Here is an interesting table and graph. It shows the number of work permits issued in Ireland per year over the last 10 years from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment.
I’m not sure how to interpret the graph in terms of the trends (for example, does the recent drop mean less people are interested in coming here, or does it mean that permits are now harder to obtain?). If you have any insight or thoughts, I’d be interested in hearing them.
as an non-EU citizen who knows other non-EU citizens who need work permits, and based on talking to them and hearing stories, and not on actual evidence, I’d say it became much harder to obtain work permits now. Which makes sense with high unemployment numbers: the whole idea of work permits is to guarantee that Irish and EU citizens are given priority over non-EU workers.