“The reality is that living standards are being squeezed across society – and creating a race to the bottom will only make things worse.”

Having abandoned “unaffordability” – an argument not sustained by the traitor Hutton – we now have “fairness”.

The argument seems to be that because the private sector has been squeezed, then so should the public sector – aka the politics of resentment.

Has nobody read the statistics on income rates versus GDP over the last 30 years? The middle classes have seen their income rise well below the rise in GDP. The poor are even worse off. Guess who has done quite well, really?

Note that this also refutes the “Chinese wage” argument – it’s about the distribution of wealth, stupid.

So… average public sector pay is higher than average private sector pay then yes? You’re just arguing that it’s not a fair comparison because the jobs aren’t directly comparable.

I assume then that you’ll stop arguing that women get paid 17% less than men yes?
http://www.touchstoneblog.org.uk/2008/10/today-is-womens-no-pay-day/

Isn’t it kinda hard to tell, given that the public sector has to contract out most of its unskilled jobs?

Firstly the Public Sector should never be paid as much as the private sector because the private sector money make the money which they spend. Simple . The hunters get more meat than the cave painters .
Working conditions, job security and a competitive environment none of which the Public sector face, should all earn higher salaries not to say the contrasting expectations of employers obliged to compete for clients (See who turns up for work when it snows )
Take teachers
1 No travel costs
2 If kids arrive job held open
3 No need to worry about paying for child care through the endless holidays the typical two income household has to navigate ,….. priceless
5 Final Salary linked , index linked guaranteed defined benefit pension…priceless although a pot of £750,000 might do it for a teacher on £30,000
6 Cannot be fired ( 18 dumped since the war )
7 Cannot go out of business
8 No need to hit any target and sure enough the OECD say that allowing for grade inflation absolutely no progress made
9 They do not ,as they claim , care about education .Try getting a teacher to work at a difficult school . Same money, harder work … they won`t do it .
This is why the National pay scale screws the inner city kidf that so conspicuously need help.
On pay the usual argument is that on a job grade to job grade but the profession like the Coucill workers has sprouted positions and hierarchies like the mediaeval church when the rest of the world has flattened out . None of this serves any purpose but to inflate salaries which are far higher than the headline figures

It is just not fair when privates sector salaries are falling, they have no pensions , work longer hours, often unpaid have no security . We are talking about privileged people who want to dump the cost of their long sunny wine swilling French holidays on everyone else and their children.

Its not on and it cannot go on

I agree* with Paul Newman because

1 He used numbered points and
2 He’s so right he doesn’t need to provide any evidence to support his ridiculous claims

But seriously, the point is that the Private Sector figures includes everyone from minimum wage up, but the Public Sector has a higher percentage of skilled people. It’s really not that difficult a concept to grasp.

*I don’t – WTF does snow have to do with it?!

Of course he’s right Gareth – look at his first point! Everyone knows teachers live in their classrooms and eat their dinner from a billy can, don’t they?

@Paul Newman

I agree with Paul. After all, who in the public sector would turn up when it snows? Well other than the cops, emergency services, highway folk, council employees and….errrr… most sentient beings,

Who doesn’t? Well those who have to commute on private sector-owned public transport as a starter. Anybody who has to get from a to b by aircraft as the private sector airports will close.

It also makes no sense to talk about “the” public sector. It is a diverse organisation and different parts of it did very differently post-1997 (broadly NHS staff did well and others did not.

Take civil servants:
* Median pay of full-time staff of £23,680, whereas in the rest of the economy it is £26,000 – 10% higher.
* The Upper Quartile pay of full-time staff (i.e. the point at which 25% of staff earn more) is £30,140, whereas in the rest of the economy it is £36,776 – 22% higher
* Real median full-time pay has increased by 7% since 1997 (indeed, since 1995 which is as far as figures go back), compared with 10% in the rest of the economy
* Real upper quartile full-time pay has increased by 1.4% since 1997 compared with 11% in the rest of the economy

These statistics will be cut a further 10% due to the 2-year real pay cut (misleadingly termed a pay freeze). Even before the Coalition took power, median full-time civil service pay was lower than in 2004 (and, at the upper quartile, lower than in 2003). And that’s without factoring in the massive pension contribution increases that will cut pay by a further 5%.

