Loved the link….

“In the decade following the legalization of contraceptives in 1979, Ireland saw a sharp fall in the crude birth rate. This led to decreasing youth dependency and a rise in the working-age share of the total population. By the mid-1990s, the dependency burden in Ireland had dropped to a level below that in the United Kingdom.” (Booms, Busts, and Echoes David E. Bloom and David Canning)

Spare no expense. We will pass the hat around when you get back – depending on the quality of the insights you bring back.

Peter W,

Yes, I’m also aware of the GDP/GNI dichotomy which of course is the logical consequence of growth led by foreign investment, but the rate of growth in GNI has still been very impressive, if a bit below GDP.

According to the OECD Observer http://www.oecdobserver.org/news/fullstory.php/aid/1507/GDP_and_GNI.html :

“Ireland is another country where GDP has to be read with care. Ireland’s position has risen up the GDP per head rankings since 1999, and is now in the top five countries in the OECD. This remarkable transformation has been put down to a mix of factors, of which inward investment in high value-added businesses is one. But does GDP per head accurately reflects Ireland’s actual wealth, since all that inward investment (and foreign labour) generates profits and other revenues, some of which inevitably flows back to the countries of origin?

Another measure, Gross National Income, accounts for these flows in and out of the country. For many countries, the flows tend to balance out, leaving little difference between GDP and GNI. But not so for Ireland, as outflows of profits and income, largely from global business giants located there, often exceed income flows back into the country. This means that in a GNI ranking, rather than being in the top five, Ireland drops to 17th. In other words, while Ireland produces a lot of income per inhabitant, GNI shows that less of it stays in the country than GDP might suggest. …

Ireland remains one of the OECD’s fastest growing economies, and this shows in a sharp rise in real income since the mid-1990s. Compared with 21 OECD countries for which figures adjusted both for inflation and purchasing power differences are available, Ireland’s GDP per capita swung from about 12% below average in 1995 to 22% above the average in 2003. GNI per capita moved from about 20% below average of the same 21 countries in 1995 to a less pronounced 4% above average, which is still quite a leap.”

As you can see, their index is constructed out of a number of different indicators. A free labour market is only one of them. So it is quite plausible to attribute their success to economic freedom as they have defined it in their index and to say that Ireland scores quite high on it in aggregate.

They actually have a more sophisticated Hayekian (in the sense of The Constitution of Liberty) understanding of economic freedom than you seem to imply.
And I don’t think it’s a case of their calling something what it’s not. Bear in mind that this publication is for a mass audience. They could give it some high faluting name like ‘indicators of effective facilitators of Pareto efficient gains in trade’ but that isn’t going to go down well.

See my comment here where I link what they are doing to some of the academic research that is out there (and bear in mind this was just a result of a 5 minute internet search on my part)
http://catallaxyfiles.com/?p=2096#comment-148740

Ireland is managing to maintain its manufacturing base and expand into growth industries because it doesn’t compete on wages. Most of the multinationals are so embedded in the Irish economy and so dependant on the very skilled Irish workforce and highly capable, innovative, Irish SMEs that it is not worth it for them to move to Eastern Europe for the cheaper labour.

Roy Green has written extensively on the subject. Roy has just returned from being Dean of the Commerce Faculty at the National University of Ireland, Galway and is Dean of the Macquarie Graduate School of Management.

http://evatt.labor.net.au/publications/papers/14.html

I recall reading an article in the Irish Times in 2000 which was about the first person ever to be sent down for tax evasion in the history of the Republic. Not only that, but up until that point only 20 people had ever been successfully prosecuted for tax evasion/fraud.

At ground level the wealth divide is getting bigger each year with all the follow on social problems…always a good idea to wait for the final act before completing analysis especially when parallel effects of rapid growth are being ignored!