Facebook Likes Ireland

Social networking giant Facebook gave Ireland a thumbs up this week by announcing an expansion of their Dublin office and the hiring of 100 more staff.

The company has its Europe, Middle East and Africa headquarters in Dublin, where it currently employs 200 people.

It will now expand that number by at least one third, with new jobs in advertising, multilingual sales support, finances, human resources, user operations and development.

Dublin's Chamber of Commerce welcomed the news saying it was "a clear indication that international businesses still view Ireland as a good place to do business".

More than 75 multinational tech firms now have bases in Ireland including Hewlitt Packard, Microsoft, Facebook, Google, Amazon and Intel.

All were attracted by the 12.5% corporation tax rate, which has been protected in the EU/IMF negotiations despite the protests of other larger European countries.

Meanwhile, financial services group Citi is to create 250 new jobs in Ireland within the next year and a half.

The US bank has had operations in Ireland for 45 years, and already employs 2,200 people there.

The expansion, which will mean new jobs in Dublin and Waterford, is backed by the IDA - the state agency tasked with attracting foreign direct investment into Ireland.

There were other pockets of good news on the jobs front this week too, including from UK fashion outlet Next, who announced the opening of a new store in Swords creating 86 jobs.

However, the overall picture remains bleak.

These new jobs barely register compared to the 70,900 jobs that have been lost in Ireland since September of last year.

The latest CSO figures show long term unemployment in Ireland has more than doubled in the past 12 months - from 3.2% to 6.5%.

Long term unemployment refers to those who have been seeking work for more than a year.

The 140,400 people now long term unemployed in Ireland account for 47% of total unemployment.