L'Etat, c'est la grande fiction à travers laquelle tout le monde s'efforce de vivre aux dépens de tout le monde. Frédéric Bastiat

mardi 19 juin 2007

Modèle irlandais

Sur le miracle économique irlandais...

(...) Ireland made itself attractive to investors, invested a lot in education and research, reduced the public sector and reduced the taxes. The country started to grow at more than 5% per year (the triple of most EU countries) In barely 20 years time, the Irish became the most wealthy of all EU citizens. (...)
The favourable commercial environment has been further bolstered by fiscal policies and an industrial strategy that encourage foreign investment. And the Irish themselves offer a flexible supply of good quality labour. (...)


... et le modèle scandinave, à ne pas suivre:

Acres of newsprint have been used in discussions of the Scandinavian knowledgeeconomy and "flexicurity" across the continent and in the UK too. (...)

But how well is the Nordic model actually doing? Despite all the hype about, say, the Swedish welfare state, a closer look at what's going on there reveals that things aren't asrosy as they seem. Back in 1975 the Swedes were the world's fourth richest people, but now they are 14th and still falling. It is therefore difficult to identify a perfect model, but if Europe needs a success story to emulate, perhaps we should be looking west towards Ireland.

In 1975, Ireland ranked 22nd in the world in terms of income per head, and it was widely seen as a sleepy economic backwater. Today, it is Ireland that is the fourth richest country. In the years since 1990, when Sweden, Finland and Denmark grew on average at 2%, 1.8% and 2.1% a year respectively (quite far behind the OECD average of 2.6%), Ireland's economy grew at a rate of 6.6% a year. (...)