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Frugality and Irish Society

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  • Registered Users Posts: 27,391 ✭✭✭✭odyssey06


    I guess if you are French and already have a chateau you probably dont need any more flaunting...

    "To follow knowledge like a sinking star..." (Tennyson's Ulysses)



  • Registered Users Posts: 13,505 ✭✭✭✭Mad_maxx


    The 19C called and wants its theories back.

    Sure its very un PC to believe religion has in anyway influenced certain societies but the nordic nations might be the poster children for secular liberal nations yet who can seriously deny their inherent Lutheranism which informs their ways?


  • Posts: 0 Avianna Shy Baton


    , buys expensive brand name clothes etc.

    I always laugh at this one. Cheap clothes are a terrible false economy. I don't buy clothes that often but when I do I spend the money to buy quality brands and they last vastly longer than cheap stuff.
    I’ve lived with English people in England. They’re quite happy flaunting wealth.

    If you had english people at your wedding you will see what people mean when they say they are tight with money, they give tiny gifts.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 809 ✭✭✭Blaizes


    Mrsmum wrote: »
    I think Irish people as a group have some kind of need to fill up a pit of despair or emptiness within themselves, be it conscious or unconscious, with all forms of 'enjoyment' eg alcohol, constant shopping. We want, want, want all the time and we keep filling up with temporary thrills. It's because we're very insecure and lacking in self esteem imo. People from other countries I think are able to get joy from simpler living. They manage to feel defined by who they are rather than what they have. Very small example but a French lady I know will invite you to her house for lunch and make a big deal about basically some crusty bread and a glass of wine. She is so relaxed she pulls it off beautifully. In reverse no Irish person would invite a guest for lunch and give them a slice of bread. And then there's the whole Danish hygge where if I understand it properly is all about embracing cosy simple pleasures. It's not enough for us here in Ireland to have enough, we want more all the time. Not everyone obviously but I definitely think success in Ireland is measured very much by how much you own.

    Think you've really hit the nail on the head, great post.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,860 ✭✭✭Mrsmum


    I’ve lived with English people in England. They’re quite happy flaunting wealth.

    Have you ever been to an English wedding. They are all home in bed by midnight if not before after a pretty frugal day. Compare that with Irish weddings which are now three days affairs.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 340 ✭✭Calltocall


    Perhaps I’m missing the point of the article but I lived for a number of years in the UK and one thing that I couldn’t get used to was the tightness/frugality of many people I met, it was the norm, for me personally it’s a real turn off if an individual is extremely tight and penny pinches on everything, it’s a trait I dislike immensely particularly if the individual is wealthy, fair enough if you’re broke but usually people like that are quite wealthy

    When I returned home to friends here who would give you the shirt of their backs if you were stuck a rather endearing trait that perhaps has something to do with our casual relationship with money but I would take it any day over my experience abroad, life is short I would rather spend on my family than watch the numbers increase on a computer screen, I don’t recommend reckless spending at all and that has put many people here in trouble but I do believe there is something in the term you can’t take it with you.


  • Registered Users Posts: 13,505 ✭✭✭✭Mad_maxx


    Women are more frivolous with money as in the heel of the hunt, its the man who will be called upon to provide for the kids, he might have to move into a bedsit but the state will look after her before him


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 5,995 ✭✭✭Ipso


    Calltocall wrote: »
    Perhaps I’m missing the point of the article but I lived for a number of years in the UK and one thing that I couldn’t get used to was the tightness/frugality of many people I met, it was the norm, for me personally it’s a real turn off if an individual is extremely tight and penny pinches on everything, it’s a trait I dislike immensely particularly if the individual is wealthy, fair enough if you’re broke but usually people like that are quite wealthy

    When I returned home to friends here who would give you the shirt of their backs if you were stuck a rather endearing trait that perhaps has something to do with our casual relationship with money but I would take it any day over my experience abroad, life is short I would rather spend on my family than watch the numbers increase on a computer screen, I don’t recommend reckless spending at all and that has put many people here in trouble but I do believe there is something in the term you can’t take it with you.

    I don't think it's that that is being criticised but more the over extravagance and 'vulgarity".
    I lived in Dublin from around 2002 to 2008, it wasn't pretty. I don't think it was a case of Irish people not being frugal back then, more of a case of believing their own hype (richest country in the world etc).


  • Registered Users Posts: 13,505 ✭✭✭✭Mad_maxx


    Calltocall wrote: »
    Perhaps I’m missing the point of the article but I lived for a number of years in the UK and one thing that I couldn’t get used to was the tightness/frugality of many people I met, it was the norm, for me personally it’s a real turn off if an individual is extremely tight and penny pinches on everything, it’s a trait I dislike immensely particularly if the individual is wealthy, fair enough if you’re broke but usually people like that are quite wealthy

    When I returned home to friends here who would give you the shirt of their backs if you were stuck a rather endearing trait that perhaps has something to do with our casual relationship with money but I would take it any day over my experience abroad, life is short I would rather spend on my family than watch the numbers increase on a computer screen, I don’t recommend reckless spending at all and that has put many people here in trouble but I do believe there is something in the term you can’t take it with you.

