Madam, – Michael Casey (Opinion, April 14th) suggests that the Irish Central Bank should simply print more money to take some pressure off the Government. He thinks that it may encourage customer spending and he says other countries have done this in extreme situations.
It’s a pity he doesn’t explain in his article what were the results of implementing quantitative easing (printing money) policies in other countries. President Obama injected an $800 billion-plus stimulus into the US economy and the unemployment rate still has not declined to president Bush’s 7.3 per cent high in December 2008. Why?
What’s been stimulated has been commodity markets and emerging markets.
It would be the same case with Ireland if Mr Casey’s proposal were to be implemented – because Ireland is one of the most open economies in the world, the liquidity would just leak out and stimulate jobs in China. Michael Casey writes that the US authorities, under a responsible president, have no no qualms about quantitative easing.
He should inform his readers that President Obama has also no qualms about proposing a $1 trillion tax hike to finance his printing money madness. Besides, isn’t it amazing that Mr Casey thinks that we do not have enough debt in Ireland? His proposal of curing the debt problem by incurring even more debt is like proposing to cure a hangover by drinking more alcohol. – Yours, etc,