John Fitzgerald: "Job creation is not the be all and end all"

Brendan Burgess

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Job creation is not the be all and end all

John FitzGerald: The headline number for new positions often greatly exaggerates the benefits to society
www.irishtimes.com

Thus, the headline number for new jobs greatly exaggerates the benefits to society. There are of course exceptions: new jobs in Donegal are probably worth more than new jobs in Dublin because of higher unemployment.

The insights from this research are now enshrined in decision-making by the IDA and Enterprise Ireland, and also underpin the Government’s code for determining the benefits from new public investment.

However, this important insight is often forgotten as governments here and elsewhere, trumpet expenditure that will “create” jobs. When we are at or close to full employment, the main the value to society arises on the output side, such as the value of new social housing or better-insulated housing, not from the jobs generated in delivering this output.

Too often advocates for individual projects emphasise the jobs they will generate rather than the good or service produced.


For example, expenditure on retrofitting our housing stock to decarbonise Irish society is valuable because it reduces household carbon emissions, not because of the numbers employed in doing the work.
 
RTE has a news item on data centres today.
Certainly the number of jobs employed need to be balanced in combination with the energy \ resources \ subsidies used as the basis for government policy.

I am surprised this is considered a new insight... lots of government supported industries were wound down in the 1980s because the subsidies per job could not be justified anymore.
 
By 2028 Data Centres will consume 29% of our electricity generation capacity. I don't understand why a the ability to generate their own electricity isn't a condition of the planning permission. It's a pity we are so irrationally blinded to nuclear power as this sort of infrastructure is an ideal candidate for new clean nuclear power.
 
Jobs are a visible metric, reduced carbon emissions aren't. If people are all going out to work every day and have money in their pocket, are they going to be more likely to vote in the politician who was in power at that time or the one for invisible carbon emissions?

It's a similar issue with data centres. They produce the same level of emissions as the airline industry but don't get the same level of negative publicity. We can see the airplanes in the sky, not so with data centres.
 
Yep, fast fashion (Penny's etc) is responsible for 10% of global carbon emissions, not to mention massive water consumption. Their carbon footprint is greater than that of all airline and maritime transport combined. People are still happy to see shops open though. Same goes for livestock farming which is far more polluting than any of the above.
 
Data Centres are over stressed g since they employ so few people and they are not creative or high skilled IT roles either.

There are much stricter rules these days in terms of LEO grants as to what is and is not in scope for state aid so some thought is going into the impact but maybe not enough
 

2018 IDA [broken link removed] covered investment since 2010, I was surprised the impact of ongoing operation was as high, but when you think about all the ancillary service of periodic maintenance, janitorial, security, etc., these will all be paying top dollar for that.

 
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