Official figures show that the number of people working in the economy topped two million for the first time in the second quarter of this year.
The Central Statistics Office said the figure of 2,017,000 in employment represented an annual increase of 87,800 or 4.6%.
Annual growth in employment has been above 4.5% for the past five quarters and is way ahead of the European Union average growth rate of 1.7%.
Full-time jobs accounted for almost 80% of the growth, while the CSO estimates that foreign workers accounted for almost 55%, or 47,800, of the annual increase.