    Kiwis are the tightest people I've ever met but then again it's a deeply Presbyterian nation culturally and the most Scottish country in the world outside Scotland

    I find it deeply offensive that so many Irish people think that just because someone is well off, they have a duty to cough up, it's an attitude which is rampant here.


  • Posts: 13,712 ✭✭✭✭[Deleted User]


    That’s not true at all. Savings don’t flow through the economy, only loans add new money, and more transactions obviously mean more economic activity.
    Where do you think the loans come from, thin air? These days, any loans drawn down by SMEs are basically drawn from personal savings. This lending did not create new money, only the ECB's asset-purchasing programme did that, and it was never designed to directly help SMEs.
    We haven’t proven that Ireland isn’t frugal yet. Savings are high. Reducing wage inflation (except in government) doesn’t seem like a good strategy in a country where wages are not in fact inflating much at all. Wage inflation is what Europe needs.
    I totally agree that Germany needs wage inflation, and that Germany has not capitulated this point despite many years of pressure. But ireland does not need wage inflation, certainly not within the manufacturing and export labour markets.
    That’s the last thing we want to do as much of economics at Econ 101 level is wrong.
    Despite all of the dramatic claims made during the last recession, none of the economics texts have been dramatically rewritten. The fundamentals are intact, except to provide updates to recent events in economic history. Most people who say otherwise tend to be cranks with no interest whatever in economics.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,070 ✭✭✭Franz Von Peppercorn


    Mrsmum wrote: »
    Have you ever been to an English wedding. They are all home in bed by midnight if not before after a pretty frugal day. Compare that with Irish weddings which are now three days affairs.

    I think we’ve been hanging around with different English people. I’m sure some English people have reserved weddings but when I was at my friend’s H and M’s wedding last year it was fairly over the top.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,860 ✭✭✭Mrsmum


    Compare Santa and Christmas in general here with other countries. We go absolutely nuts spendingwise.


  • Registered Users Posts: 20,329 ✭✭✭✭dxhound2005


    Mrsmum wrote: »
    I think Irish people as a group have some kind of need to fill up a pit of despair or emptiness within themselves, be it conscious or unconscious, with all forms of 'enjoyment' eg alcohol, constant shopping. We want, want, want all the time and we keep filling up with temporary thrills. It's because we're very insecure and lacking in self esteem imo. People from other countries I think are able to get joy from simpler living. They manage to feel defined by who they are rather than what they have. Very small example but a French lady I know will invite you to her house for lunch and make a big deal about basically some crusty bread and a glass of wine. She is so relaxed she pulls it off beautifully. In reverse no Irish person would invite a guest for lunch and give them a slice of bread. And then there's the whole Danish hygge where if I understand it properly is all about embracing cosy simple pleasures. It's not enough for us here in Ireland to have enough, we want more all the time. Not everyone obviously but I definitely think success in Ireland is measured very much by how much you own.

    I think I would know if I had a pit of despair or emptiness. It could hardly be unconscious. And I am not insecure, nor lacking in self esteem. Sorry if this does not match your estimation of Irish people as "a group".


  • Registered Users Posts: 15,631 ✭✭✭✭whisky_galore


    There's a certain amount of a 'keeping up with the Joneses' here, people must have the new car with the new car smell, the bigger dick-waving McMansion than the one down the road, the latest designer furniture etc etc.
    You can't be seen dead in an old or a modest house. The wall to wall property wankery in print and tv feeds into this.
    Every Christmas has people getting into hock buying stuff they can ill afford because the advertisers tell us we need all this shyte. A live for the moment, worry about the bill tomorrow 'shur it'll be grand' mindset.


  • Registered Users Posts: 13,505 ✭✭✭✭Mad_maxx


    I think we’ve been hanging around with different English people. I’m sure some English people have reserved weddings but when I was at my friend’s H and M’s wedding last year it was fairly over the top.

    So individuals are often at odds with the general culture

    We are saying that in general, the British are tighter with money than us


  • Posts: 13,712 ✭✭✭✭[Deleted User]


    Mrsmum wrote: »
    Compare Santa and Christmas in general here with other countries. We go absolutely nuts spendingwise.
    very anecdotal, but yes, I agree.

    I think we need a Santa index, along the lines of the Big Mac index. Might be a useful measure of trends in terms of household tendency to overspend.

    (BTW Santa is real, kids. Go to bed)


  • Registered Users Posts: 20,329 ✭✭✭✭dxhound2005


    Mad_maxx wrote: »
    So individuals are often at odds with the general culture

    We are saying that in general, the British are tighter with money than us

    And the Scots are even tighter. Like Cavan people.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,860 ✭✭✭Mrsmum


    I think I would know if I had a pit of despair or emptiness. It could hardly be unconscious. And I am not insecure, nor lacking in self esteem. Sorry if this does not match your estimation of Irish people as "a group".


    You must be very young or something to not understand most people have unconscious wants and needs.


  • Registered Users Posts: 4,701 ✭✭✭jam_mac_jam


    I think some of it is new money. We have never had any money throughout our history so we go mad when we do have some. The example of christmas and weddings, we go mad in comparison to other Europeans. As a country we are very status concious and a bit insecure.


