As the economists count the cost of blowing the boom, we look at 10 things we've lost and 10 we've gained in today's Ireland, writes SHANE HEGARTY
Losses
1 Our optimismUntil this year, the Irish proved themselves to be the happiest bunch in Europe: sunny, optimistic, and at odds with the notion that there is nothing more miserable than an Irish childhood. This week, a behaviour and attitudes survey showed us to be utterly pessimistic about the state of the country, the economy and our jobs. Perfectly understandable of course, except that only the next day the Second European Quality of Life survey announced that the Irish rated their personal happiness at eight out of 10. In isolation, you could say they tell us that we're only happy when we're unhappy. But we've always been happy. Right now, we're just not expecting it to last.
2 Respect for bankersGlobally, bankers were not necessarily the most trusted of professions – certainly not compared to perennial table-toppers nurses, doctors and firefighters – but they usually had the edge on lawyers, estate agents and, for some reason, journalists. They won't be winning any popularity competitions anytime soon. Those who work behind the counter at bank branches report regular verbal barrages from customers; in the UK a leading banker's house was attacked this week. Halifax ran ads saying that they weren't like other bankers, but you don't see them too often now. Instead, the banks have run full-page newspaper ads begging for business. Although, among the biggest scandals remains the AIB ad which features an actor getting a mortgage.
3 Estate agentsIn the headlines about mass job losses, the dribble of redundancies among estate agents has gone largely unnoticed. But on the main streets of towns across the country there are signs in windows thanking customers for their business and explaining that the office will be closed and that work will now be done from mobile phones, if at all. In the six months leading up to the start of this year, more than 300 estate agents closed their offices and another 200 are expected to close in 2009. About a quarter of jobs in the industry have been lost. And as banks are lending to few in the construction sector, it has been reported that estate agents currently have as much chance of getting a mortgage as that actor in the AIB ad.
4 Employee powerThere was a time when graduates would go straight from college to a job interview and ask for big money. It was a sign of the way in which the jobs market had become a buyers' market. If you lost a job, you'd get another one quick enough. Even if you were in a good one, you'd have a recruitment agency keeping an eye out for a better one. It made employers keen to make their office a good one, with attractive pay, team-building days and massive Christmas parties. In the space of a year, that is gone. Unless, of course, you work in certain parts of the public sector, where the threat of a strike still has some bargaining power. But for most people, it's not about demanding higher wages, but hoping that the pay cut isn't too severe.
5 Our reputationOnce upon a time, the world's media queued up to report on the economic miracle of the Celtic Tiger. Now, they come to see what went wrong. In recent days, there have been comments in the Philadelphia Inquirer ("A world of struggle"), Scotland's Sunday Herald ("the Celtic Tiger licks its mange") and the LA Times ("deep into an economic and psychological funk"), and the contraction of our economy was this week reported by everyone from Bloomberg to al-Jazeera. We've become a washed-out champ who rose quickly, only to be found a few years later living in the dumpster.
6 PeopleThe years of immigration have ground to a halt, but it doesn't necessarily mean that there has been a great outflux. Central and Eastern European countries find themselves in a bad way too, so while unemployment among the immigrant population in Ireland was almost 10 per cent at the end of last year, their options are as limited as anyone else in Ireland. Instead, many Irish have travelled abroad in the hope of work, with many now going to work in London. The GAA clubs abroad are thriving in a way they thought would never happen again, but not for the reasons they would have hoped.
7 Misery litDuring the boom times there was an insatiable appetite for those "tragic lives" memoirs, disparagingly referred to as "misery lit". It was a quirk of the good days that we wanted reminders of how bad it could be. Saturation point was reached and sales have fallen off dramatically in the past year (just as the wider book industry is suffering from the recession). What will replace it? Perhaps middle-class angst about their polite teenagers descent into cannabis hell, ie Julie Myerson's The Lost Child. Also watch out for post-boom reads such as Derek Brawn's "estate agents exposed" book, Ireland's House Party.
8 TouristsIf you see one on the street, staring blankly at a map while turning around in circles, point them in the right direction and thank them for coming here. Traffic through Dublin Airport has dropped 9 per cent on this time last year. The number of British tourists dropped 20 per cent in January. There were 2.2 per cent fewer visitors into Ireland in 2008, making it the first time in 18 years that more people flew out of Ireland than entered it. The closure of several major hotels was inevitable. How much this will be offset by the Irish taking advantage of cheaper rates and holidaying at home remains to be seen.
9 Foreign propertyMore accurately, the talk of buying foreign property, because many people are stuck with second properties whose values have plummeted. In January, 60 properties in Antigua, Bulgaria, Cape Verde, Dubai, Spain and Turkey were put up for auction, some at half price. One was sold. There are property crashes across Europe and Irish investors have been left out of pocket by the collapse of a firm that had sold, but not completed, properties in Bulgaria. Last year, the developers of homes in Clonakilty offered a free Cape Verde apartment as a sweetener, which neatly summed up the state of the property market here and abroad.
