Opportunities in a bailout!

Read a very interesting article today in Constantin Gurdgiev's "True Economics" blog on the possibilities that come with a EFSF bailout for Ireland. The most salient point being that Ireland's problems are "despite what we are being told by our policymakers, ...... structural".

There seems to be a broad consensus that public sector spending in the country is out of control and our tax system is not working and remains dependent on a model based on high consumption and far too reliant on the wrong kinds of tax's for this moment on time. The problem is though, what do we do about it? The political will is not there to deal with any of our major structural problems in a real and robust way, from social welfare from public sector pay.There is no doubt a lot of issues which need to be addressed and a lot of people who genuinely do not feel as if they can take any more cuts but the fact remains there is a real need for restructuring of how our state operates.

Gurdgiev argues that despite the obvious reasons for fear an EFSF bailout and the strings attached would bring the rigours of IMF/ECB examination down on Ireland and that this would be no bad thing. Infact he argues a bailout would provide access to a cheaper, more solid line of credit with which to finance the country and it would afford us an opportunity to overcome our political impotence by essentially getting some lesser involved higher powers to face us with the stark choices we need to make on a new direction for the country.

With the rising uncertainty since our Dept of Finances announcement that their figures were not up to scratch, rising costs of borrowing, changes of tone from Germany as concerns bond holders and especially in the face of our own inability to deal with the task in hand it is for me a fairly convincing argument but maybe thats just the sound of desperation from a citizen who's lost faith in the countries decision making classes ability to provide the leadership that is so obviously needed.