In the 1970s and the early 1980s, like the old woman who lived in a shoe, we had so many children that we did not know what to do. The refrain of “too many people and not enough jobs” had echoed round Ireland for at least a century and a half. However, over the space of a decade, from 1985 to 1995, the public perception of Ireland’s demographic challenge was transformed. Instead of worrying about safe jobs for our children in the civil service, the relative youth of the population came to be seen as a major economic benefit and speeches and commentary in the media began to trumpet the relative youth of the population as a source of major strength. Was this apparent transformation a “miracle” or did it have more mundane roots