If the Government is concerned to decrease the raw average public sector pay figure, why not bring all the taxpayer-funded “private sector” contracted-out low skilled staff back in house and give everyone a 10% pay rise. Average pay would plummet…

Paul Newman – I know many teachers who love working at hard schools but they do need their pay higher to reflect this.

Without an educated population you can say goodbye to a good private sector. A public sector and private sector go hand in hand.

Also the private sector pensions should be raised in line with the public sector not the other way round.

a comparision is only worth making when there are meaningful comparators

Fair point.

Hay Group undertook a survey looking at private sector remuneration for senior HR professionals for 2009, examining 422 private sector companies.

Among the findings were that there were only 17 HR directors/division heads among the 422 private sector companies on salaries over £200,000 per annum.

By contrast, the HR director for the public sector BBC at the time earned £320,000. What’s more, two of her deputies earned more than £200,000…… i.e. the BBC alone had 3 members of its staff on higher salaries than 87% of the most successful private sector equivalents.

Elsewhere in the public sector, the HR Director of the Derby Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust earned > £246,000……and so on.

@ 4. Paul Newman

1. Private sector workers are earning less than public sectors workers (sic).
2. Let’s not bother about comparing like with like.
3. And let’s not join a trade union to try to distribute some of the wealth from the private sector bosses who are clearly not paying us fairly, or to improve our terms and conditions.
4. Instead, let’s make public sector workers poorer.
5. That way we can all be miserable together.
6. And we can suck more wealth out of the economy to ensure a recession.
7. Then we can complain even more loudly about fellow workers having better pay, because we believe that is the real issue.
8. Return to 1. above.

@4 Paul Newman

“It is just not fair when privates sector salaries are falling, they have no pensions , work longer hours, often unpaid have no security.”

As I said previously, this might be the case for middle- and low-income private sector workers, but it’s certainly not the case for upper-income private sector workers. Just because one sector of the economy is imposing a re-distribution of incomes from the poor to the rich is no excuse to extend this to the public sector.

“It is these compositional differences which account for the vast majority of the pay differential between the sectors. ”

Quite. As Tim J points out, this is also true of the compositional differences in hte male and female workforces which account for the cast majority of the pay differential between the sectors.

You know, years in the labour force, qualifications, occupational segregations…..

Paul Newman -

“Firstly the Public Sector should never be paid as much as the private sector”

What, the public sector *overall*? OK – but what does that have to do with the average pay of public sector workers vs private sector workers?

“Take teachers”

Yes please. This should be good… I’m married to a teacher so I have some idea what I’m talking about.

“1 No travel costs”

Erm… why don’t teachers have travel costs? Do you think they live in the staff room? Funnily enough, my wife lives with me in my house and gets the bus to work in the morning.

“6 Cannot be fired ( 18 dumped since the war )”

Get real. Teachers are routinely persuaded to jump even if they’re seldom pushed.

“8 No need to hit any target”

You must be joking. It’s wall-to-wall targets. What do you think SATs, league tables, ‘teaching to the test’ etc. are all about?

“9 They do not ,as they claim , care about education .Try getting a teacher to work at a difficult school . Same money, harder work … they won`t do it .”

Palpable nonsense. If this were true, “difficult” schools would be unable to recruit teaching staff, which of course they are not. If my wife doesn’t care about education, perhaps you could explain why she works from 8.00 to 5.30 every day in an inner city Bradford school, brings home at least 10 hours of planning and assessment per week, regularly gives up evenings to attend governor’s meetings, etc.? (Clue: it’s not because we’d otherwise need childcare through the school holidays – we wouldn’t – and it’s not because a few weeks’ extra holiday, some of them spent working at home, makes up for working 60 hour weeks during term time.)

“It is just not fair when privates sector salaries are falling, they have no pensions , work longer hours, often unpaid have no security.”

No, it’s not fair. But the correct response is to demand better private sector pensions, not worse public sector pensions. The alternative is a ‘race to the bottom’, with private sector pensions getting *even worse* as employers realise they no longer have to compete on pensions with the public sector.

“We are talking about privileged people who want to dump the cost of their long sunny wine swilling French holidays on everyone else and their children.”

