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Quantifying Revenue Windfalls from the Irish Housing Market

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  • Diarmaid Addison-Smyth

    (Central Bank and Financial Services Authority of Ireland)

  • Kieran McQuinn

    (Central Bank and Financial Services Authority of Ireland)

Abstract

The speed and severity of the decline in the Irish fiscal position in recent years raises a number of important issues regarding the assessment of fiscal policy within the EU. From a position of relative strength, with large surpluses and a low debt to GDP ratio, the Irish public finances have rapidly deteriorated, culminating in an Excessive Deficit Procedure being launched in early 2009. In hindsight, it is evident that tax revenues were on an unsustainable path in recent years due, in large part, to structural imbalances within the economy, mainly associated with the housing market. The excess growth in the latter culminated in large and transitory tax revenue windfalls, which ultimately proved unsustainable. These windfalls contributed to large general government and cyclically adjusted budget surpluses. This paper seeks to quantify the windfall gains associated with property taxes through modelling housing related tax receipts over the period 2002 to 2009. From this, estimates are derived as to the underlying or property adjusted fiscal position, which is found in various years, to have diverged greatly from actual outturns.

Suggested Citation

  • Diarmaid Addison-Smyth & Kieran McQuinn, 2010. "Quantifying Revenue Windfalls from the Irish Housing Market," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 41(2), pages 201-233.
    • Handle: RePEc:eso:journl:v:41:y:2010:i:2:p:201-233
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Addison-Smyth, Diarmaid & McQuinn, Kieran & O'Reilly, Gerard, 2009. "Modelling Credit in the Irish Mortgage Market," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 40(4), pages 371-392.
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    9. McQuinn, Kieran & O' Reilly, Gerard, 2007. "A Model of Cross-Country House Prices," Research Technical Papers 5/RT/07, Central Bank of Ireland.
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    1. Bergin, Adele & Conefrey, Thomas & FitzGerald, John & Kearney, Ide, 2010. "Recovery Scenarios for Ireland: An Update," Forecasting Report, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI), number jacb201051, July.
    2. Philip R. Lane, 2013. "External imbalances and macroeconomic policy," New Zealand Economic Papers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(1), pages 53-70, April.
    3. David Cronin & Kieran McQuinn, 2023. "The housing net worth channel and the public finances: evidence from a European country panel," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 30(5), pages 1251-1265, October.
    4. Alan Barrett & Adele Bergin & Elish Kelly & Seamus McGuinness, 2016. "Ireland’s Recession and the Immigrant-Native Earnings Gap," Springer Books, in: Martin Kahanec & Klaus F. Zimmermann (ed.), Labor Migration, EU Enlargement, and the Great Recession, pages 103-122, Springer.
    5. Martina Lawless & Donal Lynch, 2018. "Scenarios and Distributional Implications of a Household Wealth Tax in Ireland," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 16(02), pages 27-31, August.
    6. Bénétrix, Agustín S. & Lane, Philip R., 2013. "Fiscal cyclicality and EMU," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 164-176.
    7. David Cronin & Peter Dunne & Kieran McQuinn, 2019. "Have Irish Sovereign Bonds Decoupled from the Euro Area Periphery, and Why?," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 50(3), pages 529-556.
    8. Cronin, David & McQuinn, Kieran, 2014. "Irish Fiscal Policy in Good Times and in Bad: Its Impact During Different Stages of the Economic Cycle," Quarterly Economic Commentary: Special Articles, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    9. Yvonne McCarthy & Kieran McQuinn, 2011. "How Are Irish Households Coping with their Mortgage Repayments? Information from the Survey on Income and Living Conditions," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 42(1), pages 71-94.
    10. Hickey, Rónán & Smyth, Diarmaid, 2015. "Government revenues in Ireland since the financial crisis," Economic Letters 07/EL/15, Central Bank of Ireland.
    11. Michelle Norris & Michael Byrne, 2015. "Asset Price Keynesianism, Regional Imbalances and the Irish and Spanish Housing Booms and Busts," Working Papers 201514, Geary Institute, University College Dublin.
    12. McQuinn, Kieran & Addison-Smyth, Diarmaid, 2015. "Assessing the Sustainable Nature of Housing-Related Taxation Receipts: The Case of Ireland," Papers WP503, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    13. Hickey, Rónán & Smyth, Diarmaid, 2015. "The Financial Crisis in Ireland and Government Revenues," Quarterly Bulletin Articles, Central Bank of Ireland, pages 60-71, October.
    14. Constantin Gurdgiev & Brian M. Lucey & Ciarán Mac an Bhaird & Lorcan Roche-Kelly, 2011. "The Irish Economy: Three Strikes and You’re Out?," Panoeconomicus, Savez ekonomista Vojvodine, Novi Sad, Serbia, vol. 58(1), pages 19-41, March.
    15. Elish Kelly & Adele Bergin, 2018. "The labor market in Ireland, 2000–2016," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 410-410, January.
    16. McQuinn, Kieran & Roche,Maurice, 2016. "Efficient Frontiers and Fiscal Stability: An Ex-ante and Ex-post Application to the Irish Public Finances," Papers WP538, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    17. Keith Fitzgerald & Jacopo Bedogni, 2019. "Examining the Volatility of Ireland’s Tax Base in the Paradigm of Modern Portfolio Theory," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 50(3), pages 429-458.
    18. Philip R. Lane, 2011. "External Imbalances and Macroeconomic Policy in New Zealand," The Institute for International Integration Studies Discussion Paper Series iiisdp376, IIIS.
    19. Adele Bergin & Elish Kelly & Paul Redmond, 2020. "The labor market in Ireland, 2000–2018," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 410-410, January.
    20. Philip Lane, 2010. "Some Lessons for Fiscal Policy from the Financial Crisis," The Institute for International Integration Studies Discussion Paper Series iiisdp334, IIIS.
    21. Agustín S. Bénétrix & Philip R. Lane, 2012. "The Cyclical Conduct of Irish Fiscal Policy," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(10), pages 1277-1290, October.
    22. Andrew Hannon & Eimear Leahy & Róisín O'Sullivan, 2016. "An Analysis of Tax Forecasting Errors in Ireland," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 47(3), pages 391-423.
    23. Philip Lane, 2010. "External Imbalances and Fiscal Policy," The Institute for International Integration Studies Discussion Paper Series iiisdp314, IIIS.
    24. Agust n S. B n trix & Philip R. Lane, 2015. "Financial Cycles and Fiscal Cycles," Trinity Economics Papers tep0815, Trinity College Dublin, Department of Economics.

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