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.

My experience of employment is rather the opposite. No one gets fired in a lot of organisations, no matter how incompetent they are, how difficult they are, how much they bully others, how little they contribute, how much they take the piss. In fact they're often rewarded, because talking the talk is all important, whereas actually doing stuff is less so.

A culture of stronger, fairer management in general would be a good thing.

When I worked for my ex years ago in 2005, when he advertised for staff (small shop) he would get maybe 10 responses. Fast forward to 2010/2011 and there would be 100 plus responses. The demand for (what was essentially a shitty serving in a shop job) was ridiculous and something really changed after 2005 with the demand of jobs. My ex (who was an asshole) didn't need to raise the wages by much because as put it "shop staff are two a penny." So in other words if they didn't like it there were plenty more banging at the door wanting a job

@Scaryclown, we really don't have that culture. No business on the planet sacks people just for being good at their job. There are these things called employment laws, put in place to protect employees, which more or less prevent employers from firing anyone at all, regardless of how incompetent they are.

As you have been told on the last 20 threads you have posted, if you were fired, it was for your attitude, not your sheer brilliance at everything you do.

You seriously think employment laws do that? And even if they did, what about the first two years before full protection?

No it wasn't. It was because by simply being good, It revealed that my boss was awful. Treaclesoda explained the same phenomenon.

In a place where I was the second best salesperson, the first best was persuaded to leave by the boss who said he was under investigation for fraud and 'best to leave'. He wasn't under investigation for fraud, the boss just wanted the best sales people to leave in case they took his job. The third best person, a muslim, was given around 300 leads for an area that had over 600,000 companies and instructed to call them over and over again. That sales person could speak five languages, and was expert at getting muslim and jewish (go figure!..) businesses to sign up. I was as much ejected for sticking up for him, as for being the second best sales person.

We do have the same anti-achievement culture we have always had. Its never been a secret.

And can't you see that you are saying 'no matter how incompetent' which in iteself suggests that incompetence doesn't eject you, and I am saying that excessive competence does - the two positions are mutually supporting don't you see that??

Also have you not watched the apprentice or the weakest link?? Jesus.

Well it is of interest.

I was researching Britain's use of US Marshall Aid. The US sent a few engineers along to help in refurbishing old factories to modern spec. This is all in the record.

They reported that the British engineers and factory workers were very excited by the opportunity to revamp the work flow system...they knew methods were outdated. Specifically factories in the UK did not work to "spec". Meaning parts were not as inter-changable as they should be and things like that.

But where the US engineers found problems was with upper management. The guys from Eton and Oxbridge. They were very comfortable running things as they had been. Personal associations, etc. They were often educated in Latin and the Classics....but had no knowledge of, nor any desire to learn about, modern manufacturing systems.

I'm earning a similar amount to the wage I got in my first job 15 years ago, despite being skilled and qualified in what I do. My first job was in admin, but a lot of those jobs have disappeared now or are advertised as apprenticeships so employers don't have to pay them a proper wage (I support apprenticeships, but not for things that are easy to learn on the job anyway like admin or retail).

There are so many less jobs around too, and a lot of them are low paid or offering minimal hours but expecting employees to be available all of the time to pick up extra hours.

Re numbers - the massive increase in numbers of applications for jobs does not reflect an increase in supply - it represents the increased ease and speed at which people can apply. This leads to distortion in both the expectation of employers and that kind of stat where 'nobody turns up for interview'

If you have 20 roles and 20 total competent applicants, each employer these days is likely to have 20 applications for each role, and shortlist the same 5 people, the first five to interview might offer to the same 2 leaving the third and fourth to start going down the list, the rest will be 'surprised' that the candidates they wanted don't turn up, or are no longer interested, so will go back to the pool and wonder again why the five they shortlist don't turn up to all the interviews.

Some down the list will go 'oh my god british workers are useless' and go to a polish agency who will fill from a queue. The market thinks there are no workers who turn up for interview, and only polish workers do, but in fact there were always 20 people to fill 20 positions.

If you are an applicant who is quite often by luck or just statistics in the 15 (the stats in that example, let alone the more realistic 100-200 applicants are that you are 75% likely with EACH APPLICATION to be not asked for interview, and not recruited, even though all of the applicants can do the job.

We have an application numbers issue,and a failure of businesses to understand it issue, not an ability or supply issue.

