The incidence of emigration on town and country life in Ireland

Abstract

To the student of economics Ireland always presents a budget of paradoxes. Things which are abnormal elsewhere are here normal and commonplace. The usual laws of cause and effect may, by an act of faith, be presumed to operate; but they elude recognition with a whimsical contrariety so that the wisest of us only differ from the "man in the street" in being less cocksure that we know all about it. I know no reason for this paradoxical aspect of Irish life except that Ireland is a country where the population has been shrinking continuously for above sixty years. The rules that we habitually apply to interpret the significance of economic facts in other countries require readjustment when we come to apply them to Ireland because of this unique circumstance. Lest we forget to bear in mind what everybody knows I begin by setting down the familiar figures showing the movement of the population in the different parts of the United Kingdom.