No – we’re talking about a range of low, middle and high earners asking their employer (taxpayers) to fund decent pensions. It’s privileged people earning vast sums in the private sector who are the problem – they don’t want to fund decent pensions for their own employees, and they don’t want to pay the taxes required to fund decent pensions for teachers and nurses.

@Flowerpower #10:

“Among the findings were that there were only 17 HR directors/division heads among the 422 private sector companies on salaries over £200,000 per annum.

By contrast, the HR director for the public sector BBC at the time earned £320,000. What’s more, two of her deputies earned more than £200,000…… i.e. the BBC alone had 3 members of its staff on higher salaries than 87% of the most successful private sector equivalents.”

Firstly, if my HTML -fu is up to scratch; consider the two terms marked in bold above. Do we know how many of the private sector directors/division heads had assistants earning over £200,000.

Secondly, note that the public sector data compared with the Hay Group report is from TPA (http://www.hrmagazine.co.uk/hr/features/1015083/hr-directors-pay-paid-displayed).

Thirdly; from the link above, quoting the Hay Group – the source of the private sector data referred to:

“HRDs in the private sector are paid 15% more than those in the public sector”

Hmm. Reload, you’ve got another foot left.

I personally loved the guardian’s piece the other day with case studies of workers who are going to be striking tomorrow….

The 29 year old drama teacher from Leytonstone on 32k p/a said it all for me…

But of course comparing gross *SALARY* does not compare benefits. Public sector workers contribute less to better pensions, are harder to sack and have more holiday time, as well as taking more days off through sick leave.

If teachers can travel to work why are the rest of us obliged to buy them houses as “Key Workers” ( The rest of us being worthless of course). In the South huge numbers commute and are ready to accept lower salaries to work locally …..
Not teachers . Of course there are only 12 Labour MPs in the Souiht outside London so its not excatly Lib cop territory. The SE is however the only tax exporting region outside London . Kind of importnat then.
Some failed teachers are persuaded to jump “eventually” but there is no process and they usually arrive in Hackney or somewere similiar hence the no O levels these still well paid failures continue to “Not teach” . Nonetheless schools are always full of teachers who are manifestly inadequate and teachers are the first people to tell you so. They could not hack it in competition and so swill around the system. You have described the problem not the solurtion .
Poor schools have ther greatest difficulty recruting and retaining good staff which is why they usually get even poorer Ask your wife
My wife will be looking after working mother`s children this week ( All of whom will spend the time working up a really good hate) .She will be returning to work shortly looking for some way to accomodate the 3/4 months off a year your wife gets which will cost us in region of £6k in child, care . Our retirement plans are ” work until we die” and we have that in common with most of the people who are being asked to fund a failing profession into their delightful cocktail party filled sunset.
Its not just teachers either . Union members are on average higher paid better educated ,more likely to be home owners and six times as likely to be in a Union.
The Composional differnces between Private and Public Sector are largely as matter of the Public Sector inventing endless fake positions as a means of attracting more money. It has become a competitive lying contest in which each “head of diversity awareness” is combatted with a coordinator of ” Creative Skills ” and on it goes .

Most schools are stuffed with them

“Union members are on average higher paid better educated ,more likely to be home owners and six times as likely to be in a Union.”

So union members are more likely to be in a union.

Thanks for that insight!

Ooops ,sorry about the spelling and ranty tone I should mention that we have also been delighted with the school our own children are at which has some excellent staff .

Pity its all going so sour really .

First time commenting but Paul Newman’s brain splurts have made me laugh.

esp.

“Union members are on average higher paid better educated ,more likely to be home owners and six times as likely to be in a Union”

Imagine union members being six times more likely to be in a union, where do they get the nerve?!?!

Public Sector workers are six times as likely to be in a union etc……( ahem)

“Public Sector members are on average higher paid better educated ,more likely to be home owners and six times as likely to be in a Union”

And your solution is … what? That public sector workers should be paid less, worse educated, less likely to be home owners and banned from union membership?

@17 can you do that bit about meat eating again? That was great!

There’s a funny thing happening at the moment. Hitherto, it’s always been the Left who have been accused of the politics of envy and “levelling down” et cetera, but it now appears that those two attributes actually belong to the Right.

