Population of Ireland without emigration

Ireland never industrialised to the same extent as Britain so it kept a significant rural population for much longer. An industrial economy can afford to buy imported food instead of growing everything it needs so it can sustain a higher population. So if Ireland had had an industrial boom in the early 19th century then it's people wouldn't have been so dependent on potatoes and the famine wouldn't have happened. But a main reason why this didn't happen was a legacy of the Penal Laws so you need a much more enlightened British administration.

I haven't got any figures but I'm sure I read somewhere that if it hadn't been for Catholic out migration NI would have had a Catholic majority within the last 20 years. There was an unofficial "Breed them out!" policy among Northern Nationalists for many years, it wasn't until the 1960's that Catholic birth rates in NI began to decline when they had been doing so in the South before that.
 
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From Wikipedia

Now obviously the population would be higher if you didn't have the famine, however it's not the only issue preventing Ireland from having a high(er) population.
 
Ireland could support more, Singapore, London, etc... do so- yes, but they're very important cities for a reason.
Singapore is in one of the best locations for a city in the world, right on a major shipping straight. Due to being in such a location it grew rich. Due to being rich people from the surrounding, significantly poorer, areas flooded in.
London- best location in the world? No. Best in Europe? One of. Best in Britain? Certainly. It also had the benefit of being the capital of Britain, located right in its most fertile area.
Ireland....well its a resource poor, not particularly fertile country, on the edge of Europe. It also has the disadvantage (from a population growth POV- which isn't a good thing) of close links to Britain. In the 19th century it was actually part of Britain, much like the rural areas of Britian depopulated to feed the cities so too did Ireland, they went where the jobs were in Britain's industrial north nd London. Post-independance; Britain and Ireland remain linked. An Irish citizen in Britain has the same rights as a British citizen. For most of the 20th century Irish people continued to head over to Britain to work, they were like the Poles of their day, its only with the Irish economic boom that Ireland's main export stopped being people.

Why didn't Ireland industrialise much? - well it did in some areas.
But for the majority of the island- you might as well be asking why didn't Cumbria, Cornwall or the Scottish Highlands industrialise? Or Wyoming for that matter to put an international spin on things.
The important resources were elsewhere in the UK, people were mobile and went where the jobs were. You can't look at Ireland as a seperate country, you instead have to examine it as a rather poor and rural part of Britain and it starts making sense.

Yes, we Irish Americans do breed like rabbits. I have 5 aunts and uncles and 6 first cousins on my mother's side alone. I probably have 30-40 cousins total, and that is a fairly meager amount compared some irish Americans!
Scipio

Irish Brits do too. On my dad's side I've a similar sized family (bigger actually. Something like 20 cousins and one or two more aunts/uncles).
 
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I have plenty of Irish catholic/protestant ancestors but so far as I can tell (3 generations back is about as far as I can recall OTOMH) they don't seem to have bred much differently from my other, non Irish ancestors. I suspect though that their common characteristic, that being that they were all reasonably prosperous farming families may be more important than ethnic or religious background
 
Yes, we Irish Americans do breed like rabbits. I have 5 aunts and uncles and 6 first cousins on my mother's side alone. I probably have 30-40 cousins total, and that is a fairly meager amount compared some irish Americans!
Scipio

ha! that's it! I have 10 aunts and uncles (not including those married in) on my fathers side, and 6 on my mothers (again, not including those married in) and over 60 first cousins! I have cousins I haven't even met!!!
 
An interesting question to take into account, would Ireland have gained independence earlier had it had a larger population?
 
I have posted on Ireland and the world without the Diaspora and what a changed world we would have through it! I would reckon around 25 million and a very prosperous wonderful peace loving island where religious nutters would have been quickly put in their place and a largely bilingual people!
 
I have posted on Ireland and the world without the Diaspora and what a changed world we would have through it! I would reckon around 25 million and a very prosperous wonderful peace loving island where religious nutters would have been quickly put in their place and a largely bilingual people!

I want some of whatever he's smoking. It sounds like good stuff.

:D

Not sure if a larger population would lead to quicker Irish independence - though what produced it might mean different circumstances, a larger population in and of itself doesn't sound like it would help much.
 
Awilla The Hun,
I'm very serious! Please do read my OP on a similar topic, the link was provided after your post! Thanks.
 
Personally, I'd say around 9-10 million at most.

I'm also Irish-decended, and my dad was one of eight children! :p I have about 16 cousins from my dad's side of the family. Obviously that's nothing compared to what some people above have!
 
One of the reasons for the large number of "Irish-Americans" isn't just high birth rates its also their integration into society.

2 Irish people meet in Ireland marry and have 3 kids. They in turn marry people hand have kids so there are now 9 Irish people.

2 Irish people emigrate to the US, they meet and marry Americans and each have 3 kids for a total of 6 "Irish-Americans". They in turn marry and have 3 kids each meaning 18 "Irish-Americans" chuck in a few more generations and people "identifying" as Irish because its "cool" and you have a massive "Irish-American" population.

Bearing that in mind you can't simply transfer the Irish diaspora for a population estimate but have to quarter it or more.
 
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