My tory friend says there is no such thing as equality... discuss.

[malificent7]

Im a socialist btw to a certain point. I do get that a nurse shoyld get paid as much as a doctor and a TA shouldnt get psid as much as teacher.
It's the vast inequalities that bug me. I dont think that how hard you work mirrors how much you earn. I think wealth buys a good education which isnt fair. What do you all rekon? Also

[malificent7]

Typos

[ComingUpTrumps]

You've mentioned what you think - what does your friend think?

[BarbaraofSeville]

If nurses got paid as much as doctors and teaching assistants got paid as much as teachers, would anyone ever want to be a doctor or a teacher?

I understand the need to pay more for jobs that require longer and more expensive training, longer hours, are more stressful etc.

Wealth from hard work isn't limited to those who had a private education. I can think of loads of people with good jobs with working class backgrounds and a state education.

What is more of a problem is extreme inequality - where people can't pay for basic housing, bills and even a modest lifestyle however hard they work but there are a few very rich people who make things more expensive for everyone else. Or when people on even above average salaries can't afford a decent lifestyle. Like in London.

People always cite Scandinavian/Nordic countries as having a better system, but what I do think they do right is that they have less inequality and fewer very poor people who cannot afford the basics. Also fewer very rich people who hoard all the wealth.

Plus a more 'work to live' than 'live to work' mindset. They don't aspire to work very long hours at the detriment of having a life outside work.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

Remove the obvious issues. That would be a start.

Why are male jobs so rewarded and female jobs so poorly paid (even when we acknowledge they are essential)? See; care work versus digging holes in the road or coal miners versus TAs. Why do public schoolboys earn so damn much with so little talent.

There was a lovely man who was in the same degree year as me. Worked twice as hard for half the grade. I have absolutely no doubt he earns 10 times what I earn. Because he went to a naice school and daddy paid for a law conversion he didn't want or deserve.

I've worked in a lot of homeless shelters and offending settings. I have met brighter, sparkier, funnier and harder working people in those setting than anywhere else. Genuinely clever and free-thinking people. In some cases I've made a difference, in some I failed. The people I met rarely got above entry level positions when they could have been changing the world.

Only giving opportunities to 10% of the kids means that we all lose 90% of the talent.

[Out2pasture]

Money can buy oppertunities.
However not everyone learns the same thing from the same oppertunities.
Not everyone who is wealthy stays wealthy, not everyone who is poor stays poor.

[makeourfuture]

Inequality is essential to conservative ideology.

[Maursh]

Wages are a function of supply and demand. If you have a rare skill or qualifications you can command a higher salary. Hence why unskilled work is paid little and footballers paid so much.

The real inequality stems from a model which enabled those with modest savings to have those without any to buy houses for them. The leveraged buy to let model has brought about the biggest inequalities in this country as far as I'm concerned, and it was a labour government which oversaw it.

Closure of grammar schools is another classic example. They were closed because secondary modern were so poor. Grammar schooling was excellent for social mobility back in the day (unlike today) but when the alternative education was failing, labour closed grammar schools rather than improve secondary moderns (so people could leave school with a trade rather than unskilled).

Scandelous how socialist government harm those they are supposed to support.

[Pickerel]

The person I know with the highest paid job (I think - obviously I don't go around asking all my friends their salaries, so this is an assumption) went to a state school. Not a grammar school either. He's a very intelligent guy.

However, I recognise that there is a difference between coming from a not-particularly-privileged background and a real sink background.

[Pickerel]

This is why I'm surprised that there was such a fuss (from Labour voters as well as conservatives) about the so-called dementia tax.

Surely by paying social care costs for those with enough assets to pay for them, you are preserving the inheritance of a small number of people by adding to the overall burden of the taxpayer. Which increases inequality.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

Hence why unskilled work is paid little and footballers paid so much.

See that's just not true. Really good female footballers are much rarer and paid vastly less. Male laborers are ten-a-penny and paid more than care workers with massively less skills.

What would be nice is to true to even the playing field. My friend's kid is kicking my kid's arse at school. He is a mini-genius, with life-limiting disabilities. Exceeding expectations all over the shop. But mum doesn't work, dad works two jobs, mostly McDonald's. No spare money. No one has been to college. I keep saying, "save for uni" and they now have a savings account. But DH and I have actually discussed how we could give him a scholarship without my mate finding out. Because they won't take charity and he won't be going to college without help.

[StealthPolarBear]

Why should a nurse get paid the same as a doctor but a ta shouldn't get paid the same as a teacher?

[TipTopTipTopClop]

I'm a Conservative voter and I believe that inequality is the logical outcome of reproductive freedom, and there's not much we can do about it.

[Pickerel]

I think that was a typo Stealth.

[StealthPolarBear]

So which one is wrong and which is right?
How come everyone else can read between the lines when posters say the opposite of what they mean, but I can't?

[MrsTerryPratchett]

It's culcha @StealthPolarBear innit?

[StealthPolarBear]

I clearly have none. Which one did she mean and which one should be the other way round?

[StealthPolarBear]

Life was so much easier on MN when people said what they meant and not the opposite!

[makeourfuture]

Grammar schooling was excellent for social mobility back in the day

For a very, very small sample.

[Bluntness100]

Is this just a secret way to Tory bash? As the first poster said, you said what you tnink, what does your mate think?

As Teresa may said the Tory ethos is "equal opportunity based on talent and how hard you work, irrelevant of your back ground or who your parents are".

I like that ethos. Wealth doesn't always buy a good education, it's not that simplistic, and plenty of people, from an unprivileged background have a good education and are very successful career wise. Your op is ill thought through, and as said, I suspect a lame attempt st Tory bashing.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

When all around here was fields and we roamed free without being quoted in the Fail.

I do get that a nurse shoyld get paid as much as a doctor and a TA shouldnt get psid as much as teacher.

See how the typo starts and therefore could continue in the "shoyld" but the "shouldnt" is strong? That's what I reckoned.

[TipTopTipTopClop]

I clearly have none. Which one did she mean and which one should be the other way round?

I was so puzzled by the opening post that I overinvested in deciphering it. The first should is actually intended as a shouldn't.

[squishee]

Also what?

[AnnaNimmity]

Grammar schools weren't great for opportunity. My DM couldn't go to grammar school because her family couldn't afford the uniform and couldn't afford for her not to work. She had to leave school at 15 and work in a factory. Her future was shit because her family was poor.

[Zampa]

As Teresa may said the Tory ethos is "equal opportunity based on talent and how hard you work, irrelevant of your back ground or who your parents are".

We're 156th in the children's rights rankings (having been 11th), social housing building has fallen 95% since 2010 (I defy anyone to achieve living in temporary accommodation although I'm sure it happens), the gender pay gap remains at 10%, the pay gap between the richest and poorest is higher than other similar countries, the life expectancy gap between richest and poorest is rising for the first time in 150 years etc. etc.

The Tory ethos is not being implemented.