Half A Giraffe

Ireland is in the grips of a deep economic conundrum. Jobs are scarce, education funding is down and going to the dole office has become the only sport the Irish are good at.

This past week we’ve had the Global Economic Forum, where industry leaders, heads of state and Dara O’Brian spoke, listened and tried to come up with plans on how to save our island of saints & scholars before leaving to the countries they emigrated to.

IMF loans are designed to help to ease the pain, and like any self respecting loan receiver from Tallaght, Ireland is considering the option of forgetting that money ever arrived and defaulting on the repayments. Much like World War II, we have a lot to thank the Germans for. They’re giving us money so we don’t have to accept smug British money (or at least, not as much of it).

All of this is vein. Doing the semi-occasional comedy blog guest post has decreed me with a sense of loftiness and economic prowess (you get a free pint for doing this) that has given me he ego that only an Irish person could have. I am going to ignore the pundits, the experts and the nobel prize winners and declare my own 5 point plan to recover the economy. What follows is my plan for economy recovery, stability and the beginnings of a master plan to make Ireland a global leader.

Neighbours... and lovers (we assume)

1. IrelandAid. It took a BBC news piece highlighting the plight of starving children in Africa to get an Irish man who emigrated to the UK to take action. Bob Geldof’s mediocre career in music was not going to be how people remember him. Nor was it going to get him a fancy house in Dalkey. No, it was going to be a concert that didn’t feature his band, but instead featured what many would have otherwise called “the coherent Boomtown Rats”, U2. Queen – who otherwise would have become a Boomtown Rats tribute band – would also benefit from the conert.

LiveAid was born, and delivered millions of needed sterlings to starving African children.

As such, the first part of my 5-point plan is to have the BBC do a piece on the news about the starving children in fields in Finglas who have to drink cans of cider instead of eating. It should also highlight the plight of people living in squalor, Fatima Mansions.

Once this airs Bob Geldof will no doubt have to spring into action to do IrelandAid, a live money-raising concert to help the Irish economy… live from Wembley, London, England – where he calls home.

2. Hire more people in state jobs. This sounds ludicrous because the government already hires far too many people. However no one cares about farmers, so we can trim the fat on the department of agriculture and re-invest in hiring people where they’re needed.

In post offices, handing out €180 a week to drug addicts and alcoholics.

Hiring “dole operators” gives people a job helping people who need jobs. There’s nothing like the satisfaction of receiving your dole cheque every week from a snarling ungreatful scumbag who realistically should be the one receiving the cheque in the first place.

3. Ireland operates in Europe, which is built on a fundamental idea of free trade across member states. This helps economic growth and sharing of wealth. Ireland has been a great recipiant of goods, services, jobs and people as a result of this.

Selling Irish goods to British, French, German, etc. people has been great. Unfortunately a lot of Latvian and Romanian people have been stealing Irish goods, but on balance it’s been beneficial to Ireland.

As such the third plan is to sell our crowning achievement; Enda Kenny.

No one looked at this malnourished ginger from the West of Ireland and thought he could plaigarise a speech given by U.S. president Barrack Obama right in front of the man himself – but he did. He did it with poise and grace. Not only that, he managed it after the high of seeing Jedward perform.

As such, I recommend selling him to a foreign nation for a lot of money. This would add buoyancy to our economy and give us the chance to hire a new leader, leading me to economic plan number four…

4. Get rid of the president and role his/her job into the Taoiseach’s. We don’t need a head of state being a nanny for the government. Instead, give all of the power to a single person. At the time it was a very controversial decision but in the end it worked out well for Germany. Only 60 odd years later and they’re the biggest powerhaus of Europe.

We can also, having shipped out our current leader and sold the Áras to Americans, hire our new Taoiseach at the minimum wage, setting an example to the rest of us: that it’s fine to spend 40 hours a week earning €320 when you could have had 40 hours free for only €140 less.

5. Bring in lower corporation tax rates and lower tax on the rich. These are the people that hire the rest of us. We need to nourish and look after the 1%.

It’s also worth imposing strict corporal punishment rules on those who occupy streets where the 1% work. Impeding on their work only stops economic growth, and we need those 1% working hard on drinking foreign bourbon, smoking Cuban cigars and spending as much money in foreign lands as possible.

Keeping the 1% happy keeps everyone happy.

Tags: economy, enda, germany, glorious nation, god save the island shaped like a driving school logo

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