Skills shortages are not always what they seem: migration and the Irish software industry James Wickham and Ian Bruff This paper argues that the skills shortage in the Irish software industry is socially produced by a range of domestic factors, especially the education and training system. It also con- tends that immigration reinforces rather than resolves skills shortages. Introduction Ireland has undergone a remarkable socio-economic transformation in the past 20 years. There has been at times explosive economic growth, driven initially by massive expansion of the high-technology manufacturing and service industries; mass immi- gration has replaced the centuries-old tradition of emigration. These two factors—high economic growth and high net inflows of migrants into Ireland—are often viewed to be inextricably linked: growth allegedly forced employers to search for suitable labour outside Ireland because the supply was exhausted within the Republic. Moreover, despite recent ructions over the employment of low-skill migrant labour, all sides of the debate continue to agree that the Irish economy ‘needs’ substantial immigration of skilled workers in order for economic growth to continue. For example, an expert group has estimated that Ireland requires a net annual immigration of 20,000–30,000, or 1–1.5 per cent of the Irish workforce, predominantly skilled migrants, over the next decade (Expert Group on Future Skills Needs and Forfás, 2005). Ireland’s economic success has led it to become ‘widely regarded as a role model in terms of the two main priorities of the European Union’s relaunched Lisbon Strategy [the European Union’s attempt to make the EU the world’s most dynamic knowledge- based economic region by 2010], economic growth and job creation’ (Schweiger and James Wickham (jwickham@tcd.ie) is currently Jean Monnet Professor of European Labour Market Studies and Director of the Employment Research Centre, Trinity College Dublin. His interests include European labour markets, migration and citizenship. Ian Bruff (ianbruff@gmail.com) is a research officer in the Department of Research and Knowledge Transfer at Edge Hill University, UK. His research interests include European varieties of capitalism, neo-Gramscian theory and the operations of labour markets. New Technology, Work and Employment 23:1-2 ISSN 0268-1072 © 2008 The Authors Journal compilation © 2008 Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main St, Malden, MA, 02148, USA 30 New Technology, Work and Employment