BY JOHN ELLIS, FINANCIAL ADVISOR
Another 300 people signed on to the live register last month, pushing the seasonally adjusted total to 171,100. The unadjusted March figure reached 168,072, a 5.1% jump on the same month last year. Yet, again, the Government appears slow to respond to these warning signs. The unemployment rate, released by the Central Statistics Office last week, increased to 4.7 %, with the 25-34 age group now the largest group on the register. It is still low by historical standards, but it is clear that the jobs market is slowing down.
Jack Kennedy, senior economist at Indeed, puts the rise in context. Job postings have slipped to just 2% above pre-pandemic levels, down from 8% earlier this year. Global volatility, the Middle East conflict, energy costs and market worries are making businesses cautious. “A sustained period of high energy costs, inflationary pressure and volatility would be far more challenging,” Kennedy warns. Firms may halt hiring and investment. Workers will push for bigger wage rises as living costs climb.
Ordinary families, already squeezed by rising living costs, could see wage growth stall, making it harder to cover mortgages or rents. Young workers may face fewer job openings or delayed promotions. This comes at a time when many are already finding it tough to get on the property ladder or start a family.
Recent Revenue Commissioners’ figures tell a similar story of underlying strain. Last year they wrote off €271.5 million in uncollectible tax, a 70% leap from €158.9 million in 2024. Most of these losses came from insolvent businesses, and the fallout of unpaid Covid-era tax warehousing and ‘non-engaging’ firms. Revenue insists the surge is not due to policy changes. Still, the jump coincides with a record €106 billion tax take, up 9% on the previous year. The economy is still pulling in record revenue, but you can already see clear pockets of real distress starting to appear with more people signing on to the live register and businesses going bust.
These warning signs are worrying enough on their own, but they make the Government’s housing mistakes feel even more damaging right now. For more than 13 years successive governments, most recently this Fianna Fáil-Fine Gael coalition, have been warned that tinkering with the rental market without a serious plan to build homes would backfire. But on they went anyway.
Last year, they extended Rental Pressure Zones nationwide. This month they brought in new rules designed to attract big international funds back into the rental sector, at the direct expense of small Irish landlords.
The latest Irish Independent/REA survey shows that in the first quarter more than 40% of three-bed semi-detached homes sold in 10 counties were former rental properties dumped by small landlords. Taxed at over 50% on rental income and stripped of basic rights over problem tenancies, they have simply walked away. The stock of private rentals is shrinking fast, exactly when we need more of it.
This is reckless short-termism. Why clear out thousands of existing rentals now to make way for thousands that we might not see for another few years? And have we not seen the same mess before? Just look at how the Government’s attempts to speed up planning backfired and made things far worse.
We have a housing crisis that has been worsening each and every year for 13 years, with homelessness heading towards 20,000. It is hammering our economy, our competitiveness and, worst of all, our families, our young people and our society as a whole. And year after year, it just keeps getting worse.
It’s time we demanded our Government stop the endless tinkering and finally build the homes we so badly need.
T: 086 8362633
