Let me just point out that the IMF was the good cop in Greece's case. The ECB was the bad cop, and they have insisted on both huge increases in indirect taxes and spending cuts. Some rise in direct taxes and property taxes occured too, a few symbolic arrests and confiscations over semi-bigwig tax evasion, but really most of the weight has most definitely not fallen on the rich.

Now they demand collective bargaining agreements be scraped and huge numbers of public servants to be fired, leading to a "liberated" labor market of (even more) pauperized workers at all levels (because the skilled ones are already leaving the country). Is that within their mandate in Ireland?

I'm not sure how much of the labor market is left to "liberalize" in Ireland, neither what the teacher to pupil ratio is in public schools. But the ECB is bad news on both counts

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom - William Blake