2012 Budget Analysis - Budget developed with microscope when telescope was required!

Budget 2012 was developed with a microscope when a telescope was required. While it paid great attention to a wide range of issues it has insufficient focus on the longer term or the wider issues that urgently require attention. These range from declining domestic demand to persistent long-term unemployment, from public debt sustainability to growing poverty and inequality.  

As a result it will damage the economy and lead to greater inequality and social exclusion in Irish society. It will have negative impacts on the working poor, on families, on children, on people with disabilities. It is unjust, unfair and won’t achieve its aims.

Even within its own parameters Government had choices that would have produced much fairer outcomes. It chose instead to protect the better off more than the vulnerable.

The ’hit’ taken by the better off will be far less damaging to them than the negative impact Budget 2012 will have on social services generally and the incomes of Ireland’s poorest people whether employed or unemployed. 

At the same time Ireland will continue to have a total tax-take among the lowest in the EU. It is not possible for Ireland to deliver services and infrastructure at an EU-average level with a tax take far below the EU-average. 

Budget Analysis and Critique document can be downloaded here