Ireland, Krugman, Kenneth Thomas
Paul Krugman points to Angry Bear Kenneth Thomas in this piece in the New York Times on the use of Ireland as somehow a success story of what are failed policies regarding employment:
Ireland Is The Success Story Of The Future, And Always Will Be
Via Mark Thoma, Kenneth Thomas analyzes the latest attempt to claim that Ireland is a success story — is this the third or the fourth time around? — and concludes that the modest fall in unemployment is all about emigration. Actually, we can reach the same conclusion by going straight to employment data:
Eurostat
This is not exactly a policy triumph.
The one sense in which Ireland has made some progress is that it has somewhat reassured bond investors that its population will continue to sullenly acquiesce in austerity; as a result, Irish 10-year rates, while still at a large premium, are now 60-80 basis points below those of Italy and Spain.
But the repeated invocation of Ireland as a role model has gotten to be a sick joke.
(Reminder that Angry Bear Robert Waldmann made Krugman’s column twice last week.)
Kevin O’Rourke has a new paper on the Euro Crisis and the endemic mass unemployment in Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Greece, and Italy. I find it kind of remarkable that Ollie Rehn thinks this immiseration of millions of people is a “success.” It should also be noted that most of the decline in Ireland’s and Latvia’s unemployment rate is due to emmigration, particularly of young workers. I expect that emmigration and remittances will be the way Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Greece will also use to solve the Economic conundrum of remaining in the Euro and mass unemployment.