All of our political parties are afraid of the middle classes. The reality of early 21st-century Irish politics is that any policy, no matter what its social merit, which might hurt even some of the middle classes in their pockets, cannot be implemented.
Nothing which might upset this increasingly large cohort of the electorate will find its way into the election manifestos of any of the parties. On the contrary, the parties are already engaged in an auction of new goodies for middle-class votes.
The middle classes in Ireland have never had it so good. They enjoy a better standard of living and (even allowing for our more fractured society and infrastructure deficits) enjoy a better quality of life than previous generations. The middle classes have benefited most from our recent economic boom and from the dramatic tax cuts that have come with it. On top of this, a whole range of new State-funded initiatives, which have been introduced in the last decade, have disproportionately benefited the middle classes.
They no longer pay third-level fees. The question of whether the ending of third-level fees has or has not improved access to college for those from more disadvantaged areas is still a matter of some dispute.
However, what cannot be disputed is that abolition of third-level fees has dramatically increased the access of middle-class kids to private secondary schools and grind colleges. Wealthier parents have now been able to divert the resources they might otherwise have been spending on college fees to buying an advantage for their children even earlier in the education cycle.
The intensity of the opposition which the then minister for education, Noel Dempsey, faced both within his own party and from the Opposition benches when he floated the idea of re-introducing third-level fees in 2003 and using the money instead to improve grants to students from lower-income households illustrates the extent of the hold the middle classes and their concerns currently have over Irish politics. The middle classes are also the people benefiting most from the hundreds of thousands of euro now being paid out of the Government-subsidised SSIA accounts.
Not only are they most likely to have had the disposable income to put into these saving accounts, but the scheme was structured in such a way that the more money one put into the SSIA, the larger the State subsidy one gets when it pays out.
The middle classes are also the main beneficiaries of the increasing amounts of money which the Government is now giving parents to subsidise childcare costs. Child benefit is not only a useful weapon against child poverty, but is also the most effective means of subsidising the increasing costs associated with rearing children including, but not confined to, the formal costs of childcare. Child benefits would be more socially progressive and a more useful instrument for tackling relative poverty if it was targeted at lowerincome parents - by either means-testing or taxing the payment. However, none of our political parties has ever been brave enough to propose this because it would raise the ire of so many middle-class voters.
The inequality of our child-benefit system has recently been compounded by the introduction of the new € 1,000 early childcare supplement, which is also untaxed and is paid to all parents irrespective of their income.
As such, it has become just the latest in a long line of socially regressive subsidies which benefit the middle classes most.
On top of all that, it seems that much of the € 1 billion or so in repayments now being made to people who were illegally (but not unjustly) charged for a contribution to the cost of their own - or their parents' - nursing home care will be paid to those in the middle-class income bracket. They are now getting a large unexpected payment at a time when, as a class, they are wealthier than ever.
Far from reining in the advantages which the middle classes enjoy, the political parties in the lead up to the election are queuing up to give them even more.
In their health policy documents, Fine Gael promises to give free GP care to all children under five irrespective of their parents' income; the Green Party wants to give it free to all children under 18 (again without distinguishing between rich kids or poor kids); and the Labour Party wants to "ultimately" give free GP care to all patients of all ages.
Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats have already given free GP care to everyone over 70, again irrespective of their income.
In their childcare documents, both the Labour Party and the Greens promise to give free pre-school care to all three-year-olds - even to those children whose parents could easily afford it.
In their tax policies, the Progressive Democrats are set to promise reductions in stamp duty which will benefit the middle classes most. They are even promising a further reduction in the already-very-low top rate of income tax.
Individually, it may be possible to justify each of these promises on some or other objective ground, but the cumulative effect is that giving these State-funded gifts to everyone irrespective of income means many in the middle classes can end up creaming it, while in reality it is the lower classes who are left coping.
The only way to really tackle inequality is to redistribute income. There are only two ways to do that. One is through the tax system. The other is through targeting public expenditure at those most in need.
Our income tax system can only achieve minimal redistribution because it is a low-tax, two-rate system. Meanwhile, all the political parties are reluctant to target our benefits towards those who need them most. The political parties will have to get more courageous if we are ever to tackle the additional inequalities which have come with our newfound prosperity.