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A blog from the Northern Ireland Assembly Research and Information Service

Economy and Finance Blog Archive

Here you will find an archive of Economy and Finance Blog articles published before 1 May 2022, divided into their relevant categories.

Economy

Copy of the Northern Ireland Executive’s Economic Strategy and the Programme for Government Consultation Document
By Eóin Murphy, Michael Scholes, and Aidan Stennett The Northern Ireland Executive is currently revising its Economic Strategy.  What are the key factors it should take into consideration when…
Dark Hedges, County Antrim (Image: Valerie Hinojosa, under Creative Commons)
Despite the absence of a centralised tourism strategy, the sector makes a significant contribution to the Northern Ireland economy and has exceeded targets set out in the previous Programme…
Figure 2: NI exports to EU and non-EU countries, percentage of total exports, 2004-2014
A referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU is to take place on Thursday 23rd June. Voters will be asked ‘Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the…

Employment and Labour Market

Infographic illustrating the scale of the gender pay gap in Northern Ireland
By Aidan Stennett & Eóin Murphy Please note: we have posted a new version of this blog article using the most recent data, see here. This article examines the gender…
A student reading in a library (Image: Tulane University, under Creative Commons)
Education and training are key factors in economic progress, acting as a means of raising productivity. Whilst other factors can result in short-run economic improvements, education and training are…
A pay slip with pound coins
The introduction of the National Living Wage (NLW) could have a number of impacts in Northern Ireland (NI), raising the earnings of those aged over 25, but potentially creating…

Energy

Image of wind farm in front of a setting sun
There was considerable growth in the development of renewable electricity over the previous Northern Ireland Assembly mandate. Changes to renewable electricity support may impact the ability to achieve similar levels…

Enterprise and Investment

This post examines financial support provided by Invest Northern Ireland (Invest NI) to businesses located in Northern Ireland (NI) from 2013-14 to 2017-18, identifying key impacts arising from that…

Finance

A mole emerging from molehill (image by Stefan Didam and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons)
Has the Chancellor’s statement had the mountainous impact on the Executive’s budget that was expected?…
A word cloud for Explanatory and Financial Memoranda
In the 2011-16 Assembly Mandate, MLAs debated, scrutinised and passed a range of legislation across a number of policy areas – from Mental Capacity to Licensing of Pavement Cafes,…
Image of a blackboard, with the words 'Is prevention better than cure?'
In recent years ‘Preventative Expenditure‘ (PE) has gained a high level of political consensus. There are many definitions, and this imprecision has resulted in departments sometimes claiming that all…

Research and Innovation

This post examines financial support provided by Invest Northern Ireland (Invest NI) to businesses located in Northern Ireland (NI) from 2013-14 to 2017-18, identifying key impacts arising from that…
An image of a microscope
  This week sees people across Northern Ireland getting interested and involved in science through the Northern Ireland Science Festival. We thought we would join the celebration of all…
Cover pages of the 2012 Economic Strategy and 2017 draft Industrial Strategy
Following on from a recent blog post on ‘a revised strategy for Northern Ireland’s Economy’, this post looks at the Department for the Economy’s draft Industrial Strategy and highlights…