If conditions are poor in the private sector that is an argument for better conditions in that area, not to drag the rest of the workforce down to that level. Arguably the unions should be doing more to make this argument and promoting themselves better in private sector workplaces – collective bargaining needn’t be the sole preserve of the public sector (I know that’s simplistic but as a general rule, as our chum points out above, public sector workers are more likely to be organised).

@24 It’s an interesting point, isn’t it. The Right have learned the lessons of the radical Left of the past and are united behind a simple message while the left chase their tails and obsess about minutiae. There is so much overthink on the Left while the simple erosion of people’s quality of life goes on apace. We lack coherence because our erstwhile representatives are hugely compromised by New Labour treachery.

@24 – it’s just a thought, but maybe there’s a constant number of spiteful bastards around at any moment, and jumping on the right-wing bandwagon is *currently* the best way of being spiteful?

@ Paul Newman

“Some failed teachers are persuaded to jump “eventually” but there is no process”

There is a process – a teacher at my wife’s school has just been put through ‘competency’ proceedings and jumped before being pushed.

“they usually arrive in Hackney or somewere similiar hence the no O levels these still well paid failures continue to “Not teach” .”

Actually I think a reputation for incompetence is pretty hard to shake off – head teachers tend to talk to one another. But yes, I’m sure some people do ‘get away with it’ – as I’m sure they do in the private sector.

“Nonetheless schools are always full of teachers who are manifestly inadequate and teachers are the first people to tell you so…”

*Full* of such teachers? In my wife’s experience, there are usually one or two bad apples in a school and they are usually identified and dealt with – either brought up to scratch or squeezed out.

“Poor schools have ther greatest difficulty recruting and retaining good staff which is why they usually get even poorer Ask your wife”

Actually my wife is of the opinion that relatively poor teachers tend to end up in ‘good’ schools – leafy lane, middle-class schools where they can ‘coast’ secure in the knowledge that their results wil be OK. The most skilled teachers are the ones in ‘poor’ schools in which other teachers just wouldn’t be able to hack it. (Where do you think you’d find the *very best* policemen – in a nice, quiet, mostly crime-free village, or in a tough urban environment?)

As for poor schools getting poorer – I’ve a feeling my wife would take a different view on that too, not least because she’s part of a leadership team that has turned around an inner city primary that had been on the edge of special measures.

“My wife will be looking after working mother`s children this week ( All of whom will spend the time working up a really good hate) .She will be returning to work shortly looking for some way to accomodate the 3/4 months off a year your wife gets which will cost us in region of £6k in child, care”

Just consider the absurdity of what you’re saying. Schools exist *to educate your children*, not to provide a free childminding service. As it happens, though, education is provided 5 days a week from 8.45ish to 3.15ish, nine months of the year, so that’s around £18k of childcare you can manage without. And you think that gives you the right to complain that you’re not being provided with *another* £6k of free childcare?

Oh, and you should read and re-read the comments by S Pill @ 24 and George McLean @ 11.

Public versus private, exactly the situation being engineered by Cameron and Co. If Paul Newman or anyone else on the right, feel that the private sector are mistreated/neglected/abused, then there is a solution. Join a union, take collective action and fight for your rights! Union membership does not gaurantee an easy ride, higher pay or better prospects for promotion. Union members join for one simple reason, the safety of numbers. They see what goes on in the private sector and know that without the union, they would be getting screwed, lower pay, worse conditions, less protection. The private sector are not barred from joining, they just seem to think the private employers will take action against them, simple fact is, they ca’nt do a damned thing about it. So stop whining about public employees having a jolly old time on the taxpayer, they do’nt, for the most part. Start thinking with many heads rather than looking out for number one, and stand up for yourselves. There are some groups that will stand up for you, we call them unions. Check ‘em out.

@Paul Newman #17:

“She will be returning to work shortly looking for some way to accomodate the 3/4 months off a year your wife gets…”

It’s quite amazing how in one breath you paint all teachers as incompetent, and in another attribute to them the superhuman ability to walk into a classroom straight from a Mediterranean holiday ready to teach lessons having absorbed all curricular changes, new areas of responsibility, developments in knowledge etc etc etc by osmosis without any necessity for preparation.

I’m not a teacher, nor do I play one on TV (nor even have a wife who is); but I have given a reasonable amount of professional training. My regulator gives CPD credit for 3 hours of preparation for every hour spent actually training, and I’ve had to use every minute of them.

