1 One thing that the study does not do, which I would be interested to see, is control for the huge amount of inward EU investment in Ireland (that is, state subsidies) over the last 15 years. While I'm not claiming this invalidates their argument, a significant reason that Ireland has been able to maintain low taxation is because someone else (that is, the EU) has been picking up the bill for much of Ireland's infrastructure improvements.

2 1. GROWTH AND EU-SUBSIDIES. The graph shown at http://workforall.net/English/size_of_government.gif clearly illustrates that Ireland's continuous wealth explosion has a neat starting point in 1985, and that this starting point coincides with the moment they reduced their tax burden. The relation between EU subsidies and Ireland's explosive Growth is statistically insignificant. Ireland benefited from European subsidies long before 1985, with no growth effect noticable at all. Ireland's growth explosion continued its steady 5,6% pace when European subsidies dramatically were reduced, and the Irish boom continues even today (5% growth expected once again). The spread diagram between subsidies and growth consequently shows no relationship at all. Other regions such as Greece or Wallonia received comparable subsidies, but apparently could not use them for the benefit of their economies at all. . 2. SCIENTIFIC PROOF. The conclusion that big government harms growth and that high direct taxes on income and labour are the most distortive taxes (as opposed to consumption taxes) does not originate from single country comparisons, but from the scientific multiple regression analysis in which 17 European countries were involved. In this investigation WorkForAll examined 25 possible causes of growth differentials over an 18 year period. The regression model explains for over 93% of the growth differentials and left only 7% unexplained for. The conclusions are undisputeable and clear: "big government" is detrimental to growth, and "countries with a higher proportion of consumption taxes" have very significant higher growth rates. Full report of the study can be read at: http://workforall.net/Tax_policy_and_Growth_differentials_in_Europe.pdf And the abstract at : http://workforall.net/EN_Tax_policy_for_growth_and_jobs.html . 3. THE CENTRAL POINT The central point is do we choose for Irish policies which have proven realistic and successfull for over 20 years, or do we believe socialist dogma's and choose a Scandinavian nanny type of government that proved so catastrophic for both wealth and job creation, and robbed the individual from his dignity as a free and responsable being? As anonymous posted here before: if we adopt a more Irish view, it is possible to create bigger wealth. More people become independent of government support. The Scandinavian model however, only redistributes wealth without any progress in society. In the long run, there will be equality, but it will more resemble equal poverty than equal wealth.