get the unemployed to sweep the streets for nothing then you make all the street sweepers redundant and what are you going to give them to do then? You end up with a Communist-style economy where no-one is unemployed but there's really no work.

[diar2me]

Biggest outgoing is health.

Making people on social welfare work for their money is counter-productive. If you can get the unemployed to sweep the streets for nothing then you make all the street sweepers redundant and what are you going to give them to do then? You end up with a Communist-style economy where no-one is unemployed but there's really no work.

And what makes up the spending in Health? HSE employee pay, doctors, nurses etc etc. Basically another section of Public Sector Pay. And I would check the figures before quoting health. We spend in the mid 20 billions on social welfare every year. I somehow don't think we are spending that much on our health system every year? Do You? You are also focusing in on one example I made. I am totally opposed paying people for doing nothing - ie. Social Welfare - it is every thing that's wrong with the system. People going away having three or four kids and sitting on home happy in the knowledge that every week they have single parents benefits, unemployment benefits along with Childrens allowance etc etc. It's a crazy system and needs to be addressed! But if you are happier to let us spend €25 billion a year and get no productivity back then fair enough!!

[auch]

Are only hope lads is to nationalise the country and let O'leary run the show for the next five years.

[diar2me]

Are only hope lads is to nationalise the country and let O'leary run the show for the next five years.

O Leary is an out and out capitalist so I'd say he'd be pretty anti nationalisation and rightly so! But I take your point. The man is a legend!

[An Rón Mór]

Forget about NAMA on this thread - Daithi has initiated an excellent thread on that (wish I could understand it all).

We are where we are. What would you do if you were in charge? My suggestions:

1. Leave the Euro and go back to our Punt. Devalue (or let it float) by, say, 20% (or maybe more). Or let it float. This would make our wage rates (relative to other currencies) more competitive and we should start to attract some new foreign investment again. And keep the ones we have.
2. Wage freeze (NOT wage cuts) for 3 years
3 The devaluation will cause inflation, though (imports will cost more). The wage freeze would be painful, but I see no way out of some pain. When the inflation has worked through the system, re-join (possibly) the Euro, at the new, lower exchange rate
4 Without a devaluation, I see no way of not avoiding major wage cuts. Wage cuts will cause major social unrest.
5 Government levies are not wage cuts - even if the effects on the employees are the same.

you could also just sit on your hole and blame the catholic church

[auch]

O Leary is an out and out capitalist so I'd say he'd be pretty anti nationalisation and rightly so! But I take your point. The man is a legend!

http://th09.deviantart.com/fs33/300W/f/2008/310/6/c/Legendary___Barney_S tinson_by_SouthernDe signer.jpg

[doppellanger]

And what makes up the spending in Health? HSE employee pay, doctors, nurses etc etc. Basically another section of Public Sector Pay. And I would check the figures before quoting health. We spend in the mid 20 billions on social welfare every year. I somehow don't think we are spending that much on our health system every year? Do You? You are also focusing in on one example I made. I am totally opposed paying people for doing nothing - ie. Social Welfare - it is every thing that's wrong with the system. People going away having three or four kids and sitting on home happy in the knowledge that every week they have single parents benefits, unemployment benefits along with Childrens allowance etc etc. It's a crazy system and needs to be addressed! But if you are happier to let us spend €25 billion a year and get no productivity back then fair enough!!

Actually I think my figures were out of date - just looking at the figures since unemployment has pretty much trebled since 2006 when it was about 4%.

If social welfare was cut those moochers would still be on the dole and claiming every benefit they could, and the people with qualifications, experience and education would be leaving the country in droves just like in the eighties. Okay, they might come back in ten years time or so when there are jobs again and they will probably have more skills to show for it but they won't be available to the Irish economy, they will be c

[wonkagirl]

Leaving the EUR is simply not an option. Have you any idea how much that would cost? Plus, our dept of finance have made such a royal FUCK UP of everything, imagine what they'd do if they were let loose on monetary policy once more? Christ knows what would happen.

