To think public sector pensions should be slashed?

I appreciate this doesn't apply to all public sector roles, but I've slashed my own life expectancy by 10 years to do the job that contributes well to my pension, so it's not like I'm going to reap any long term benefits.

Swings and roundabouts. The grass isn't always greener.

Public sector workers, nurses, teachers, bin men, social workers, all serve the public. The private sector workers would be pretty stuffed if we all went home or changed jobs. Want to look at the vacancy rates in education right now? The pension is one of the few things that keeps state school teachers in the job. But go ahead and bugger that up too and see what it does to recruitment and retention.

That's because the salary isn't great. Someone on the same salary in the private sector would in all likelihood have a much much lower pension.

ETA I'm not saying you deserved a low salary or wouldn't have earned more in the private sector.

I work in private sector. My salary is lower than public sector's. Public sector (especiali civil service) got this imaginary 'massive salaries' vision of private sector. I could also only dream of 19% (!) of employer's contribution to my pension....

I think you're missing everybody else's point, that public sector pensions were reduced from final salary to average salary in the early 2000s, and then those salaries were slashed in real terms after the financial crash when austerity measures required a total pay freeze for years followed by more years of below-inflation increases.

I work in the public sector and I honestly cannot think of anyone I know who could not earn 25%, 50% or at the more senior levels 100% plus more if they worked in the private sector. I could easily double my salary if I returned to the private sector, probably more than double, but I didn't enjoy the pressure of meetings sales targets every month.

OP good to hear that, as per your last post, you're willing to change your mind.

I used to work in the UK public sector; I left (went abroad) partly because the pension became so much worse after 2015 with the shift from defined contribution to career average. I have former colleagues still in their jobs, who after some further negative changes worry about how they'll be able to live on their pensions in old age.

Here's the thing: keeping old people in a state of independence, dignity and comfort costs money. If you make pensions too small to live well on, the NHS and social care will need the money saved to respond to the effects. The private sector is, in effect, already outsourcing the cost of dealing with the effects of stingy pensions to the taxpayer.

What is needed is not a race to the bottom on pensions, but governments getting together and finding ways to claw back more of the perverse profits and wealth that CEOs, owners and investors in the private sector currently get to keep. Fat chance, I agree - but that's no reason to target already-vulnerable groups s.a. pensioners.

It's already been said but we're already struggling keeping police officers, doctors, nurses, teachers etc. And then we want to lower their pensions and see what impact that has? It's not going to be good is it?

Son has just applied for a job with a public sector pension and one of the benefits is the employer ( Govn) pay 24% into their pension

The salary starting point is £30k plus and it’s available to those newly graduated which doesn’t seem low.

but then in response to the lower pensions in line with private sector then the reasonable response would be to raise wages then in line with the private sector ?

Nobody is missing your point, its just your point is invalid!

Public sector pay is so below private sector - that if you cut one of the only benefits like pension - everyone will leave, and the public sector will require their salary to become competitive. It doesn't save any money - just disrupts the workforce.

My NHS pension is the only thing that keeps me working there otherwise I would leave and move to the private sector, like many of my Nurse colleagues.

Yep, METPolice is about 5000 officers short.
Hubby is luckily retiring in exactly a year.

They were continued in the public sector as a sweetener because (apparently) public sector jobs were lower paid.

And that is still the case - not "apparently" but actually.

Public sector workers at most levels are paid less than their qualifications & experience would nett them in the private sector.

Why else do you think a lot of doctors do private work, as well as NHS work, for example?

That's an insanely generous scheme.

If you start work at 18 and do 49 years you end up with 100% of your salary as a pension?

How on earth can that be justified?

YANBU OP. Forget whether it's 'final salary' or 'career average' public sectors pensions are DB schemes as opposed to the DC schemes in the private sector.

The total pensions liability for the public sector is £1.3 trillion it's completely unsustainable. RR is faffing about destroying private sector businesses, raising £25bn through NI raises, destroying kids education by adding VAT to school fees to raise £1.5bn. It's the £1.3 trillion public sector pensions that need dealing with.

And those saying people should campaign for better private sector pensions completely miss the point that the sheer cost of funding a decent pension (like the £1.3 trillion public sector pension liability) means it's quite clearly unaffordable for the private sector.

This.

When I had a baby my maternity benefits were were also way lower than anyone I knew in a professional job in the private sector.

As everyone else has said public sector is career average pensions, not final, pay is pretty shit and been held down for many, many years and we don't get any of the other perks people I know in the private sector do.

its my brother in the police. PTSD is real. As is the overtime, massive workload and no staff.

You couldnt pay me enough to do it. He's thinking of leaving as its so shit, the pay does not compare to the job, years of no payrises, but yes, lets take away the half decent pension, that is nothing like it used to be! Lets see how many people want to do the job then! Whne my brother joined he was one of about 10,000 applicants (c.20 years ago). THe latest recruitment drive didnt even fill the posts available, go figure!

Weirdly, no one seems to want to slash MP's or former government pensions (looking at you BoJo etc) or expenses or Lords.
Why is no one outraged that Liz Truss will be paid her PM salary for rest of her life? For precisely nothing.
Why does no one question that richer are getting extremely rich but poor are getting very poor and seemingly are cause of everything bad?

A career average salary is far more valuable than most private sector pensions. Pensions are a significant issue for many people
People with more variable incomes who have bought buy to let properties with the aim of having an income from it in retirement feel that their pensions are being eroded by tax .
There needs to be a good look at pensions and retirement provision generally; particularly with changing demographics. Non of this should be a race to the bottom- it should be about making sure more people have a decent retirement

While you are thinking about that, add thinking about how infrequently people think about how the profits of companies are spent - but those some out of your pocket as well. Seriously. In the end "our tax money" is a price we pay to provide a commodity (service) just as the price of a car is what you pay to for that particular commodity. Do you ever sit and wonder what Rolls Royce or Seat or any other car producer does with their money?

The joke is that I think a lot of public sector workers reassure themselves that the low salary is worth it for a good pension. But very few have actually done the maths and compared it realistically to what a private sector salary and pension would get them. Many of them don't realise their pension isn't actually all that good unless they're on one of the old style final salary pensions. Once people wake up to that fact, I think the public sector will struggle even further.

I'm a teacher on the career average pension who's leaving for a private sector job at end of this term. I used to think that my pension would suffer when I left. But when I do the maths over what my current DB career average pension would likely be if I stayed in teaching compared to what my private sector pension is likely to be (assuming a few promotions and reasonably average returns over the next 30 years), the private sector wins.

Husband police too. Don't forget the 20% deduction from salary to the gold plated pension.
PTSD, broken bones and dead bodies.
I was on 6 figures many moons ago, working in the office, also with final salary pension (private one).
The two don't compare and I wouldn't do his job, even if it was similarly rewarded.

Additionally my employer’s contribution percentage has not risen in line with mine.

additionally my age to access my pension has risen by 8 years.

so in every sense this has been a pay cut.

i don’t see why I should have less pension because the private financial model of choice is to try and strip out maximum profit, year after year by exploiting anything and anyone? Like huge companies making huge profit margins? Why not make 5% less profit and just pay people more? It’s your business choice to be greedy and underpay people. It’s a choice.

I'm fairly confident in asserting that I think the public sector is better organised and works both harder and smarter too. A lot of people who claim to work hard in the UK like BTL landlords or senior managers spending all day on emails probably don't work as hard as they like to think.

Like I say, I’ve always been very low level, due to moving around a lot as a military wife. Please believe me when I say, all things considered, it’s not great!!