In a book called The Famine Plot by Tim Pat Coogan published by Palgrave MacMillanm NY, 2012 a picture of Ireland is painted. The picture of Ireland prior to the famine is a country divided by religion. In the north Catholics outnumber Protestants 2 to 1 and in the rest of the country Catholics outnumber Protestants 20 to 1. Generally Protestants looked towards England and since London ruled the country, appointing the people who ran the government, there was good reason to look towards England.

The second year of the potato blight and starvation in Ireland, the government changed and so did their responses. The new government stopped the importation of food from India (corn meal) and then the famine burned a number of terms into the Irish folk memory: coffin ships, emigration, food exports, starvation, landlords and evictions. In times of starvation for any county, people will begin to move. Some of it will be desired by the authorities – move to another country for greater opportunity; move to lessen the number of people which need to be help; and for some, but not all, move so landlords can increase other activities on their lands. In Ireland, since most of it was rural, animals replaced people. In the case of evictions, the military or troops went to the homes to evicte people and removed the roofs of their houses. In other cases, the eviction was the selling of the property – those who remember the fall in US house prices will recognize the double edge sword – selling in a bad market only benefits someone else (now days we called them Vulture funds).

Sometimes government edicts make life for the smaller companies much worse, in Ireland all landlords no matter the size had to pay 4 lbs for their rate; and the Gregory Clause denied relief to anyone who owned more than a quarter acre of land; as opposed to the great landowners who were in the Cabinet and making the regulations.

Government policy often has the Protestant virtues of thrift, hard work, self-reliance and charity for the deserving poor. However, when the government does the opposite had a bias towards Catholics, tended to have a view in general of the Irish of feckless, lazy, and wallowing in a mess of potatoes and priest-craft. In one sense, the politicians were reasonably happy famine was dealing with the Irish problem. A surplus and unwanted population was being disposed of. Remember the owners of the largest estates – 50,000 acres plus were making the rules and they half wanted greater change.

In recession people need to earn income and there are always government projects to be done. Infrastructure projects were considered a good thing to do and would help the local economy. If the proposal qualified for a 50% grant, then they were likely to be started and finished. If they had to be paid out of local taxes, then little work was done. In an effort to ensure of the prudent use of tax dollars, the proposal had to go through local group making a submission, the land surveyor, the Board of Works, to lord lieutenant and then the treasury to pay for work. The process takes time. The projects that were undertaken, were not the best projects and sometimes they were the classic – dig a hole and fill it in.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, when dealing with the government often being cynical helps you to analyze what the real motives of the government is. With dividend paying stocks, they have a history of good execution of their goods and services and this is what you expect to keep happening. The motive is to continually to earn a profit and reward its shareholders. If it is not doing that simple thing, look to alternatives

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.