  • Registered Users Posts: 20,329 ✭✭✭✭dxhound2005


    Mrsmum wrote: »
    You must be very young or something to not understand most people have unconscious wants and needs.

    I would be quite happy to share some wine and crusty bread with a French lady. Equally happy with sliced pan and a mug of tea. I am a person of simple needs.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,070 ✭✭✭Franz Von Peppercorn


    Where do you think the loans come from, thin air?

    Effectively.
    These days, any loans drawn down by SMEs are basically drawn from personal savings. This lending did not create new money, only the ECB's asset-purchasing programme did that, and it was never designed to directly help SMEs.

    That’s totally wrong. It’s a good example of why Econ 101 is a mess though. Bank lending does create new money. That’s how most money is created. Paying off debts destroys money. The asset purchasing also creates money but it’s limited (but both also create liabilities). Savings has nothing to do with it. Deposits come after money is injected into the economy, not vice versa.
    I totally agree that Germany needs wage inflation, and that Germany has not capitulated this point despite many years of pressure. But ireland does not need wage inflation, certainly not within the manufacturing and export labour markets.

    Why does wage inflation alone bring out the Puritanism in economists? The individual companies either have to pay more money for workers or they don’t. If they do what’s the problem. Isn’t that the market? We can be pretty sure they won’t pay enough to make profits non existent, or that if wages stagnated and profits increased that wouldn’t be a problem. (Profit inflation needs to be stramped out said no economist ever).
    Despite all of the dramatic claims made during the last recession, none of the economics texts have been dramatically rewritten. The fundamentals are intact, except to provide updates to recent events in economic history. Most people who say otherwise tend to be cranks with no interest whatever in economics.

    If that were true (luckily it isn’t) then the entire corpus of economic theory should perhaps leave the university system and find a better place in ye oldde shoppe of fake prognosticators, beside the Nostradamus texts.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,070 ✭✭✭Franz Von Peppercorn


    Mad_maxx wrote: »
    So individuals are often at odds with the general culture

    We are saying that in general, the British are tighter with money than us

    And I’m saying that’s not true. We can match anecdotes all day though. What’s needed is data.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,070 ✭✭✭Franz Von Peppercorn


    Also who is buying McMansions in this housing environment? You’d be lucky to spend 400k on a two bed.


  • Registered Users Posts: 13,505 ✭✭✭✭Mad_maxx


    And I’m saying that’s not true. We can match anecdotes all day though. What’s needed is data.

    I don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows

    I also believe Frank sinatra was way better than elvis, I've no data however so I suppose its not true


  • Registered Users Posts: 15,631 ✭✭✭✭whisky_galore


    Also who is buying McMansions in this housing environment? You’d be lucky to spend 400k on a two bed.

    There's heaps of mini hotel sized houses around, dont know if they're changing hands much these days. Many half-finished seemingly abandoned ones too which says a lot.


  • Registered Users Posts: 30,024 ✭✭✭✭freshpopcorn


    It's something that really annoys me at times. I know people and they worked hard at school/college and now work to achieve what they have and they are people who'd try and make them guilty for buying things they want/like either for themselves or there family.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,070 ✭✭✭Franz Von Peppercorn


    Mad_maxx wrote: »
    I don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows

    You’ll need one to know which way it blows tomorrow.
    I also believe Frank sinatra was way better than elvis, I've no data however so I suppose its not true

    Data isn’t important in that fairly subjective opinion. Neither appeal to me much.


  • Registered Users Posts: 30,024 ✭✭✭✭freshpopcorn


    Calltocall wrote: »
    Perhaps I’m missing the point of the article but I lived for a number of years in the UK and one thing that I couldn’t get used to was the tightness/frugality of many people I met, it was the norm, for me personally it’s a real turn off if an individual is extremely tight and penny pinches on everything, it’s a trait I dislike immensely particularly if the individual is wealthy, fair enough if you’re broke but usually people like that are quite wealthy

    My aunt has an English visitor and when he first started calling he used only had a cup of tea and refused anything else. When he was leaving he offered to pay for it because it was the done thing in his area.
    When ever he calls now she has to tell him things are free because he's afraid of the cost.


  • Registered Users Posts: 4,080 ✭✭✭sheesh


    I think you are all wrong there are flashy people and frugal people in all the countries mentioned in this thread. Germany creates some of the flashiest cars in the world they didn't pick that up by chance it is because there is a market for those kinds of cars in that country.

    Plenty of impressive architecture in those countries too because it impresses, some brits love to make a splash some German Dutch Danish like to put on a show too plenty of irish i know deliberately held off buying a house during the boom because they knew the crash was coming. one guy i know sold his apartment in tallaght at the height of the boom went off working in Australia in telecoms he now has a house in a nice part of cork which he bought when prices were low.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 13,505 ✭✭✭✭Mad_maxx


    You’ll need one to know which way it blows tomorrow.



    Data isn’t important in that fairly subjective opinion. Neither appeal to me much.

    So your opinion that the brits are as loose with money as us is subjective?


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