I know what ur saying, but it just aint viable. As well as it being far too costly, there are too many advantages to being in the single currency.

As for what i'd do- christ where do i start- the HSE anyway is a complete joke- they jsut throw money at crises, so hence all the hospitals start creating crises in order to get funding- for eg. a hospital in dublin 'created' a backlog of 100,000 xrays in order to create an emergency situation so that the HSE would hire in radiologists from all over dublin, pay them triple pay to get through the backlog- wtf

this entire country is rotten to the core and will take generations to fix. it's been this way for far too long


God it's good to bitch about something other than the fuckwit

[wonkagirl]

Do you even begin to realise ho catastrophic this would be for the Irish economy?

The immediate reaction would be everybody taking their money out of the country because they know Ireland is about to devalue. Other people would just withdraw Euro cash, which would have the same value if spent in France, Germany or wherever. Irish banks, which are already pretty screwed would go bust.

Our external debts would still be in Euro, but we'd have to pay for them in our new weakened currency. It would be like dropping everyone's salary by 20%, but leaving them with the same debts.

Many of our external purchases would still be in Euro. Inflation would go through the roof as everything would now cost 25% more.

You'd then add overheads on to Irish business. A 3% charge any time they want to sell or buy in the Eurozone. You also force them to change all their accounting systems again, with all the cost that entails.

And what do we get? A small currency that is wide open to attack by speculators. Denmark currently spends 3% of its national income just doing that. The fact is that it's very difficult for a country of our size to have an independent currency.

In fact, we've never had one. We were tied to Sterling til the late 70s. Then we came the closest we were to independent - we tried to maintain a balance between our rate relative to Sterling and the Deutch Mark. By the early 90s, we were tied to the Deutsch Mark alone and finally we were tied to the Euro.

What of interest rates for this independent currency? Well, to make some attempt to stop the flight of capital from the country and to keep rampant inflation under control, we would be looking at interest rates of 7-8% at least. Try explaining that one to mortgage holders who have seen their salaries cut by 20%.

As it is, the Euro is the only thing standing between us and complete economic catastrophe. Should we really drop it just because we started paying ourselves too much?


Wow, ur good. Excellently put. The EURO is about all we have standing between us and complete financial retardation.

[Tanhauser Gate]

I guess the first thing I would do is

1. Cull the amount of quangos, "Government consultancy bodies" and semi-state bodies that seem to be in orbit around all of the main government departments. All these do is really push paper and create unnecessary paper trails but they do no actual work of value. I would return this functionality to the government and civil service where it belongs.

2. I would cull the staff of the HSE and remove people in duplicate positions.

3. I would cut the number of elected officials and also reduce their salaries to a normal level. I would cap their expenses to a normal level.

4. I would terminate all commissions and tribunals etc as these solve nothing and only to serve to burn more money.

These positions have only grown up in the last number of years as Ireland tried to follow Britan's (failed) Neo-Liberal model of government. This has been shown to be largely ineffective and consequently should now be removed. These are things that could be immediately done NOW without any impact on the lives of the vast vast vast majority of the population. If the IMF have to roll in here its probably one of the first things they'll do.

4. In order to restore some faith in the Irish economy I would prosecute about 10 or 15 white collar bankers and property 'developers' who (to a large extent) are responsible for bankrupting the country. This will do little in terms of actually saving money but at least it will send a message that things here aren't completely Micky Mouse.

5. I would merge all of the struggling banks into one and consolidate their debt but I would not nationalize it. I would fire all of the senior executives in all the banks and get a selection of world class economists and poached senior staff from Ernst & Young / Mc Kinley & Associates to run the thing.

... more to come in a bit (probably)

[irishmonkey]

In terms of social welfare its a 2 tier issue
I dont think any of us have an issue with people that cant find work.
I have no problem supporting/helping them
Its the people who don't WANT work should take the brunt of any cuts.
how to figure out which from which i have no idea but it would be nice if they could figure out some system rather than punish people that have been unlucky and let go.

maybe some system of you get less the longer you are on it.
but some people cant work due to medical problems.

