Why are wages so fucking bad in 2017? They're the same as the 80's/ 90's?

[BaydreamDeliever]

My mum moved to London in the 80's and worked for a high end shop. I've just had a look at the position they are advertising for at the moment, and it's a touch above min wage. My mum was able to afford to live on her wage back then, even though it wasn't big bucks, there is no way I could live on what they are offering today.

Wages are basically the same as years ago if you are in a lot of jobs. And the culture of 'internships' has further fucked everything. I see loads of these paying nothing or paying maybe £50 a day, demanding quite specific software skills. Entry level doesn't seem to mean entry level anymore.

I get that there always must be winners and losers in society as it's structured now, but seriously how can things churn on with workers being paid such shit money? If they do away with tax credits or housing benefit - what then? What will happen? I don't get it and I'm scared thinking of it. I'm educated, have a bit of experience in certain fields but not in any that pay reasonably. There must be millions like me in that same boat.

HeadDreamer, I'm watching those self-driving cars particularly - I reckon that will be the absolute last straw. What will ordinary people do when there is no way of earning a living any more?

We need basic income, or some other way of redistributing food and housing (just like the ancient Athenians' calls for land redistribution, nothng ever really changes).

IT in public sector is another issue. They shouldn't even be using Microsoft for cryin' out loud - better understanding of IT, its security, and its role as fundamental modern infrastructure is desperately needed at top-level government.

If you know anything about cyber security, you'll know that it is nigh on impossible to stay ahead of the hackers. 50% of UK businesses were hit last year.

www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2017/04/19/cyber-attacks-hit-half-uk-businesses-2016/

scary I can believe that unfortunately.

Head Dreamer I'm in N Ireland. My husband works in IT but within that, it's quite a specific thing he does. So although he has skills that are in short supply, the flip side is that there are also very few employers who would actually need someone who does what he does.

treaclesoda I think that is why if you are in NI. The cost of living differences is huge in the UK. I'm in Hampshire and £25k would be entry in IT.

Head and also to give some context to what salaries are like here, I work with several qualified chartered accountants. One of them is on a salary of £18k...

Head yes, that's what I was saying originally, that I know that housing costs are a lot lower here, but they're not so low that it makes it easy to live on £20k. And on the other hand, food and utilities are often more expensive here, there is a lack of childcare options etc, so even though housing costs are lower, it's not the whole picture.

I would have loved a job asking middle managers in my last job to describe the process flows in their job and their junior staff's capabilities and ambitions and firing the ones that didn't know any of this..

I even met a senior IT manager who was so geeky he thought that having inefficient code data reports were better than a suite of standard reports that could be constantly refined. It was like working with people beamed in from the stone age and asking them to manage a car plant, yet because those above them had no idea if what competent looks like, they couldn't tell that they had shit staff. Some of the seniors were on more than £100k..that's why Britain is fucked, not bad staff or immigrants, totally incompetent, deluded senior management infarction too many companies.

I've just had an interviews for a role. The expectations and the skill knowledge required were quite high - but the role paid only a bit more than some unskilled jobs.

I have been job hunting - and it's surprising the skills they ask vs the pay they expect to pay you.

Another component is that employment agencies pay fuck all, so you might be in there with your £50k job skills, with a branch manager earning £30k.who thinks she's amazing and that you don't deserve that wage..

I was just saying to dh that my line of work pays the same now as 20 years ago (1997). Back then it was a decent/good rate of pay. Now, it's pathetic and insulting. I am so angry, i have decided to re-train in an entirely new career! I cant go on like this. What to re-train as though ...?

@holditfinger and the small amount of other posters saying 'I was on forty quid a week in the early 1990's.' as if that was a normal salary for many. Sorry but that is rubbish.

In the 1990's you would only be on a wage that low if you were on a Youth Training Scheme, or you were an apprentice (like a hairdresser.) Most actual adult jobs (outside London) paid around four to five pounds an hour in the 1990's. Many people I knew at the time (who lived outside London, and were in ordinary jobs, not professional careers,) were on 8 to 12 grand in the 1990's. Admin AND manual labour jobs.

I got paid £19K in the early 1990's, but that was because I was a P.A. for a multi national company in London, so my example wasn't great. But I was trying to illustrate that I was earning that 25 years ago, and many jobs don't pay that now. And even a PA job in London (now) is only about 26-28 grand.

The equivalent of £19K now is around 40 grand. So a P.A job in the 1990's was easily 50% more than it is now . And these days, outside of London, a P.A's salary is probably a third less than it is in London.

@holditfinger says she is glad it's illegal now to pay people low pay, yet they still do it on apprenticeships. And to be honest, as I said earlier, that was the only time jobs paid that bad anyway, even in the 1990's and 1980's etc. Normal, regular jobs paid quite well.

