Giving the Eyes More Reason to Smile

Hold your horses, London. Not so fast, Paris. Dublin is now the European capital of personal wealth.

Or so the Irish say.

According to the Bank of Ireland's newest 'Wealth of the Nation' study, the Celtic Tiger is roaring louder than ever. The Irish, on average, are now the wealthiest people in Europe and the second wealthiest in the world, behind only Japan.

One look at the 2006 report, released on Monday, confirms that potato famines are but a distant memory for the Emerald Isle. Ireland has at least 33,000 millionaires in this country of 4.2 million, up 10 percent from the previous year. The nation's average individual wealth rose 19 percent in 2006 to 196,000 euros ($268,500).

Ireland is Europe's comeback kid, reversing a long-time laggard economy with growth that's been picking up speed for more than a decade; over the past ten years, personal wealth has grown a whopping 350 percent. Ireland's immigrants now outnumber its emigrants, and the country continues to win over international investment from global companies with its large, qualified workforce and hearty tax incentives.

But it's taken more than the luck of the Irish to build up those impressive stockpiles of cash. Ireland has the best personal savings rate in Europe - Celts save about 14 percent of their disposable income, besting Germans at 10 percent, Brits at 5 percent, and Americans at a paltry 1 percent.

Of course, the 20 percent surge in residential property value this past year was also an integral factor in Ireland's premier position in personal finance.

So, leprechauns may be mythological, but the pots of gold? Apparently real.

by Liz Gunnison