Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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They pay a little less than €25,000. A person whose gross pay is €70,000 has €45,000 after all personal taxes have been deducted. Such people usually live in private houses that they have bought with mortgages, which means they have to make mortgage payments on top of paying their taxes. Those referred to by the Deputy as very well-off quickly come down to being the coping classes and the squeezed middle. They are the people who drive the economy and they are people who work the hardest. The ESRI research has actually shown-----