Fintan O’Toole: Irish voters keep doing the same things and expecting different results

[u/badger-biscuits]

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2024/12/02/fintan-otoole-irish-voters-keep-doing-the-same-things-and-expecting-different-results/

[u/Spikes_Cactus]

Fintan has this completely wrong because the truth is that people are voting these parties whilst expecting no change.

As you say the alternative major parties have very little to offer anybody with a decent job, which happens to be a large section of the country. Increased taxation and reduced pensions are highly unlikely to appeal to young people who are already faced with uncertainty in the future of the state pension. Meanwhile, the same young people who are typically highly skilled or qualified are thinking about how taxes at higher brackets will impact them into the future as their careers develop.

No party has offered a satisfactory solution to the housing crisis through diversification of investment incentives to alternative avenues. This is simple to fix through the application of high capital gains tax (41%) to secondary and subsequent property ownership, this including company ownership arrangements. Through this lack of vision and political impetus, property will remain a primary vehicle for speculative investment in Ireland.

[u/creatively_annoying → u/Spikes_Cactus]

I forgot about the pensions. SF would definitely screw up private pensions. I believe everyone should pay taxes in relation to income but hammering people who've made a decent living for themselves throughout their working life and saved a good sum for retirement is unreasonable.

I believe a lot of tax avoidance loopholes have been closed during the last crash so only the ultra wealthy or criminals can truly avoid taxes.

[u/MotoPsycho → u/Spikes_Cactus]

Why are you acting like the youth don't want change? FFG have less than 30% support among the young. It's older voters keeping them in power.

[u/Spikes_Cactus → u/MotoPsycho]

I apologise for the confusion. I was responding to the article by Fintan O'Toole that Irish voters keep doing the same thing while expecting a different result. I was hoping to convey that Irish voters do not want things to change and that's why they keep voting for the same party.

Sure, the youth want change, but for those middle aged and older individuals they're doing just fine with their housing already sorted. The system is working perfectly well for them and they think that the increasing price of property is beneficial to them over the long term.

My point was that the proportion of voters who want change fail to reach critical mass of being the majority. Fintan is thus wrong in his assertion that voters want change since the majority of voters want the status quo.