Madam, – Ireland Inc cannot continue with the current levels of expenditure given the collapse in taxation revenue. So who should bear the cost the budgetary correction? Depending on which vocal protest group you listen to, it is a case of not front line health services, not education, not social welfare, not public sector salaries (due to the Broke Park agreement [sic]). The sum total of these areas of expenditure exceeds the total tax revenues of the State and has been the case for the past few years.
What is the solution shouted by the protest groups? Tax the higher paid.
Who are these people? Do they have the enormous stashes of wealth that can save our State? Is this the same 6 per cent of income tax payers who were already contributing over 50 per cent of income taxes collected? Do they exist in sufficient numbers to cure all economic ills and protect the current levels of public spending? Of course not, but to acknowledge this would damage opinion poll performance. It is easier to pretend there is an untaxed pot of gold stashed at the bottom of rich man’s rainbow than to acknowledge the politically difficult decisions necessary to rectify the economic mismanagement of the past decade.
I am tired of the politically correct calls for fairness in sharing the burden of economic adjustment. Fairness is a subjective concept. For most Irish people fairness seems to be a case of cut them, not me. It is time to call a halt to the economic Nimby-ism. This country was economically mismanaged for too long and the price to rectify this is too high to spare any sacred cows (including the Broke Park agreement) or any sector of society – from welfare recipients to high earners and all those in between – from shouldering some of the burden.
Let’s get the pain out of the way and then we can start the recovery. – Yours, etc,