// archives

Featured

RSS feed for this section
This category contains 16 posts

Toxic tips from D’Oh School of Economics

By ⋅ October 3, 2008 ⋅ One comment

Originally published as a business column in The Irish Times, October 3, 2008 BREAKING NEWS: Homer Simpson has been operating the controls of the international financial system for the last several years. Mr Simpson, normally the animated nuclear safety inspector at the Springfield Nuclear Plant, is known to spend much of his time eating doughnuts, [...]

Frustrated customer speaks out

By ⋅ September 7, 2008 ⋅ One comment

Dear Strong Language, No one understands me! What can I do? I’m a good customer, really I am, but sometimes when my bank, solicitor and other service providers contact me, I feel like they’re talking another language. My post-box is jammed with letters that say things like: “I acknowledge receipt of your letter dated September [...]

Beware the legalese virus

By ⋅ May 30, 2008 ⋅ One comment

EUROPEAN SCIENTISTS are concerned about the rapid spread of an aggressive virus known as legalese LT08. A close relative of jargonitis, academicspeakis and gobbledegook, the malady has taken hold of European laws and infected civil servants throughout the EU. The virus, mostly found in EU legislation and government publications, attacks the human mind and hijacks [...]

The mother of all workplace myths

By ⋅ January 25, 2008 ⋅ One comment

Do women know what they’re risking when they have children or are they blinded by the myth of equality? It wasn’t her imagination. They were looking at her differently. You’d think she had six heads or something. Siobhán had worked like a dog for the past 15 years. She had received top honours at university [...]

Wanted: celeb to emulate Buffett

By ⋅ May 13, 2007 ⋅ Post a comment

The Irish Times Business This Week, May 11th 2007 On tonight’s episode of “Sage of Omaha: the next generation” Grandpa interviews his potential successors from Europe’s greatest economic success story – the Emerald Isle Stay tuned to see if they have the modesty, frugality, economic knowledge and common sense to become . . . the [...]

Sub-prime time or Abbatoir of debt

By ⋅ April 16, 2007 ⋅ Post a comment

Fresh meat is needed to feed the insatiable appetite of the international abattoir of debt. Our Government has been waving a big juicy carcass in the air – your mortgages – for some time, writes Margaret E. Ward. Recently, the scent was picked up by lenders to the credit-troubled. These sub-prime lenders are flooding into [...]

— Next »