10 Work-life balance as your big job concernOkay, so it might still be something you worry about, because no one wants to be slogging away in a job, many road miles from home, leaving early in the morning, returning after the kids have gone to bed. But right now, where once there were newspaper articles and TV programmes dedicated to finding that balance, there are instead articles about how to cling on to your job or, worse, how to fill your days when you lose the work part of the "work-life" equation. Although some glass-half-full types have suggested that reduced hours are a chance to get that balance right. If someone says that to you the day you're told you're on a three-day week, God help them.
Gains
1 Consumer powerPeople still talk of "rip-off Ireland", but where once the consumer fought a rearguard action, now they go in all guns blazing. Retail sales have slumped by 20 per cent on this time last year, with car sales in such trouble that customers can force good deals on previously very pricey second-hand luxury models. The age of the discount retailer has also dawned, and the road to Newry has become extremely busy as Southerners go for Northern bargains and scoff politicians' hollow calls for them to be "patriotic". With inflation turning to deflation, and some sales never-ending, the punters have even toyed with the idea of haggling, threatening to turn Grafton Street into a Moroccan market.
2 A bankHey, we all own a bank. There are some who argue that the entire banking system should be nationalised, but for the moment we have to make do with just one: Anglo Irish Bank. You may have heard of it. It was the roaring success of the Celtic Tiger, something of which we were so proud. Now, with its activities the subject of a Garda investigation, it has become the epitome of everything that was rotten in the banking sector. And you own a bit of it. Congratulations.
3 Dole queuesIn 2008, unemployment jumped by 69 per cent. There was also the largest drop in people in employment since the mid 1970s. In January, a record 36,500 sought jobseekers' benefits. When journalists talk to those in the lengthening dole queues, they find architects, construction workers, IT workers, other journalists and others with just about every kind of qualification. The few who are not represented are those who work in the social-welfare offices and are so busy that a backlog of claims has built up. Those newly signed-up might have to wait 12 weeks for their first jobseekers' payments. For a generation unused to the system, it has been a nasty shock.
4 Sporting gloryIt's a strange thing, but during the past year Ireland has arguably had a string of sporting successes to match anything that has gone before it.
Padraig Harrington won two majors golf tournaments (bringing his total to three); Ruby Walsh had a record-breaking week at Cheltenham; Irish boxers won three Olympic medals; Bernard Dunne became boxing’s first Irish world champion in a decade; and there was the small matter of the Grand Slam. Maybe these things are sweeter in a recession, but the way in which people were desperate for a rugby victory as a salve to our troubles was evident from the first match. The recession wasn’t officially over, despite what the text message said, but it gave us a weekend break away from it.
5 AngerThere was a joke doing the rounds after the recent street march through Dublin that this was the first time the Garda had overestimated the numbers in the protest. Whatever the truth about the 100,000 figure officially reported, it was certainly the largest street protest since the anti-war march of 2003. Since then, there was the threatened Day of Action by public-sector unions, which was due for Monday but which has been postponed in favour of partnership talks. That the Impact trade union couldn't get the two-thirds majority it needed to back the strike suggests that not everyone is angry, but time will tell how much it ferments among public- and private-sector workers – as well as the new unemployed.
6 An appreciation for savings instead of creditThere is a quirk in the current crisis in that, for a time at least, some people are doing quite well out of it: those in a job whose mortgage repayments are down and whose day-to-day costs are reduced. Still, people are not spending their money, preferring instead to hold on to it for dear life in case the country becomes Iceland II. It's a change from the credit-card culture that previously existed, when personal debt rose from €20 billion to more than €140 billion between 1999 and 2007. It's not to say that people aren't still using their credit cards – repossession cases are showing how much people are relying on them – but they are no longer seen as the route to easy money they once were. Still, it means fewer letters pre-approving you for loans you never asked for.
7 A sudden interest in the business newsThere was a time when the business news was something that periodically got in the way of Morning Ireland. Not now. It is Morning Ireland. The recession has been bad for the coffers of newspapers and television, but the business media has done relatively well. The business shows on radio have seen strong gains, Prime Time's recession-themed specials have done well, and RTÉ has commissioned shows such as George Lee's How We Blew the Boom, which ran last weekend and acted as the pin to burst the Grand Slam weekend bubble.
8 BudgetsThere was an early budget, brought forward to October. But that didn't solve the problem. So in February, the Taoiseach Brian Cowen stood up in the Dáil and told the country where €2 billion in savings would be made. But now there's a need for a mini-budget, or emergency-budget, or whatever you want to call it, but whatever it is there will be nothing mini about it. Since the last Budget, the Government has admitted to making a mistake by raising VAT. It's political future will rest on it getting it right second time around. Surely there's a "three budgets and you're out" rule.
9 Ghost townsEvery large town has one. Some have more than one. They are the half-built housing estates; the half-sold apartment blocks; the developments that haven't developed. They are everywhere and have become rotting, cement ghosts from the boom. They're often accompanied by giant billboards promising the usual guff about "exclusive" homes in fabulous locations, but they don't look so exclusive when JCBs are rusting and the portaloos unused.
2008 saw the construction of one-third fewer homes than the previous year, and 2009 will see a sharper fall as developers either hold back or go out of business. And still there is an over-supply. Perhaps we could use them for Celtic Tiger theme-parks.
10 Recession-themed articles in newspapersThis won't be the last of them.