Debate House Prices
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Ireland Cuts VAT
HAMISH_MCTAVISH
Posts: 28,592 Forumite
http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-2009942/Ireland-slashes-VAT-9--Britain-cutting-taxes.html#ixzz1QxoV2FqpIreland will tomorrow slash VAT on everything from hair cuts to cinema tickets in an attempt to revive its economic fortunes.
The Irish government will slash Value Added Tax from 13.5% to 9%, firing the debate in many struggling Western economies about whether taxes should rise or fall to solve their debt problems. Ireland's new lower rate only targets discretionary spending and the tourist industry.
Until 31 December 2013, a 9% rate will apply on restaurant meals, hotels, cinema and theatre tickets, takeaways, museums and galleries, fairgrounds, hair cuts and newspapers.
Whilst it's refreshing to see that someone in the Irish government has at last twigged that you can't cut your way out of a recession, it's far too little, far too late.
Ireland will remain economically doomed as long as their house prices continue to fall.
The only solution to Ireland's problems is to bulldoze the 17% of houses that are empty and get asset values back up to a reasonable level.
Until that happens, it will remain an economic basket-case and social disaster zone.
“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie – deliberate, contrived, and dishonest – but the myth, persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic.
Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”
-- President John F. Kennedy”
Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”
-- President John F. Kennedy”
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Comments
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HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »The only solution to Ireland's problems is to bulldoze the 17% of houses that are empty and get asset values back up to a reasonable level.
So, if the people of Ireland have to pay more for their housing, it'll fix their economy ?
I'm sure Irish and foreign businesses in Ireland can't wait to pay people higher salaries, so they can afford a roof over their heads. I mean, look at countires such as China and India, there's no way we would want to do business with those places, their wages are far too low.
30 Year Challenge : To be 30 years older. Equity : Don't know, don't care much. Savings : That's asking for ridicule.0 -
Yep, wanton destruction of assets always creates wealth."It will take, five, 10, 15 years to get back to where we need to be. But it's no longer the individual banks that are in the wrong, it's the banking industry as a whole." - Steven Cooper, head of personal and business banking at Barclays, talking to Martin Lewis0
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HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-2009942/Ireland-slashes-VAT-9--Britain-cutting-taxes.html#ixzz1QxoV2Fqp
The only solution to Ireland's problems is to bulldoze the 17% of houses that are empty and get asset values back up to a reasonable level.
High house prices are the cause of this. You know need 2 wages no sorry 3 or 4 to buy a house. Its insane.0 -
If those houses are held in an RMBS at 20-30% of par value they're still 'worth' more than if they were bulldozed and the land returned to agricultural use. Ireland doesn't have the same structural difficulties as Greece or Portugal and these houses could provide good cheap homes for folk in 5-10 years time.HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »The only solution to Ireland's problems is to bulldoze the 17% of houses that are empty and get asset values back up to a reasonable level."The state is the great fiction by which everybody seeks to live at the expense of everybody else." -- Frederic Bastiat, 1848.0 -
these houses could provide good cheap homes for folk in 5-10 years time.
Only if your name is Mr Ed.....
Besides, unless asset values rise, there won't be anything left of their economy for people to buy houses in 10 years time. Unemployment is now at 15% and still rising. They have enough empty houses to meet demand for decades. Their deficit reached 32% of GDP last year.
Bulldoze them and get the economy moving again.“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie – deliberate, contrived, and dishonest – but the myth, persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic.
Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”
-- President John F. Kennedy”0 -
What a dozey bull.
Maybe that's what we need to do to get our economy going, bulldoze some houses. :rotfl:30 Year Challenge : To be 30 years older. Equity : Don't know, don't care much. Savings : That's asking for ridicule.0 -
What a dozey bull.
Maybe that's what we need to do to get our economy going, bulldoze some houses. :rotfl:
No need here.
We don't have 17% of our houses empty...... Just 3%.
Which is why our house prices are 11% below peak, and theirs are 45% below peak.
Which is why we have 7.8% unemployment, versus their 15% unemployment.
And it's why we have a deficit of 11% of GDP, versus their deficit of 32% of GDP.
And of course it's also why our wider economy is doing far better than theirs....
You can't have a monumental house price crash like Ireland without destroying your economy..... And tinkering with VAT won't make the slightest bit of difference.
Ireland is economically doomed until their house prices start picking up.“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie – deliberate, contrived, and dishonest – but the myth, persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic.
Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”
-- President John F. Kennedy”0 -
HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »
The only solution to Ireland's problems is to bulldoze the 17% of houses that are empty and get asset values back up to a reasonable level.
The property developers may have gone bust. However these are still assets on the banks balance sheets. So worth more still standing.
Who is going to pay to clear the sites?
Do you suggest the same policy in Spain?0 -
HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »Only if your name is Mr Ed.....
Besides, unless asset values rise, there won't be anything left of their economy for people to buy houses in 10 years time. Unemployment is now at 15% and still rising. They have enough empty houses to meet demand for decades. Their deficit reached 32% of GDP last year.
Bulldoze them and get the economy moving again.
Hamish, are those one-trick ponies I see in that photo ?
Ireland tried to build a successful economy based on their property market, and it did not work. Maybe it's time for them (and others) to concentrate on other ways of creating wealth, rather than borrowing ever larger amounts of money and trying to outbid each other on piles of bricks.30 Year Challenge : To be 30 years older. Equity : Don't know, don't care much. Savings : That's asking for ridicule.0 -
Thrugelmir wrote: »Do you suggest the same policy in Spain?
I'd suggest the same policy anywhere that has too many houses and not enough people.
House price crashes are a poisonous blight on society.
A strong economy and strong asset values go hand-in-hand.
Just ask anyone living in Detroit how much good their houses for $10 have done for them.
Ireland must stop the rot, or it's future will look a lot like this....
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-mayor-of-detroits-radical-plan-to-bulldoze-one-quarter-of-the-city-2010-3#ixzz1QyDLcQFKHow do you save a city that is dramatically declining like Detroit?
Well, for the mayor of Detroit the answer is simple - you bulldoze one-fourth of the city. Faced with a 300 million dollar budget deficit and a rapidly dwindling tax base, Detroit finds itself having to make some really hard choices.
During the glory days of the 1950s, Detroit was a booming metropolis of approximately 2 million people, but now young people have left in droves and the current population is less than a million.
The true unemployment rate for those still living in Detroit is estimated to be somewhere around 45 to 50 percent, and poverty and desperation have become entrenched everywhere.
In many areas of the city, only one or two houses remain occupied an an entire city block. In fact, some areas of Detroit have so many vacant, burned-out homes that they literally look like war zones.
And yes, it is true that there are actually some houses in Detroit that you can actually buy for just one dollar.
According to one recent estimate, Detroit has 33,500 empty houses and 91,000 vacant residential lots. So what can be done when an entire city experiences economic collapse?
Well, Detroit Mayor Dave Bing (pictured) believes that the answer is to downsize on a massive scale. Bing believes that Detroit simply cannot continue to pay for police patrols, fire protection and other essential services for areas that resemble ghost towns.
So his plan is to bulldoze approximately 10,000 houses and empty buildings over the next 3 years and direct new investment into stronger neighborhoods.
In the areas that the city plans to bulldoze, the residents would be offered the opportunity to relocate to a better area. For buildings that have already been abandoned, the city could simply use tax foreclosure proceedings to reclaim them. Of course if there were some residents that did not want to move, eminent domain could be used to force them out.“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie – deliberate, contrived, and dishonest – but the myth, persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic.
Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”
-- President John F. Kennedy”0
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