"[T]he real cleavage in Europe is between European taxpayers and bank creditors (with the ECB being a third interested party, as another body which could help to fill the holes which have emerged in the European banking system). But since the powers that be are ruling out bondholder haircuts and quantitative easing, the only cleavage we are left with in practice is the one between core and periphery taxpayers.
Of course ordinary French and German taxpayers are going to be angry at lending their money to an insolvent state with lower tax rates than their own. Why wouldn’t they be? Of course ordinary Irish taxpayers are going to be angry at having to pay for high interest loans designed to bail out foreign banks. Why wouldn’t they be?
And while ordinary Europeans get angry with each other, with unpredictable political consequences, capital walks away scot free."
Hear ! Hear !
Unfortunately, I can't claim Kevin as a close relative but his acumen and ability to get to the point shows that there is a pedigree issue 🙂
Now, who is going to turn his bons mots into a pithy non-loony-left campaign slogan for me before it is too late ?
Fergus, I'm looking for that too--you let me know if you find one!
Mind you, I suppose that the capitalists who invested in bank shares would be rather miffed by the "scot-free" label.
I disagree about the comments to Kevin's piece, by the way. This one is from Cork emigrant to Toronto, Mark Dowling priceless:
I see France’s VAT rate is 19.6% compared to Ireland’s 21 (and soon to be 23). I think we should all write to His Imperial Shortness and complain.
In fact, I would urge everyone to read the comments, which focus like Mark Dowling's, on the tax issue. (And presumably were added after Stephen had finished).
I learned something which may not be new to everyone here viz. that Intel had 19 reasons to invest in Ireland when it decided to build its first plant here, but the only one still applying is the corporation tax rate.
There's much more, and I especially commend the contributions by Michael Hennigan of FinFacts, a rather neglected source of wisdom on, especially, who did - and who said - what when the routes to disaster were plotted.
Hmm, maybe they do pick up after Dowling, but only just.