PAUL TANSEY:PAUL TANSEY, who has died aged 59, was economics editor of The Irish Times. He returned to journalism last year, having spent 20 years as an economic consultant undertaking assignments at home and abroad. He had a particular interest in the Irish labour market, and was the editor of two books - Making the Irish Labour Market Work (1991) and Ireland at Work: economic growth and the labour market (1998).
In addition, he acted as a labour market expert for the European Commission in Ireland.
Born in 1949, he was the eldest of the four children of John Joseph and Catherine Margaret Tansey of Shankill, Co Dublin. He attended Blackrock College, Dublin, and classmates remember him as a bright student and avid reader. He also was a member of the cross-country running team that won the Leinster Colleges senior trophy in 1967.
He studied economics and politics at Trinity College, Dublin. Founder and editor of Liaison, the organ of the Student Representative Council, he also became editor of Trinity News.
Elected president of the Student Representative Council in 1970, he was elected deputy-president of the Union of Students in Ireland in 1971 and spent a year in Prague attached to the International Union of Students. He was the first male to join the Irish Women's Liberation Movement.
In addition to an MA he also completed an MBA at Trinity. In later years, he returned to academe as adjunct Professor of Economics at the University of Limerick. An independent member of the National Economic and Social Forum, he also was a member of the Tourism Strategy Implementation Group.
Having joined The Irish Times in 1973 he was appointed economics correspondent in 1975. Following a year at the London School of Economics, he returned to The Irish Times in 1978. He was appointed News Focus editor in 1981. He continued to write a weekly economics column, Money Talks, in which he regularly highlighted the extent of the national debt.
He left to become deputy editor of the Sunday Tribune when it was relaunched in 1983. He next set up the economics and financial consultancy group, Tansey Webster Stewart Group.
In 1992, with Dr Frank Roche, he wrote Industrial training in Ireland for the Industrial Policy Review Group. This complemented the Culliton Report, which he strongly defended when it was the subject of what he believed was unfair criticism by a contributor to this newspaper.
Other publications include The economic consequences of Maastricht (1992), for the Institute of European Affairs and, with Colm McCarthy, Taxes on labour in Ireland and the United Kingdom (1994) for Ibec, the employers' group. In 1998 he wrote a pre-budget submission for the Civil and Public Service Union.
He told the Humbert Summer School in 2001 that globalisation meant free trade, but not fair trade. And he said that there was no centralised international institution to counteract trends such as currency speculation.
In conjunction with Microsoft in 2005 he published a major study of productivity trends. It highlighted the key role that driving increased productivity gains would have on helping to ensure that Ireland maintained its competitiveness. A highly-respected journalist and commentator, he recently interviewed Jean-Claude Trichet, president of the European Central Bank, and Alan Greenspan, the former chairman of the US Federal Reserve.
John McManus, business editor of The Irish Times, this week said: "Without a doubt, his work both as a journalist and an independent consultant had an influence on the development of Irish economic policy over the last 30 years.
"His measured manner, modesty and unfailing courtesy came across in his writing and only added to its influence in an era in which the strident and the sensational increasingly tend to catch attention, even in the realm of economic journalism. The hallmark of his work was the underpinning of his comment and analysis by a thorough examination of the underlying data.
"He brought an intellectual rigour to the coverage of economics in the Irish media, but first and foremost he was a journalist."
Dan McLaughlin, chief economist at Bank of Ireland, said: "He did a very good job of making economic trends decipherable and writing clearly for the ordinary reader."
Brendan Keenan of Independent Newspapers said: "He was extremely open-minded and willing to trade arguments with anyone from the extreme right to the extreme left, and always with a sense of fun in what's called the dismal science."
A keen horseman, from an early age he was involved in show jumping and hunting. He regularly attended racemeetings at Leopardstown and Gowran Park.
Paul was a gregarious man, generous to others with his time and advice, particularly so with young journalists trying to get a foothold in the profession.
He made life-long friends and enjoyed good company. Friends and colleagues in turn enjoyed - and valued - the pleasure of his company.
A devoted husband and father, he is survived by his wife Olivia O'Leary, daughter Emily, sister Niamh and brothers Neil and Jody.
Paul Anthony Joseph Tansey: born August 17th, 1949; died September 21st, 2008