A growing number of people are opting to leave Ireland in search of jobs, according to recent figures.

The state-funded Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) forecast that by April 2012, some 100,000 people will have left the country in search of job vacancies.

This is the highest emigration rate in recent years and even eclipses the outward migration levels seen in 1989, when 44,000 people moved overseas.

Alan Barrett, an author of the study, told the Telegraph: "The big problem for the Irish economy is that consumer spending has been very depressed because people feel insecure about their future."

As well as high unemployment rates, Ireland is currently suffering economically, with the ESRI reducing its estimates for the nation's gross domestic product in 2011, dropping it from 2.25 per cent to 1.5 per cent.

Mr Barrett said the increase in taxes levied by the government coupled with spending reductions have had an adverse affect on consumer spending.

This comes after Eurostat published figures showing that the number of people out of work in the European Union between October and November 2010 fell by 35,000 to 23.248 million.

Posted by Alex Donnell