Another Irish migration
Image by Getty Images via @daylifeStudent Niamh Buffini works hard and plays hard. As Ireland's No 1 taekwondo martial arts practitioner – she is rated 12th in the world – her ambitions include winning Olympic gold for Ireland.Ireland has whole subdivisions of brand new empty homes. Market analysis appears to have been an afterthought in Ireland.
But by the end of this month her future will have been decided by forces not just beyond her control but seemingly those of her government also. Ireland is on the cusp of insolvency. Some economists argue that it already is.
Buffini will soon learn if her fees at the Institute of Technology in Tallaght, south Dublin, have climbed beyond her means. Her father is a self-employed builder, which has recently become a euphemism for "unemployed".
"My class size will have dropped by 50% by next year," Buffini said. "Even lecturers took part in the recent student protests over fees because society here is going to be left with very few educated people. My best friends have already left – they're doing bar work in Spain and Australia."
Last week was not a good week for Ireland. Speculation about a European Union-backed bailout pushed its borrowing costs to unprecedented heights.
At Buffini's college on Friday, the day began with a protest by construction workers who were supposed to have been working on a new wing. Their paymaster Michael McNamara – the country's premier construction firm – had been put into receivership under the weight of debts of €1.5bn (£1.27bn), leaving them jobless and out of pocket for work they had already completed.
So far the workers' demonstrations have remained largely peaceful. Indeed, many Tallaght students seemed shocked by the violence they witnessed in TV reports from London involving their British counterparts. But that may change.
Economists are sought-after celebrities in Ireland at the moment and none is more famous than Morgan Kelly. His doom-laden words are lapped up by a nation addicted to Celtic melancholy.
Kelly, of University College Dublin, was laughed at, scorned and even threatened when he correctly predicted, as long ago as 2007, that Ireland's property bubble was heading for a spectacular explosion.
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Ireland has a history of large migrations because of economic failures. The Irish who cam to the US have been very successful. Sending all that talent abroad continues to plague them.
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