[Jim Comic]

The Economy - What would YOU do?.

emigrate

[pat o shea]

emigrate


Possibly the best answer of all

[buds]

do you even begin to realise ho catastrophic this would be for the irish economy?

The immediate reaction would be everybody taking their money out of the country because they know ireland is about to devalue. Other people would just withdraw euro cash, which would have the same value if spent in france, germany or wherever. Irish banks, which are already pretty screwed would go bust.

Our external debts would still be in euro, but we'd have to pay for them in our new weakened currency. It would be like dropping everyone's salary by 20%, but leaving them with the same debts.

Many of our external purchases would still be in euro. Inflation would go through the roof as everything would now cost 25% more.

You'd then add overheads on to irish business. A 3% charge any time they want to sell or buy in the eurozone. You also force them to change all their accounting systems again, with all the cost that entails.

And what do we get? A small currency that is wide open to attack by speculators. Denmark currently spends 3% of its national income just doing that. The fact is that it's very difficult for a country of our size to have an independent currency.

In fact, we've never had one. We were tied to sterling til the late 70s. Then we came the closest we were to independent - we tried to maintain a balance between our rate relative to sterling and the deutch mark. By the early 90s, we were tied to the deutsch mark alone and finally we were tied to the euro.

What of interest rates for this independent currency? Well, to make some attempt to stop the flight of capital from the country and to keep rampant inflation under control, we would be looking at interest rates of 7-8% at least. Try explaining that one to mortgage holders who have seen their salaries cut by 20%.

As it is, the euro is the only thing standing between us and complete economic catastrophe. Should we really drop it just because we started paying ourselves too much?

exactly....go back to the punt??????????????? What kind of madness would that be

[poulgorm]

In terms of social welfare its a 2 tier issue
Its the people who don't WANT work should take the brunt of any cuts.
how to figure out which from which i have no idea but it would be nice if they could figure out some system rather than punish people that have been unlucky and let go.


Everybody should have to work for the dole. If you get, say, €200 per week, then you should have to work (200/minimum wage) hours per week.

The moaning would start then !

[Closer80]

Everybody should have to work for the dole. If you get, say, €200 per week, then you should have to work (200/minimum wage) hours per week.

The moaning would start then !

Where exactly would everybody work?

it's not a bad idea but kind of unrealistic methinks. Alot of people at the moment are on the dole because they have no choice.
Attitudes have to change, we are no longer in dole sponger economic boom. We are in 80s dole queue chaos.

[Earth Repair]

Anyone familiar with locally run and created currencies? LETS schemes, Timebanks etc?
There are many examples and varieties going a long way back into history. There was a vibrant, if small LETS scheme going in Cork from 1994-2001. This was a bunch of people who got together and agreed to exchange goods and services using a currency of their own creation called Cuids. These units were brought into being simply, by a member of the scheme writing a cheque for an agreed amount to pay for goods or services from another member. (If you think this sounds wacky do a bit of research into how banks create money).
The idea behind this is that rather than being a scarce resource under the control of banks and unaccountable financial institutions money is simply a means of keeping count and should be freely available and under the control of people who use it.
A lot of factors in the current recession are out of our control but what's to stop communities developing their own currencies that they can trust and believe in?
This was a solution that people in Argentina turned to during their 1999 meltdown and it got a lot of people through some difficult times. There is a lot of literature written about it and other examples.
Google "Social Credit" for a look at some historical thinking along these lines. There's also an economist called Richard Douthwaite who has done a lot of work in this area.
It's a hellishly difficult situation but we need to put more emphasis on what we as individuals and communities can do to remedy our own situations. Everything we have relied on up to now is collapsing and no external power is going to come and rescue us.

