Irish consumers still paying higher prices

IRISH consumers are still paying a fifth more than their average EU counterpart for goods and services despite the country’s GDP having fallen by more than 13% in the past three years.

New figures released by Eurostat show that on the face of it, Ireland is still a wealthy nation with only Luxembourg and the Netherlands ahead in the GDP stakes.

But when the amount of money multinationals send back to their headquarters is taken out of the equation, the resulting gross national income (GNI) is very close to the average at 106% — considerably less than the 128% GDP.