Earnings in the Republic of Ireland – the four quarters
Recent publications from the NERI have contributed towards a more detailed understanding of the nature of the Republic of Ireland’s income and earnings distribution – a key context for the formation of public policy. See here and here and here. Dealing only with taxable income, data from the Revenue...
Monday Blog: ‘a serious challenge that businesses and the Government must address’
In Northern Ireland – as in the rest of the United Kingdom – real wages have been falling since 2008. Using data from the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) the UK-based GMB trade union has estimated that average earnings in Northern Ireland , when adjusted for inflation, have fallen by 12%...
Monday Blog: Decent wages: What, Why, How?
What is a 'living wage'? How do we measure it? And how could it be brought about for everyone at work? You have guessed - these are no simple answers to these questions. Research by NERI does throw some light on these questions and it is hoped to undertake additional research into these matters in...
Monday Blog: Economic Development with a purpose
The recent Government Medium-Term Economic Strategy, 2014-2020 ('A Strategy for Growth') is a welcome statement of key economic goals even if the Strategy lacks important detail and a more ambitious social perspective which learns from one of the greatest crisis that has emerged since the foundation...
Monday Blog: Where to now (Post-Troika)?
A very strong narrative is gathering pace abroad and at home: There was ‘absolutely’ no alternative to ‘austerity’ in the case of Ireland once the storm broke in 2008; Ireland displayed remarkable and exceptional resilience, consensus and passivity in accepting the ‘tough’ decisions that ‘had to be...
Monday Blog: A Modest Proposal
Suppose you were the Minister of Finance in 2009 and that you were held up and forced to hand over a lot of money to a number of bust banks?. You didn’t have the money at the time so you took it out of a special pension savings fund built up by taxpayers meant for the next 50 years. Suppose that, in...
UK Autumn Statment fails to tackle underlying problems
In the Autumn Statement today the Office for Budget Responsibility has upgraded forecasts for growth in the UK economy from 0.6% to 1.4% for 2013. Furthermore they have upgraded forecasts for 2014 and 2015 to 2.4% and 2.2% respectively. While much attention has focused on the speed of the UK...
Monday Blog: Are we over-spending?
The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) periodically publishes comparative data on a wide range of economic and social areas from education to pensions to overseas aid. In its latest Government at a Glance there is a wealth of data on many aspects of public service and...
NERI Seminar: Household Tax Contributions
Presentation at NERI Research Seminar Series November 20th 2013. Slides linked to NERI working paper 2013/no.8 'Estimating the Direct and Indirect Tax Contributions of Households in Ireland'.
Average Incomes – falling back to 2005 levels
Income levels, whether for individuals or households, are far from perfect measures of progress and well-being. However, they offer one insight into the experience of recent years for households across the Republic. In particular, trends in disposable income (income after taxes and welfare payments)...