People quickly forget that at the peak of the celtic tiger we were not even in the euro. Summer of 2000 interest rates on deposit were 4.5% (£5k for 3 months) and a mortgage was upwards of 5.25%. Which is more or less where we are right now.
What killed us was a low interest rate which fueled everything else. That was great in Berlin but caused a ripple here as money was cheap, housing market either unable or unwilling to meet demand driving prices up, inflation followed as did the begging bowl for pay increases. Tax revenues soared on the back of all this and country actually ran a surplus and the Dail give away show began and fueled the bubble further
Had we held all taxes at 2001 levels we wouldn't have been in half as much trouble as we are now, assuming the excess was skimmed of to the pension reserve or into capital projects
The only thing which was done during the post euro mess was the pension reserve fund, the billions in there saved us from further overheating plus provided a safety net.
Outside the euro we probably would have still needed the IMF to come in as we couldn't defend the punt from the speculators, but we wouldn't be anyway near as much debt as we are and the classic devaluation trick would have helped.
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