Irish Travellers Still Live A Hard Life

Ireland’s travellers, formerly known as the “tinkers” carries on, but it’s a hard life indeed. A 2008 study found that there were still more than 20,000 itinerant people living on Ireland’s roadways. Today they live in motorized homes rather than the painted, horse-drawn carriages one saw on Irish roads right up to the mid 70’s. Travellers have only a one per cent chance of living beyond age 65, and are about eight times as likely to be unemployed as the general Irish population.