I want to know how, according to the news the other day, average wages have gone up by 2% when public sector pay is capped at 1% and so many others have had no pay rise? To have an average of 2% there must be a lot of people getting a bit more than 2 or a smaller group who are getting much more that 2. So who is getting the money? Or are they cooking the books by double counting or something. For example last April as a teacher I got 1.25% plus 1% back dated from the previous year so 2.25% in one go but it should have been counted a separate years. (actually I got a pay cut in real terms due to pension increase and NI contribution increases but that's beside the point)

House prices are dependent on supply - we need more houses!

Nope. House prices are dependent on cheap and easy credit. The banks can print as much money as they like and this is used to pump up house prices.

If banks were limited to lending 3 x income, then prices would fall. The housing market is a completely corrupt monopoly based on keeping banks and house builders shares high. Tax credits and housing benefit help to ensure the capitalists get this subsidy even if people lose their jobs or wages fall.

Inflation has been pretty low for the past 20 years. This calculator is interesting, to find out the effect inflation has had on buying power.

Not really. House prices are not included in inflation figures. It's ridiculous that the most expensive cost in one's life (shelter) is not included in inflation figures. If house prices were included inflation would be well into the double digits!

I'm 41
not only have wages stagnated but what is expected for the wage has gone up a lot

I was talking to a friend's dad - he is 60something - and he was saying he couldn't believe how much was expected for that wage now. He planned on early retirement ages ago luckily, but he started work in the days where you got a full lunch hour and were meant to go home on time.

anyway, overpopulation = massive oversupply of labour. I think we'd have less trouble getting parties to address overpopulation if not for the massive benefit that they can all keep as much company or cannon fodder around in poor conditions if they don't do anything aobut overpopulation - which from an ivory tower, chauffeured to meetings etc - doesn't affect them at all.

PA jobs now paying £26 to £28k are also double the workload from the 90s!!! user1493759849

In 1997 I was paid about £7.50-£8.50 pH to work in call centres. I was miffed that my friends were getting paid more than me when I was a recent business graduate and they were arts graduates. My rent was £30 a week, with food at £10 a week. Beer was about £2.50 a pint in expensive places.

Now I am earning 7.20ph, market rent is £600 a month, food around £30 a month, and beer in expensive places is nearing £5 a pint. 20 years later, I have less money.

It's like someone in the 90s earning £35 a week. It's mental. Thanks coalition/conservatives...thanks very much...

HeadDreamer

Just wait till the machines replacing the existing and remaining retail and manufacturing jobs. It is already happening. For example china is losing factories as more and more robots are used. They even build a new factoring in Germany for addidas or reebok because it is cheaper than in china. Amazon new warehouse in the U.K. will also be very high tech. Then there is self driving cars which is on the brink of a breakthrough to common use. These low skills jobs are all doomed (except in care) but we aren't training our workforce to deal with it unlike Germany.

That ^^ is spot on! And the only way to combat this trend and keep people employed is through education! It would be down to governments, to overhaul the education system. Schools should be preparing their pupils for the workplace full of technology! Everyone should understand how algorithms work, be able to write basic computer programs, how to keep save in every sense and how to deliver a good, friendly service. The 3 R's should be taught at primary level with a complete restructure of secondary education where handling technology is key from day one.
I know, some of this is already done, but not enough or thoroughly - "computer science" is taught very patchy but should be one of the major subjects beside English and math.

It's balls. Productivity is lower despite individual capability being at an all time high.

I've long thought housing costs were the main problem - when an average young person in the SE has no realistic prospect of buying anything without years of hardship or living with parents, it's a problem.

I do think it needs state intervention - the private sector only wants to build houses it can sell for the current exalted prices.

"Why on earth do people keep rewriting history over tax credits when the low wage jobs were there beforehand"

Because it allows them to perpetuate the myth that the Labour Government introduced a brand new policy called "Tax Credits" when, in fact, have been around in one form or another for decades. The idea was first introduced by Ted Heath's conservative government in the 70s.

John Major's government called it "Family Credit". I remember watching the TV adverts, telling mothers to check their family allowance books to see if they were entitled to it.

How does the UK function?

Is it not just a massive house of cards, with people laden with debt, businesses dependant on people buying services instead of selling goods and dependant on Government credits?

Will there be a crash? When everything just falls apart. People stop buying the goods we sell, people have no money to then buy services and it crashes.

I have kept my old CVs and looked up my past wages - all full time secretarial/admin jobs in central London.

When I was 17 I earned £2,400
At 27 was earning £14,500
At 37 was earning £24,000
Now at 57 I am earning £23,000

For 'normal' jobs there has been no increase in salary whatsoever for the last 20 years.