David McWilliams

Sucked into Anglo black hole

David McWilliams — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 09:35:56 +0000

The government has spent more than it can afford on Anglo, a bank of no value, so when a proper bank comes begging, there will be nothing left to give Writing on a bus can always be a bit tricky, particularly on a dodgy stretch of road outside Charleville. But, bumps apart, the 12.30 Citylink bus...

Paying for our banks a recipe for instability

David McWilliams — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 09:00:04 +0000

I AM sitting outside a lovely bar called De Prins in Amsterdam, looking out over the canal, past the cyclists, toward Anne Frank’s house beyond. The crowds are lined up again, as they are every day, to bear witness to the most unspeakable crime and the most magnificent courage. We know that the effervescence of a...

The reality finally hits home

David McWilliams — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 09:25:42 +0000

‘You want it to be one way.” ‘‘Man, stop.” “[But] it’s the other way.” The above dialogue occurs in season four of The Wire – the HBO crime series based in Baltimore, Maryland. Marlo Stanfield, a notoriously vicious drug dealer, walks into what Americans call a convenience store. Straight in front of the security guard, he pays for...

If it looks like a duck . . .

David McWilliams — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 09:09:48 +0000

Last Friday, European bond markets wobbled again as investors – albeit in a thin market – got the fear. The reason apparently was, again, Greece, where reports of soaring unemployment and complete economic stagnation are fuelling worries that the Greeks will have to renegotiate their debts. Bondholders will lose no matter what. But they should lose. They took...

Collapsing house prices? We ain’t seen nothing yet

David McWilliams — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 08:16:22 +0000

THE most comprehensive report on the Irish property market is out and it evidences the total destruction of wealth of a certain generation. According to the wonderfully detailed work done by Ronan Lyons at Daft.ie, asking prices countrywide fell by just over 4pc in the second three months of the year — a slightly larger...

Costly wearing of the green

David McWilliams — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 09:45:44 +0000

Our boomtime ideology is alive and kicking – and our refusal to look to developing countries to build our economy again will be the death of us. Can Irish football tell us anything about the state of the country, and just how far we have to travel to compete at the highest level? People might say...

The bank guarantee has done its job, so move on

David McWilliams — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 08:24:12 +0000

WHEN I hear the new boss of Anglo urging the Government to extend the bank guarantee, I know the right thing to do is precisely the opposite. Put in its most simple form, what is good for Anglo is bad for Ireland. The only course of action is to close this thing down, together with Irish...

Middle class dying a slow death

David McWilliams — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 09:26:00 +0000

Last year, I was lucky enough to interview Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard law professor and likely new head of the new US consumer protection agency. We discussed the US banking crisis, but my interest in writing about Warren stems not from her views on the US banks, but from what she has been saying for years...

We’re the losers in silent takeover of democracy

David McWilliams — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 10:23:17 +0000

On January 7 1961, Dwight Eisenhower, then the outgoing US President and former General of the US Army — a military man to his toes — made an extraordinary reference to the threat that the US military posed to American society and its economy. In his final speech as President — one made at the height...

Selling off state assets on the cheap is just madness

David McWilliams — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 08:09:54 +0000

This Government will not contemplate selling property just in case it would bankrupt the banks. The State’s argument is that the market is depressed so if we were to sell the land, we would not get a fair price for it. So we will postpone the problem: we get NAMA — a financial skip into which...