> Anyone know anything about the Irish economy? I'm just looking at some
> stats and am surprised by the huge trade surplus (corporate tax
> shelter services?) and strong productivity growth (way ahead of
> Germany's, which is way ahead of most of the rest of Europe). But
> bubble, then bust. Wuzzup?
Just to amplify what Wendy Lyon said: You have to be careful about Ireland's NIPA numbers, as you probably know, because of the huge number of multinationals that headquarter there for tax reasons. Their profits go into GDP but not GNP, if I'm not mistaken, and presumably show up in the export column, since they derive from non-Irish purchases. But those profits won't have the normal effect on the balance of payments since most of that money will probably be kept in non-Irish banks. So Ireland could show big (GDP) current account surpluses in the published stats, but its BoP will behave as if the county's running big c/a deficits.
Do you know whether the trade numbers you were looking at were from the GDP or GNP accounts?
Also: On productivity, that's not so surprising, is it? The country did get rich, after all.
SA