Posing the wrong question is a guaranteed shortcut to coming up with the wrong answer. Virtually all public discussion of the housing crisis proceeds as if the problem is in some sense national. It is not. The problem of housing affordability is mostly a Dublin-area issue, as a few minutes on any of the property websites will confirm.

There are a few areas elsewhere in the country where housing is becoming unaffordable for those on moderate incomes but the situation in Dublin is getting out of control. And it really matters if housing costs are unaffordable in and around the capital because it affects much larger numbers of people. It is also a threat to national competitiveness since, for better or worse, the Dublin region is the principal economic engine of the country. Should economic expansion in the Dublin area become too difficult because of housing costs, it does not follow that other locations around the country will attract the same jobs.

it is foolish to expect that failure to address problems in Dublin will result in offsetting success in the provincial cities and towns

Dublin competes, in attracting international services businesses, with various cities around Europe and it is foolish to expect that failure to address problems in Dublin will result in offsetting success in the provincial cities and towns.

The greater Dublin area, some of which for administrative purposes is in neighbouring counties, has one third of the national population and around 40% of national economic output. A housing mess in Galway city is a local problem with local solutions: a housing mess in Dublin is national only in the sense that failure to address it has national consequences. As in Galway, the solutions are mostly about local zoning and planning. Evading these solutions in Galway is to be deplored: in Dublin the policy paralysis is irresponsible.

Differentials

Since the economic recovery got going five years ago, house prices and rents have risen sharply across the country but the differentials between Dublin and the provinces have not closed. Rents in Dublin are now higher than they were at the height of the bubble. Prices of houses and apartments have yet to catch up in most districts but are back at madness levels in some of the inner suburbs: two-bedroom apartments close to the city are priced up to €600,000 and €800,000, with rents of €2,500 per month now commonplace.

For a single occupant in a normal job, these properties are already out of reach but even for a couple, both working, they are unaffordable unless both incomes are at least twice the national average. A couple with a combined income of €80,000 are not doing too badly. If the bank stretches the mortgage limit and offers them 3.5 times the combined income, they cannot afford a two-bedroomed apartment in the city’s inner districts or even a three-bed semi in the distant suburbs. Single people can forget about more central locations unless they have generous parents or top jobs.

Aside from the negative effect on the city’s competitiveness, there are severe social consequences. Young Dubliners who have grown up in the less fancy older suburbs can no longer aspire to buy in those areas or even to rent: the continuing influx of tech companies has seen monthly rental costs spiral beyond their budgets. Some of these tech companies pay €80,000 and even €100,000 per annum to their highly skilled staff, who have predictably bid up rents even in less swanky areas such as Ringsend or Portobello on the southside and in Fairview and Clontarf to the north.

Subsidised rents

Local authority housing is available at subsidised rents in some of these areas and not surprisingly is in heavy demand with long waiting lists. But, to qualify, an applicant must show limited means while in the private market, only those with monthly incomes well above the average can compete. There is a social segregation process under way which sees these traditional residential areas inhabited by people who are either poor or rich.

Dublin is not a high-density city and there are plenty of derelict sites available in the inner suburbs, not to mention the rolling prairies of undeveloped land on the outskirts. But local and national politicians have chosen to perpetuate the crisis through perpetual objections to every proposal for residential construction that comes along.

The most recent example concerns Clonburris, 10km from the city centre and just outside the M50, which boasts an unopened railway station called Kishoge on the Kildare line built and paid for 10 years ago.

Plans for 8,400 units at this location have been appealed to An Bord Pleanála even though the site is designated for housing and South Dublin County Council signed off on the plans in June.