[diar2me]

Anyone familiar with locally run and created currencies? LETS schemes, Timebanks etc?
There are many examples and varieties going a long way back into history. There was a vibrant, if small LETS scheme going in Cork from 1994-2001. This was a bunch of people who got together and agreed to exchange goods and services using a currency of their own creation called Cuids. These units were brought into being simply, by a member of the scheme writing a cheque for an agreed amount to pay for goods or services from another member. (If you think this sounds wacky do a bit of research into how banks create money).
The idea behind this is that rather than being a scarce resource under the control of banks and unaccountable financial institutions money is simply a means of keeping count and should be freely available and under the control of people who use it.
A lot of factors in the current recession are out of our control but what's to stop communities developing their own currencies that they can trust and believe in?
This was a solution that people in Argentina turned to during their 1999 meltdown and it got a lot of people through some difficult times. There is a lot of literature written about it and other examples.
Google "Social Credit" for a look at some historical thinking along these lines. There's also an economist called Richard Douthwaite who has done a lot of work in this area.
It's a hellishly difficult situation but we need to put more emphasis on what we as individuals and communities can do to remedy our own situations. Everything we have relied on up to now is collapsing and no external power is going to come and rescue us.

I have heard of those let schemes alright. While in theory I understand how you think they could be beneficial, however I just think they would be less effective now for a variety of reasons. I mean like there are so many businesses in massive debt to banks I am sure the idea of bartering goods and services now would be met by many businesses with much cynicism. That alongside the fact that less and less business has a local owner and more and more international businesses are wiping out local industry.

I work as a rep so I get to meet businesses in all areas of Cork and the main problem is not sales, it's cashflow and getting paid on items and stock they have sold or the elephant in the room, getting even just small amounts of credit from the banks. While, as I said theoretically a good concept I just don't think it would work in the current climate / crisis business finds itself in! Businesses just need cash is the bottom line, to pay staff, rent, electricity etc etc. They can't do this with these schemes!

[daithi81]

Anyone familiar with locally run and created currencies? LETS schemes, Timebanks etc?
There are many examples and varieties going a long way back into history. There was a vibrant, if small LETS scheme going in Cork from 1994-2001. This was a bunch of people who got together and agreed to exchange goods and services using a currency of their own creation called Cuids. These units were brought into being simply, by a member of the scheme writing a cheque for an agreed amount to pay for goods or services from another member. (If you think this sounds wacky do a bit of research into how banks create money).
The idea behind this is that rather than being a scarce resource under the control of banks and unaccountable financial institutions money is simply a means of keeping count and should be freely available and under the control of people who use it.
A lot of factors in the current recession are out of our control but what's to stop communities developing their own currencies that they can trust and believe in?
This was a solution that people in Argentina turned to during their 1999 meltdown and it got a lot of people through some difficult times. There is a lot of literature written about it and other examples.
Google "Social Credit" for a look at some historical thinking along these lines. There's also an economist called Richard Douthwaite who has done a lot of work in this area.
It's a hellishly difficult situation but we need to put more emphasis on what we as individuals and communities can do to remedy our own situations. Everything we have relied on up to now is collapsing and no external power is going to come and rescue us.

Who? (http://ideas.repec.org/cgi-bin/htsearch?q=Richard+D outhwaite+)

In addition, does research into banking mean studying it for 7-8 years, like most people who are qualified to say they are an expert, or does it mean simply watching Google videos?

Finally, what acts as a protection against hyperinflation, in this model?

[doppellanger]

Everybody should have to work for the dole. If you get, say, €200 per week, then you should have to work (200/minimum wage) hours per week.

The moaning would start then !

Makes no economic sense. You'd be putting people with real jobs out of work.

You'd end up with an East German economy - jobs for everybody but work for no-one.

[diar2me]

Makes no economic sense. You'd be putting people with real jobs out of work.

You'd end up with an East German economy - jobs for everybody but work for no-one.