@ 4 Paul Newman

I trained as a teacher and I now run a tours company

I am able to claim a lot off my tax bill due to deductions, indeed it is very generous.

I laugh when the bankers and corporate clones who dominate the Tory party ( and NL) whinge and disinform about the public sector. It is they who line their pockets with money that should go into the public purse.

Further , Tory boy, I started my business from nothing, not a bean. The recent immigration cap has been a disaster for tourism and related industries in this country. I won’t listen to the Tories lecturing people on wealth creation.

One thing I never hear from the private sector idealogues is how our wealth is how we strip the world bear in order to satisfy our developed world lifestyles. Orgs like the TPA never dwell on that- how strange.

@ 4 Paul Newman

“Firstly the Public Sector should never be paid as much as the private sector because the private sector money make the money which they spend.”

And of course, the private sector never benefits from the work of the public sector. No private sector worker ever went to a state school, was treated on the NHS, used a public road, had their bins collected, was able to see thanks to a street light, was prevented from being mugged by the presence of the police, took a book out from a library… yes, you’ve definitely thought this one through. Enjoy leading the race to the bottom.

I’m surprised that more has not been made of the 3+% increase in pension contributions. This is nothing short of a pay cut, so why not call it that?

Lets get this straight?

- Earlier retirement

- Higher rates of pay for low paid and medium paid workers.

- The kind of final salary pension schemes the private sector phased out.

And this is all equality, eh comrades?

At least the British Bankers Association admitted it was about money and keeping a good thing.

@ 33. Comrade Tebbit

How have your comments helped Paul Newman to organise for better terms and conditions? All you’ve done is reinforce his bitterness at the fact that some workers have a better deal than he does, and have the guts to stand up to a government run by and for capitalists. Give him some encouragement – you’ll both get something out of it!

And you write: “Lets get this straight?”. You need an apostrophe in “Let’s” and you don’t need a question mark. Was your English teacher on strike when you should have been doing grammar?

“I’m surprised that more has not been made of the 3+% increase in pension contributions. This is nothing short of a pay cut, so why not call it that?”

Well, not so much actually. “Pay” is all the things that are paid to employees. Pensions are deferred pay. And when people hire people they look at the “entire” pay that have to offer to get the people.

Employers NI for example, well known that this “really” comes from the workers wages. In theory, so do pensions.

In fact, I’ve actually seen a US writer point out this very point. That public sector workers cannot be asked to pay more for their pensions because they already pay for their pensions anyway.

All that’s being done is to make it more obvious…..more apparent…..

@34. George McLean: “And you write: “Lets get this straight?”. You need an apostrophe in “Let’s” and you don’t need a question mark.”

Please mellow a bit. Comrade Tebbit’s argument is clear and it is fair comment.

English grammar scholars conduct interminable arguments about the value of the apostrophe. And are there fixed rules whether to apply a question mark at the end of an interrogative clause or sentence. <– Should that end full stop or with a question mark?

@35

But they will end up with 3% less in their income and no better benefits. If that isn’t a pay cut, then what is? Anything else is obfuscation.

that some workers have a better deal than he does, and have the guts to stand up to a government run by and for capitalists.

You think the majority female graduate public sector teaching profession have grabbed such a large share of the goodies ? They have guts?Funny I have never noticed .
I wonder, could it actually be because they are a state provider monopoly swollen with an infants sense of entitlement after ten years of their chums in New Labour handing them the froth off the top of a super heated asset bubble …. The gutsy miners, car workers and printers all went out of business and the only unionised private sector employees are in either heavily subsidised industry or para state activity like bin men.
I do not resent the overpayment of teachers. I resent paying for it

@10 Flowerpower

Elsewhere in the public sector, the HR Director of the Derby Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust earned > £246,000……and so on.

Tell me, Flowerpower, was this a £246,000 annual salary… Or a sum achieved by a severance package? Still a lot of money, I accept, but for the purposes of comparison with the private sector it is important to know.

@ Bob Piper #39:

“Tell me, Flowerpower, was this a £246,000 annual salary… Or a sum achieved by a severance package? Still a lot of money, I accept, but for the purposes of comparison with the private sector it is important to know.”

