Hot money flowing into a country does crazy things to it. It takes both an irresponsible borrower and an irresponsible lender to make an irresponsible deal.
There are ways to mitigate that - e.g. increased taxes based on land value and stronger legislation around lending. Trouble is, rising house prices are more popular to politically powerful groups.
Ireland could hardly pursue appropriate monetary policy as a member of the currency union. Euro monetary policy is totally driven by Germany's needs. So are we saying that the real screw-up was joining the currency union?