Ahem I hate to say it again, but with similar conditions, with my expert jiggery pokery and 4 years market analysis study, was able to treble appropriate recruitment two years ahead of a doubling target because I understand this in depth, and most companies, especially small ones don't/

You don't have to listen, as my previous bosses didn't, because 'who do I think I am? etc, but it is what it is.

makeourfuture yes there are countless examples of this, and good HR literature even spells this put directly, but most HR courses (CIPD I'm looking at you) miss these crucial phenomena completely. I was lucky to study, and continue casual study, in the areas of market analysis, sociology, behavioural economics and psychology, which works better for this kind of stuff.

@scaryclown, no one listens because you come up with the same incomprehensible, delusional rants over and over again.

The thread is about why wages haven't gone up in real terms since the 80s. It has nothing to do with you being sacked countless times for being too good at your job. It has been suggested on many of your threads that you should seek outside help with your problems. Have you thought any more about it?

My earnings haven't gone up in years, and I took a massive rate cut taking on a new account but it coincided with moving out of London to live and work remotely in one of the cheapest places in U.K. So in real terms I took no hit, maybe increased my disposable a bit. But I haven't increased in 3 yrs. So now I'm setting up a second and diversified business to make more money. If I can make £10k a year profit I'll be thrilled but if it goes well, it could be more or could become my primary business.

I am always looking to upskill and diversify.

I will spend my children's childhoods teaching them about entrepreneurship as the primary gift I want to give them for their futures.

I think in future there will be 2 ways to be wealthy. Going into the traditional big money jobs like banking, law, some medicine etc. The other way is entrepreneurship, and this is so much more accessible now than even 5 yrs ago with advances in online platforms, payment methods, access to global consumers. I want my kids to have the skills and flexibility to be both so they have choices throughout their lives.

Making money working for others in all the old jobs is no longer profitable (retail, manufacturing, healthcare, etc). All these organisations are now answerable to shareholders and will suck as much money as possible away from the workers. That will never go back to fair pay.

scary
'Ahem I hate to say it again, but with similar conditions, with my expert jiggery pokery and 4 years market analysis study, was able to treble appropriate recruitment two years ahead of a doubling target because I understand this in depth, and most companies, especially small ones don't/'

If you are really as good as you keep saying you are, you simply would not have been let go from a number of jobs and now be on £7.20ph.

Unless you are a total PITA...

DWP gets unemployed people to send out so many job applications a week, even if the jobs are unsuitable. A waste of every one's time.

And can't you see that you are saying 'no matter how incompetent' which in iteself suggests that incompetence doesn't eject you, and I am saying that excessive competence does - the two positions are mutually supporting don't you see that??

Tbh I don't see the two positions as mutually supporting. I've never seen someone sacked for high performance or low performance. The only time I've seen a colleague be sacked it was for theft. And even then, I strongly suspect that if it were possible to have just swept it under the carpet that would have been the preferred option.

However, all of this is off the topic of the original discussion anyway.

I think the simplest answer is that salaries are low because employers can get away with it. But having come of age before minimum wage existed, I do remember the days when it would have been perfectly legal to pay £50 a week for a full time job, so whilst salaries have definitely stagnated, the lowest salaries are higher than they used to be.

A lot of what seems to be expected and the skills required / experience do not seem to match up with the pay offered.

In an ideal world, there would be a limited pool of people with skills and businesses would compete to get these people / poach these people.

I have seen people sacked for incompetence.

wombling My thinking will be incomprehensible to you - its advanced and your instinctive triggered response to me saying things that you don't get is very similar to how my boss felt and behaved, so you should know acutely the phenomenon I'm talking about. The reaction of 'its mumbo jumbo crazy talk' to stuff that you don't understand is what fuels the kind of 'burn the witch' behaviour that happens to really high performers.

The problem is the numbers game I'm talking about, because the expansion of my example shows that statistically its highly probably that someone competent and high performing can consistently be in the unselected 75% or more, whilst at the same time having businesses recruiting sub-optimally, or not at all.

The idea that the fact that someone is out of work means they 'must' be a PITA is just bollocks.

i was talking to an economist friend at the weekend and he said there's strong evidence wages have stagnated since 2008, economists aren't really sure why they haven't seen wage recovery.

The point he made about the min wage is that the LPC has to be risk averse as they seek to avoid unemployment and hours cuts, it's possible they could get away with raising the min wage to £10ph but it's clearly a gamble because that big of an increase has never been tried before as sensible policy makers would try to avoid making a gamble of an unprecedented size.

It seems to be that the pay of the lowest has increased - minimum wage has done that.

But the pay of people with skills, knowledge and experience that should be paying far more than minimum wage hasn't increased much but the demands have.