The cities of Central and Eastern Europe are full of Irish pubs. But it is not just drinkers hunched over their pints of Guinness who are dreaming of the Emerald Isle. In foreign and finance ministries too, a surprising refrain can be heard: "We want to be like Ireland." Ireland is held up as a model because it has done astoundingly well since it joined the eu. In the early 1970s, just before it joined the European Economic Community (as it then was), the country's gdp per head, measured on a purchasing-power basis, was only 61% of the eu-15 average; by 1990 it had reached 73%, and today it is 115%. In only 30 years, the Irish caught un with and then overtook the rest of the eu.
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