Industrial relations disputes, inflation from the oil crises of 1973 and 1979, new capital taxes and poor management of the economy by the government took their toll in the 1970s. By the 1980s Ireland was referred to as the 'sick man of Europe' .
The historical consensus that overpopulation was the root cause of pre-Famine Irish poverty was endorsed by Connell (1950), who saw the introduction of the potato as a major catalyst for eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Irish population growth.
Ireland, too, had a depressed economy. The economic war with Britain from 1932 further depressed the Irish economy. The Irish government promoted a policy of protectionism and self-sufficiency, and attempts were made to start an industrialisation programme.
The state of 18th Century Ireland Poverty can be partly attributed to the devastation caused in the mid-17th century by the armies of Oliver Cromwell. These armies burned land, crops and food stores in their wake, making farming in Ireland difficult, and in some areas, impossible.
The economist Dermot McAleese wrote that “high taxes, low confidence, high labour costs, excessive regulation and anti-competitive practices” plagued the Irish economy in the 1980s. Ireland's accession to the European Economic Community in 1973 brought no respite from these economic woes.
Celtic Tiger is a nickname for Ireland during its boom years—between 1995 and 2007— when its economy was growing rapidly. The Irish economy grew at an average annual rate of 9.4% between 1995 and 2000, and between 1987 and 2007, Ireland's GDP grew by 229%.
Ireland was also the poorest country in Western Europe. Original Six: Germany ($19,074 per capita); France ($20,441); Italy ($16,950); Belgium ($19,399); Netherlands ($20,851); Luxembourg ($23,820 – part of workforce live in other countries). New members: Denmark ($22,228); Ireland $10,946) and the UK ($19,168.)
Far from being a natural disaster, many Irish were convinced that the famine was a direct outgrowth of British colonial policies. In support of this contention, they noted that during the famine's worst years, many Anglo-Irish estates continued to export grain and livestock to England.
Since England first invaded the country more than eight centuries ago, Ireland has suffered from war, religious conflict, and political division, and the encounter between the English and the Irish has also left a profound legacy on Irish culture and even in the landscape itself.
Between 1845 and 1855 more than 1.5 million adults and children left Ireland to seek refuge in America. Most were desperately poor, and many were suffering from starvation and disease. They left because disease had devastated Ireland's potato crops, leaving millions without food.
While the potato crops had failed there was still food in Ireland. However, the British government were keen to avoid interfering with the market at any cost. This meant that food was shipped out of Ireland even though people were starving to death.
In 2021 Irish GDP/capita was $100,129 compared to $47,508 for the UK and there is no sign of that divergent trend ending any time soon. Ireland's GDP growth rate was 13.5% in 2021 and is expected to be 7.9% in 2022 while the UK has entered a period of recession or GDP decline expected to last a least a year.
The main cause was a disease which affected the potato crop, upon which a third of Ireland's population was dependent for food. There had been crop failures before but during the famine it failed across the whole country, and reoccurred over several years.
It is estimated that the Famine caused about 1 million deaths between 1845 and 1851 either from starvation or hunger-related disease. A further 1 million Irish people emigrated. This meant that Ireland lost a quarter of its population during those terrible years.
Sometimes, donations to Ireland came from the poorest and most unexpected countries, including islands in the Caribbean and West Indies. Despite their own hardships, people in Barbados, Jamaica, Saint Kitts, and many other small nations came together during one of the hardest times in Irish history.
The Great Famine was caused by a failure of the potato crop, which many people relied on for most of their nutrition. A disease called late blight destroyed the leaves and edible roots of the potato plants in successive years from 1845 to 1849.
And so began eight centuries of fun, games, and oppression. From the twelfth century on, the English did everything in their power to make the Irish more 'English', including teaching them tiddlywinks, making them eat Yorkshire pudding and, when all else failed, taking their lives.
The history of Ireland from 1169–1536 covers the period from the arrival of the Cambro-Normans to the reign of Henry VIII of England, who made himself King of Ireland. After the Norman invasion of 1169–1171, Ireland was under an alternating level of control from Norman lords and the King of England.
Ireland during the period of 1536–1691 saw the first full conquest of the island by England and its colonization with mostly Protestant settlers from Great Britain.
The "famine" ended in 1849, when British troops stopped removing the food. While enough food to sustain 18 million people was being removed from Ireland, its population was reduced by more than 2.5 million, to 6.5 million.
During the Irish potato famine, why didn't people simply eat other vegetables? Other vegetables, grains and meat animals were grown and exported through the famine but it was the property of the landlords and any who attempted to eat it would have been met with severe punishment.
Potatoes were easy to grow in Ireland since their other crops were taken by their landlords and exported for profit. Irish potatoes became ruined by disease and could no longer provide food for the Irish population thus leading to famine.
The poverty and living conditions in Dublin's tenements were described by 1913 at the time of the Great Lockout by James Connolly as the worst slums in Europe. Infant mortality rate was the highest in Europe with deaths from tuberculosis related illnesses 50% higher than that of England and Scotland.
Taking purchasing power parity into account, this puts Ireland very high up in the list of the world's richest countries, in 3th place. Inflation in Ireland in 2022 was around 7.81%. Within the EU, the average in the same year was 8.83 percent. In the United States, it was most recently 8.00%.
The ten poorest countries in Europe, based on GNI per capita, are Ukraine, Moldova, Albania, Republic of Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Belarus, Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, and Russia. Among the poorest countries in Europe, Ukraine ranks as the poorest with a GNI per capita of $3,540.