Well, since Mr Riley left the Trust in 2009, the year the figure i drawn from, I think we know the answer to that, don’t we?

http://uk.linkedin.com/pub/tony-riley/12/a92/906

What’s happened, Flowerpower? Cat got your tongue?

@Comrade Tebbitt #33:

“Higher rates of pay for low paid and medium paid workers.”

Cite?

You can have all of the studies, comparisons etc
I know from personal experience that I get paid more when I work for Private Sector clients.
Working as a contract IT professional the scale is
Public Sector < Retail < Other Private Sector < Financial

@ 39 and @40

Tell me, Flowerpower, was this a £246,000 annual salary… Or a sum achieved by a severance package? Still a lot of money, I accept, but for the purposes of comparison with the private sector it is important to know

I don’t know for sure. But I doubt any organization would actually abolish the post of HR Director, so genuine redundancy would seem unlikely.

Redfish,

Your experience is different to mine. I was offered 30% more to work for a local authority than for a bank.

@Flowerpower #43:

“I don’t know for sure. But I doubt any organization would actually abolish the post of HR Director, so genuine redundancy would seem unlikely.”

Tony Riley retired 28 February 2009; his salary was £105-110k and “other remuneration” of £130-135k was paid – see page 74 of the 2008-9 annual report:

http://www.derbyhospitals.nhs.uk/about-us/publications-reports/publication-archive/?assetdetesctl198985=2064

@ 36 Charlieman

“Should that end full stop or with a question mark?”

This, sir, is an incomplete sentence. I cast you out!

I have worked in both sectors and it is true that the private sector generally used to pay more than the public sector at medium and higher levels. There really wasn’t a lot to choose between them at lower levels. In terms of job security and pensions etc (i.e anything not related directly to pay) the public sector was and is better provisioned. It is also true that pay in the public sector has generally closed the gap on the private sector over the course of the last 5/10 years; except again at the higher level where….. well anyone who believes that board level pay in the private sector is a fair and equitable return for the work put in is genuinely misinformed. Its the benefit of being able to vote for your own pay package don’t you know (rather like MP’s – oh of course they are part of the public sector)

One of the main issues, however, is the bitterness of the debate which is reflected within the posted opinions here. It seems to have become a divide and conquer exercise in encouraging those who work in the private sector (at the lower and middle level) to rubbish those who work in the public sector and vice versa. I think there is a perception amongst private sector workers that the public sector does not understand how tough the actual environment is in manufacturing and retail etc. where there is little job security and indeed little job opportunity.

It’s not however a left v’s right battle and by making it that many people posting here are doing the government’s work for them. There is a problem with funding the existing public sector model and the government needs to address this. The debate should be based around creating a rational view of the fiscal challenges of the next 5/10 years.
In my opinion large public sector savings do have to be made. The basic numbers are inescapable but the government must be held responsible for implementing a
rational fiscal policy for the public sector. This should begin by fully addressing the waste involved in programs such as PFI, defence procurement and generally any major capital project. This does not, and need not, involve the pension provision of the public sector.

If you outsource all the low-paid jobs, in a hospital for instance, by employing contractors to provide cleaning services then you’re going to be left with the better-paid jobs. And conversely, the private sector (even though it’s working in the public sector and doing work previously done by the public sector) will see an increase in low paid workers.

If you increase the salaries of those at the very top of the public sector – DG of the BBC and so on – then that will also bring the average up without making much difference to those who serve the lunches in the Beeb’s canteen.

And finally, if you work in the private sector and think that those in the public are on a gravy train and have it all just peachy you could, maybe, work to improve conditions in your own sector by getting unionised.

Or you could just moan about how unfair it all is. Politics of envy?

All I seem to hear is the bitter ‘whaaaaaaaaa!!!!!! why have I not got it!!!!!!!!’ – Unions do a good job – Tories don’t like it and they’ll throw any shit at them to do away. Support these guys because they are fighting for their right to maintain there lifestyle – regardless of what is paid or what is thought is appropriate – because I cant see it stopping there! -

Mr Paul Newman – I agree it’s not nice to pay for things you don’t want – nor agree. But it’s a delusion to think this is the cause or end of problems – unions need to be strong or we’ll go though the 80′s again – and I can’t do that!