Raise the tide, don’t sink the boats

Ireland’s property crisis is a crisis of justice because most people are faced with foreclosure through no fault of their own. The exorbitant prices of their homes, and hence the sizes of their home loans, were the product of a price bubble over which they had no control.

An asset price bubble is simply an inflation – indeed, a hyperinflation – in respect of the asset in question. A homebuyer can no more ...