Who is your Fantasy Government?

1. Donie Cassidy – businessman and TD
2. Bill Cullen – businessman and television personality
3. Niall FitzGerald – honorary KBE, chief executive Unilever
4. Arthur Guinness – brewer
5. Eddie Hobbs – financial guru, presenter of Show Me the Money and Rip-Off Republic
6. Phil Kelly – multi-millionaire entrepreneur, Author ” Asia 360 -The Culture of Building Business in Asia”
7. Pat McDonagh – founder of Supermac’s
8. J. P. McManus – businessman
9. Dermot Mannion – CEO of Aer Lingus
10. Brian McCarthy – founder and Chairman of FEXCO
11. David Peglar – Global Headhunter and Business Consultant
12. Denis O’Brien – highly successful entrepreneur and founder of Esat Telecom
13. Michael O’Leary – colourful CEO of Ryanair
14. David J. O’Reilly – CEO of Chevron
15. Anthony J F O’Reilly – Independent Newspapers and head of Heinz, 1979-1996
16. Seán Quinn – multi-millionaire entrepreneur
17. Tony Ryan – founder of Ryanair and Guinness Peat Aviation
18. Peter Sutherland – Chairman of BP Plc, and Chairman of Goldman Sachs International and formerly Ireland’s representative at theEuropean Commission

The concept of Adam Smitha and free markets – despite the fact that the US economy was sheltered for centuries behind high protective tariffs and state intervention, or the British who wrecked the economies of those they colonised, the two great examples being Egypt and India who both advanced countries but were reduced to famine suffering dependants.

The ‘rules’ of ‘capitalism’ shift like the proverbial sands of the desert, in good times they are used as the lash to justify high profits, in ‘bad’ times as the lash to justify lashing wages in the interests of ‘competition’

I have to admit, I am far from an expert on the other issues you raise and need to do a lot more work but these are my thoughts to this point.

There is a common misconception about ‘socialism’ lacks innovation or is anti-innovation/anti-entrepreneurial.

I have posted on this previously and highlighted the advances made in Cuba in the area of health care in particular (victim of the longest running and most insidious economic blockade in modern history).

They are a world leader in many aspects of health care, so this criticism is not borne out in reality.

Indeed, many ‘industries’ in the capitalist system have time and again benefitted from State intervention, normally involving taxpayers/public purse money, the financial sector being the most recent example, the same can be said for the airline industry, motor industry and a host of others………..private industry is quiet when the profits are rolling in but scream when the game turns sour…………IBEC have said virtually nothing on the need to go after the bankers but always lash the Unions and workers on the minimum wage – impossible to take their pronouncements seriously……

I do wonder – what do we mean by regulated capitalism? What do we mean by capitalism? What do we mean by socialism? Instead of dealing with often abstract terms which mean different things to different people we should get into specifics, like how would we like to see a country organised economically, politically and socially – this seems far more practical and important, ism’s tend to alienate or raise the emotions.

During the Spanish Civil War, the left faction for a moment had things moving in an interesting direction but it was stamped out by fascist forces and Western indifference and for their own good reasons.

An economy based on social justice, fair distribution of resources, equality and democratic control in the workplace, with business operating along co-operative lines seems fair and feasible to me and not a bad place to start.

32. yoganmahew Says:
February 28th, 2010 at 4:54 pm
WRT Iceland – Iceland has gone the Sweden model in extremis – reconstitute the insolvent banks and wind down the bad debt. Unfortunately for Iceland, all its banks were insolvent, hence the large scale of the disaster. What is the case for Ireland? Ditto, it seems to me…
Therefore we have gone for the Japan model – save the banks at the expense of the business of banking – zombies a go-go.
We are caught between going to hell in a handcart and hell in a handbag – zombie or bust. Fine, but we should have taken a view on what would be better for the rest of the economy – the fact that we plan to create fewer jobs than the workforce will expand by for the forseeable future is a result of the japanning of the economy – we will have a veneer of hustle and bustle with nothing much happening underneath… swimming with our arms only and slowly drowning…
33. Paul Hunt Says:
February 28th, 2010 at 7:09 pm
@YM,
Rarely have you seemed so pessimistic or apocalyptic. I remain convinced we will muddle through – mainly because Ireland has relinquished so much of its sovereignty. The ECB and the European Commission are acting as proxies for the German banks by exercising detailed oversight of the bank resolution exercise – such as it is. Minister Lenihan is taking the promised 4b out of the fiscal deficit this year and is committed to extract a further 3b next year. This may be enough to satisfy the gods of the bond market.
The existence of enormous over-capacity in the real economy – primarily measured in terms of high unemployment (that will be eased by increasing emigration) is of no concern to the bond markets or German banks once there is a capability – and a government commitment to maintain this capability – to service the sovereign debt and to pursue the current approach to bank resolution.
The German attitude is: “you had your party – largely financed by our largesse while we experienced serious pain to remain internationally competitive; sorry about the hangover, but we’re going to get our pound of flesh”.
34. yoganmahew Says:
February 28th, 2010 at 7:42 pm
@Paul Hunt
I think you are absolutely right, but a little optimistic.
There are two crises ongoing in the eurozone – a sovereign debt/structural deficit one and a banking system one. There will be a significant casualty from each of them to make the closer union that the euro requires happen. For a good while I thought we would be both of them (it would be awfully convenient if a small economy on the periphery of Europe was the suicide bomber for both unsustainable activities). As it is, Greece is doing its best to rip one of the bomb vests from us (as our sovereign debt position is not that bad and hard cuts would at least get us to a bottom from which we could grow).
Our banking system, however, appears beyond salvage and the government seems determined to bring the rest of the economy down with it in a hard landing.
So, yes, I’m thoroughly fed up.
Still, I’m all right Jack, my export business (eh, me!) is doing just fine with its punitive tax rates. My brother in Hungary tells me there’s new tax-free company status for people like me if I fancy moving over there. Hmmm family or chips, which to choose?