That's a complete generalised view of what we are trying to suggest. For example, there are plenty charities that could used people's help. With the massive amount of employees in the city and county councils there is still many roads and streets that could be cleaned, many buildings that could be painted. I am not suggesting for a second that you make it a long term option for people, I am saying that you could use it as a solution to create productivity from those people who are on the dole for a short period of time. Many people claim boredom when they are on the dole. This would go a way to solving that. Consider these charities:

The Samaritans
St Vincent De Paul
Barnardos
Cope
The Simon Community

etc etc

Are you telling me that these charities could not use a helping hand and if people were to help these CHARITIES that we would be putting people out of work. For people on long term social welfare it should just be cut off. Too many scroungers earning money for doing nothing and making their living out of it. It's a disgrace!

[NotoriousFin]

Cut current account expendiutre by 50%.
That means universal pay cuts on everybody across the public sector, and removal of ALL perks.

On solving unemployment:

Abolish income tax and the minimum wage. ;)

[diar2me]

Cut current account expendiutre by 50%.
That means universal pay cuts on everybody across the public sector, and removal of ALL perks.

On solving unemployment:

Abolish income tax and the minimum wage. ;)

Lower the minimum wage more like. The key to the solution of our problems is to become more competitive! Also hire an assassin and give him €1 million to execute Jack O Connor, Joe Higgins and David Begg!

[poulgorm]

Put Conor Counihan in charge

[Tico]

put mourinho in charge, he may play boring tactics but at least he gets the right results

[Earth Repair]

I have heard of those let schemes alright. While in theory I understand how you think they could be beneficial, however I just think they would be less effective now for a variety of reasons. I mean like there are so many businesses in massive debt to banks I am sure the idea of bartering goods and services now would be met by many businesses with much cynicism. That alongside the fact that less and less business has a local owner and more and more international businesses are wiping out local industry.

I work as a rep so I get to meet businesses in all areas of Cork and the main problem is not sales, it's cashflow and getting paid on items and stock they have sold or the elephant in the room, getting even just small amounts of credit from the banks. While, as I said theoretically a good concept I just don't think it would work in the current climate / crisis business finds itself in! Businesses just need cash is the bottom line, to pay staff, rent, electricity etc etc. They can't do this with these schemes!

Check out Ballinasloe Chamber of Commerce website http://www.ballinasloe.com/content/view/1095/187/. They have recently initiated a LETS scheme with local businesses and Credit Union participating. Don't know how it's working for them yet but a brave and interesting move nevertheless.
It's success or failure will depend on whether people can get things they need from it, like rent, staff wages, electricity etc as you say. Whether this happens will depend on whether enough folk are willing to give it a go. Good luck to em I say. They are taking some initiative and trying something different.
I agree with you about the weakness of local businesses and growing international ownership. This means that wealth can be siphoned off out of a local economy to the benefit of those owners and the detriment of the locality. Local currencies that are only valid within a geographical area can act as a preventative to that.
Of course you'd still need a means of trading over a wider area which suggests some form of multi-tiered currency. (Not my idea by the way) Local - National - International. Complicated and of course there'd be problems and it still isn't necessarily going to help your businesses with cash-flow problems unless they're able and willing to make fundamental changes but it's not as if what we have now is doing us much good is it?

[Earth Repair]

Who? (http://ideas.repec.org/cgi-bin/htsearch?q=Richard+D outhwaite+)

In addition, does research into banking mean studying it for 7-8 years, like most people who are qualified to say they are an expert, or does it mean simply watching Google videos?

Finally, what acts as a protection against hyperinflation, in this model?

Research to me means questioning what I'm being told and identifying underlying assumptions and challenging them. It means looking at other ways of doing things, reading history and learning from it, trying things out and seeing what works and what doesn't. It means listening to other people and trying to understand their positions. It means trying to expand my knowledge and capacity to live in the world.
Leaving it to the "experts" is a very dangerous path to go down and it is what has got us into this mess in the first place. A lot of my opinions on this come from having been involved in the Cork LETS scheme for about 7 years and learning from the experience, mainly by making mistakes. The scheme was small enough to operate on trust which also acted as a guard against hyperinflation and abuse of the system. It died out as did most of these schemes because there was less of a need for it as the Celtic Tiger kicked in
I haven't seen the video you refer to but I will check it out when I get time.
Cheers