Ireland, after all, is a tiny, highly open economy whose booming export sector is benefiting from existing strengths – including low business taxes, a skilled workforce, and a flexible economy – and favorable external conditions, especially the strong recovery in its main markets, the US and Britain. Even so, the economy is smaller than it was before the crisis, the unemployment rate is in double digits, domestic demand remains depressed, and the €64 billion bank-bailout bill unjustly imposed on 2.2 million Irish taxpayers still looms large.