There is no version of macroeconomics, from the ideological left or right, which recommends an expansion of budget stimulus when things are already going well. Since small countries which have joined a currency union, in Ireland’s case the euro system, have no resort to exchange rate adjustment and no control over the general level of interest rates, there is just one policy instrument available when stimulus is advisable. There can be no exchange rate policy, no monetary policy, just budget variations. If the economy hits a rough patch, that is the time to loosen the budgetary stance, through higher spending or cuts in taxes, financed through borrowing if needs be.

Unfortunately this option is closed if the country in question cannot borrow, which is what happened in 2010 – debt had built up very quickly, the State balance sheet looked flaky and the country could only borrow from the IMF and European Union institutions. Nobody else would lend.

There followed several years of conditionality imposed by these emergency lenders, the Troika of IMF, the European Commission and the European Central Bank. The austerity period saw tight controls on current spending, including public sector pay cuts and higher taxes. The volume of State capital investment was halved.

In a downturn, this is not the ideal medicine and the economy experienced a sharper recession than would have happened if the capacity to borrow freely had been preserved.

In the period leading up to the banking bust of late 2008, the flattering budget numbers proved to be an illusion. Tax revenue looked buoyant and there were even budget surpluses for a while.

But the tax revenue, especially from bubble-related stamp duties on booming property transactions, evaporated quickly, bank debts were taken on to the State balance sheet, international sovereign credit markets tanked and Ireland paid a heavy price for loose budget strategy in the good years.

Prudence is its own reward when trouble strikes. It preserves the capacity to stabilise even when borrowing gets scarce internationally, as it regularly does in a downturn.

There are two distinct arguments for avoiding a spending spree in current circumstances. First, there is no need for fiscal stimulus when the economy is close to full employment, labour markets are tight and net immigration at record levels.

In his Irish Times column last week, John FitzGerald laid out the case for prudence – there is no point trying to spend your way out of a boom, even if you can.

The second objection is that sometimes the option is just not available.

Economic conditions, including the capacity for sovereign borrowing, can worsen very quickly.

Just when you might wish to borrow for a few years of stimulus, you discover, as Ireland did in the summer of 2010, that nobody wants to lend at interest rates you can afford.

Three or four years earlier, the Government persuaded itself that the good times would continue to roll, the banks were sound as a bell, the State balance sheet looked solid and tax reliefs alongside higher Government spending was the chosen combination.

It was not needed, it was not sustainable either and Ireland had to seek a sovereign bailout at the end of 2010 for the first time in the history of the State.

The macroeconomic outlook for Ireland in 2024 looks uncomfortably similar to the perception of policymakers in the years before the crash of 2008.

The economy is doing fine, nobody in officialdom is worried about the banks, the State’s net debt position has improved and Government has ready access to fresh borrowing to roll over maturing debt.

But there are frequent, at times daily, promises from politicians of new expenditure commitments and reductions in tax burdens.

The ratios of State debt to national income or to the tax base look better than they did a few years back.

But they looked even better in 2006 and 2007, and we know what happened next. Advice to be cautious has come from the Central Bank, the Fiscal Council, numerous economists as well as international observers in the OECD, the European Commission and the IMF.

Taoiseach Simon Harris has promised a Department of Infrastructure and a further expansion of the capital programme, now back to pre-2008 levels of ambition. Sinn Féin has just pledged €39bn for public housing, following Green leader Eamon Ryan’s plan to spend about the same on provincial railways.

The historical record on Irish State capital spending is a catalogue of boom and bust, with savage cutbacks when the money ran out in 1987 and again 20 years later.

The best defence against a repeat is to heed John FitzGerald’s advice – there is no case for expansionary budgets, no need to risk another cycle of boom-bust induced by the mismanagement of the public finances.