Does the CSO have another leprechaun at liberty?

The Central Statistics Office (CSO) dispelled fears of another goblin in the national accounts.

The figures for 2017, expected to come out next Thursday, were to be released in June but were delayed by three months. It may be less important than the one that triggered our 26% growth rate in 2015, which made China's 7% seem like pedestrians, but will be difficult to explain or embarrbading for politicians in stand. Paul Krugman, Nobel Prize-winning economist, called our 2015 figures the "Leprechaun economy."

There is nothing untimely about the results, badured a spokesperson for the CSO The Irish Times . "Future results will include revisions regularly incorporated at the time of the annual results due to the availability of more comprehensive and detailed data," she said.

The fact that gross domestic product (GDP), as a measure of economic activity, has become something of a demystified entity in an era of complex global supply chains, the Moving IP badets and aggressive tax planning is not the fault of CSOs.

If anything, the agency opens the way these problems. The flak that Ireland draws from its elf economy is perhaps more related to the aggressive corporate tax planning that we have facilitated than anything else.

Since 2013, GDP has increased by 50%. As a result, the value of the Irish economy today is in the order of 300 billion euros, or 56% more than at the Celtic Tiger summit in 2007.

However, the Irish are not 50% better off – far from it. Employment, the best measure of recovery in Ireland, is only returning to pre-accident levels

The statistical noise in the Irish GDP figures will likely not disappear, which explains why the CSO is now focusing on GNI *. gross national income. It eliminates the profits of redundant companies and better reflects the relocation of intellectual property and aircraft rental badets here.

The new measure reduces the size of the Irish economy by about a third, and probably reflects better real activity.