While I’m at it this is pretty good too:

41. Graham Stull Says:
March 1st, 2010 at 10:27 am
Minister for Car Accidents Lyin’ Brenilan arrived at the scene of a bad car crash, in which a man, D. I. Rish, was trapped in an overturned SUV. Emergency response workers were about to use the Jaws of Life to extract the badly injured man from the wreckage.
“No!” the Minister called, “Don’t use the Jaws of Life! There was an accident in Iceland yesterday and they used the Jaws of Life and the driver looked a complete mess when they took him out.”
“But the Jaws of Life aren’t the cause of that! And we can’t just leave him there!”
“My government has a plan in place to deliver him some emergency care in through was is left of the driver’s side window. Furthermore, we have not completely ruled out the possibility of taking him out of the wreckage at some future point in time.”
“But, Minister, he is critical, he needs to get to hospital immediately!”
“Look, taking him out too quickly would be a shock to his family. They need some time to get used to the idea of Mr Rish being an injured man. Also, there’s a vomiting bug in the hospital and of course, the ambulance could crash on the way over there and another reason and a few half thought-through excuses and we are where we are and its the only show in town…”

“59. Edgar.Morgenroth Says:
March 2nd, 2010 at 9:44 am
@Brian O’ Hanlon – we should build mental hospitals because we need them not because we need to find something for builders to do. What stimulus money??
@paul quigley – you seem to be under some misconception about what economists do. Have a look at the literature and you will find that the bulk of the papers are concerned with the analysis of resource allocation and behaviour without reference to politics, politicians, elections or parties.”

“62. Paul Hunt Says:
March 2nd, 2010 at 12:38 pm
@Edgar,
“..the bulk of the papers are concerned with the analysis of resource allocation and behaviour without reference to politics, politicians, elections or parties.”
And so they should. But we have a problem when government, the “permanent government”, the quangocracy, the elites and “insiders” collectively decide, depending on circumstance or preference, to ignore or to abuse or to use selectively, but inappropriately, key elements of this analysis that relate to public policy. Different varieties of this “unholy alliance” may be observed at work in all of the established democracies. The US variety delivered the systematic de-regulation of the banking and financial sector that led to the current global crisis – and the “freshwater” economists proved to be very useful idiots.
Ireland, of course, has its own variety and it has proved more virulent than most. It is the pomps and works of Ireland’s unholy alliance that fuel much of the comment on this site.
So what should economists, with a competence in, and knowledge of, public policy analysis, do? The consensus appears to be that it is sufficient to “speak truth to power” – as this blog admirably and consistently attempts to do.
But it appears to me that this leaves a large constituency distinctly dissatisfied. Since this crisis is manifesting itself in economic, fiscal and financial terms, there is an expectation, rightly or wrongly, that the economic fraternity should be in the forefront resolving the problems.
But there seems to be a corresponding failure to recognise that the current system of democratic governance precludes the effective, widescale engagement of competent members of the economics fraternity – unless they are appointed (e.g., Patrick Honohan), retained to perform a specific task (e.g., Colm McCarthy) or retained as an advisor (e.g., Alan Ahearne).
So, should economists be actively advancing reform of the process of public policy design and implementation to ensure full use of economic theory and practice or should they remain as “hurlers on the ditch” – waiting to be called into play by government?”