Understanding the Irish economy

The CSO Institutional Sector Accounts allow a decomposition of the separate contributions to the Irish economy since 2013 from the Multinational Enterprise (MNE) sector and the domestic sector. The share of national income arising from the MNE sector in 2021 amounted to 29 per cent, up from 22 per cent in 2013. By 2021 a third of the wages paid in the Irish economy came from MNEs. Using these data, the growth rate in real income over the period 2013 to 2021 at 4.4 per cent a year, is much higher than that experienced by other EU countries of 1.5 per cent. Using GNI* as a measure of national income, Ireland appears to have an aboveaverage standard of living while, on the basis of household and public consumption, Ireland has somewhat lower standard of living, partly because of the high rate of saving in Ireland.