About Emer O'Siochru

mer O’Siochru is a qualified architect and valuation surveyor. She was a founder of Feasta and served on its executive committee for many years. She is director of EOS Future Design which designs and develops sustainable systems and settlements. She also manages the Feasta-led Smart Tax Network which is funded by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government to develop tax policies in areas related to the environment. She lives in Dublin.

Emer has written 49 articles so far, you can find them below.

New book from Smart Taxes: The Fair Tax – supported by history, agreed by economists, feared by the 1%

Ireland is unusual among industrialised countries in that it has no property tax. But that is about to change - and the type of property tax that is brought in will be crucial to Ireland's future. This new book from the Smart Taxes Network and Feasta explains how a poorly-designed property tax could bring about a second massive transfer of wealth from the 99% to the 1%. A Site Value Tax would be vastly preferable, and the book convincingly shows how easy it would be to assess and implement.

Philadelphians are smart enough to understand a land value tax…

Professor Frank Convery believes that Irish people will never accept land value taxation even though it is the best kind of property tax:  and he knows it is because he participated in the EEA conference of environmental taxation in Dublin 2010, which showcased site value tax as an ‘environmental tax’.  Maybe he thinks Irish people are too thick to get the message of what is in their interest.  It might help if they were actually given the information and offered the choice, don’t you think?

Nat O’Connor on Job Guarantee

Nat O’Connor of Tasc which partnered Smart Taxes recent conference “Lessons from the Crisis” that introduced MMT ideas to Ireland, writes in Social Justice Europe to advocate a Job Guarantee. He usefully scopes what the JG would mean for Ireland.  We hope this is the start of a serious debate of this option.  [...]

Even US Big Business can see the sense of a Job Guarantee

Government must take a leading role in job creation. Conservative or even liberal agendas that cede responsibility for job creation to the private sector over the next few years are simply dazed or perhaps crazed. The private sector is the source of long-term job creation but in the short term, no rational observer can believe that global or even small businesses will invest here when the labor over there is so much cheaper.