page_title: Economy of the Republic of Ireland
section_title: Signs of recovery (2014–2016)
hierarchical_section_title: Economy of the Republic of Ireland / History / Signs of recovery (2014–2016)
caption_attribution_description: English: 2011 Ratio of GNI to GDP (EuroStat National Accounts)
context_page_description: The economy of the Republic of Ireland is primarily a knowledge economy, focused on services into high-tech, life sciences, financial services and agribusiness including agrifood. Ireland is an open economy, and ranks first for high-value foreign direct investment flows. In the global GDP per capita tables, Ireland ranks 5th of 187 in the IMF table and 6th of 175 in the World Bank ranking.
  Following a period of continuous growth at an annual level from 1984–2007, the post-2008 Irish financial crisis severely affected the economy, compounding domestic economic problems related to the collapse of the Irish property bubble. Ireland first experienced a short technical recession from Q2-Q3 2007, followed by a recession from Q1 2008 – Q4 2009.
  After a year with stagnant economic activity in 2010, Irish real GDP rose by 2.2% in 2011 and 0.2% in 2012 - mainly driven by improvements in the export sector. The European sovereign-debt crisis caused a new Irish recession starting in Q3 2012, which was still ongoing as of Q2 2013. By mid-2013 the European Commission's economic forecast for Ireland predicted its growth rates would return to a positive 1.1% in 2013 and 2.2% in 2014.
context_section_description: The term "Celtic Phoenix" was coined by journalist and satirist Paul Howard, which has been occasionally used by some economic commentators and media outlets to describe the indicators of economic growth in some sectors in Ireland since 2014.
  In late 2013, Ireland exited an EU/ECB/IMF bailout. The Irish economy began to recover in 2014, growing by 4.8%, making Ireland the fastest growing economy in the European Union. Contributing factors to growth included a recovering construction sector, quantitative easing, a weak euro, and low oil prices. This growth helped to reduce national debt to 109% of GDP, and the budget deficit fell to 3.1% in the fourth quarter.
  The headline unemployment rate remained steady at 10%, though the youth unemployment rate remained higher than the EU average, at over 20%. Emigration had continued to play a significant factor in unemployment statistics, though the emigration rate also began to fall in 2014.
  Property prices also increased in 2014, growing fastest in Dublin. This was due to a housing shortage, especially in the Dublin area. The demand for housing caused some recovery in the Irish construction and property sectors. By early 2015, house price increases nationally began to outpace those in Dublin. Cork saw house prices rise by 7.2%, while Galway prices rose by 6.8%. Prices in Limerick were 6.7% higher while in Waterford there was a 4.9% increase. The housing crisis resulted in over 20,000 applicants being on the social housing list in the Dublin City Council area for the first time. In May 2015, the Insolvency Service of Ireland reported to the Oireachtas Justice Committee that 110,000 mortgages were in arrears, and 37,000 of those are in arrears of over 720 days.
  On 14 October 2014, Minister for Finance Michael Noonan and Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Brendan Howlin introduced the budget for 2015, the first in seven years to include tax cuts and spending increases.  The budget reversed some of the austerity measures that had been introduced over the previous six years, with increased spending and tax cuts worth just over €1bn.
  In April 2015, during a "Spring Economic Statement", Noonan and Howlin outlined the government's plans and projections up to the year 2020. This included policy statements on expansionary budgets, deficit management plans and proposed cuts to the Universal Social Charge and other taxes.
  In October 2014, German finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble said that Germany was "jealous" at how the Irish economy had recovered after its bailout. He also said that Ireland had made a significant contribution to the stabilisation of the euro.  While Taoiseach Enda Kenny praised the economic growth, and said that Ireland would seek to avoid returning to a "boom and bust" cycle, he noted that other areas of the economy remained fragile. The European Commission also acknowledged the recovery and growth, but warned that any extra government revenue should be used to further reduce the national debt.
  Some other commentators have suggested that, depending on the Eurozone, world economic outlook as well as other internal and external factors, the growth seen in Ireland in 2014 and early 2015 may not indicate a longer-term pattern for sustainable economic improvement. Other commentators have noted that recovery figures do not account for emigration, youth unemployment, child poverty, homelessness and other factors.
  On 23 June 2016, the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union, which was widely reported as likely having a negative impact on trade between the UK and Ireland, and the Irish economy in general. Other commentators, for example the Financial Times, suggested that some London-based financial institutions might move operations to Dublin after Brexit.
  In 2016 official CSO figures indicated that the economic recovery had led to 26.3% growth in GDP in 2015 and 18.7% growth in GNP. The figures were widely ridiculed including by Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman who labelled them "leprechaun economics".  The official explanation was that the closure of
caption: EU 2011 Ratio of GNI to GDP (Eurostat National Accounts, 2011)
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