Gap between rich and poor too much

[schoome]

For example in the education sector - headteachers are paid 50k and teaching assistants 12k. Headteachers do paperwork and admin all day and teaching assistants do the real work.

Used to work for a high street bank where the CEO got £3.6m p.a. but counter clerks were on very small salaries.
Given your school example, a four times differential between top and bottom of an organisation doesn't sound too bad to me.

I understand it is upsetting not to be paid well (I'm in £17k so I know). But it's awfully naive to believe that the HT doesn't do 'real work'.
'Sneaks off to meetings and doesn't come back.' Probably because they're in meetings... which is their job.

While the minimum wage should be increased, TAs get 6 weeks off in summer, half terms etc without the work that regular teachers have to do in this time and they're paid accordingly, they are less experienced and less qualified... that's how it works.

When I have put in the 15/20 years my boss has worked I hope to be on a similar wage, but for now I am not so this is my wage until I ask for a raise or receive a promotion.

Don't be bitter towards someone who will be doing a lot of work that you just don't see.

I remember when I first started working in hotels, many, many moons ago. I would gaze angrily at the manager's office door promising myself if I ever became manager I would help when it was busy and not just hide in my office and sneak off for coffee breaks.

And then I became the assistant manager and would wistfully gaze at my office door while simultaneously calling around to cover staff absence, typing up an email to justify why profits were down 5% on last year (it's a global recession you twat) and trying to find the £5000 that night staff lost. There were times I vehemently wished I could go back to only having to worry about giving the guests the right room key and taking their details.

I came on to say what grumpy said. And £50k for a headteacher sounds low to me, tbh. I was earning that as a 22 year old trainee lawyer, without the fate of 500 children hanging over my head.

£50,000 for a head teacher is very low. My friend earned over £100,000 last time we spoke about it a few years ago (she lives in the North (nice area).

Your argument is poorly thought out OP.

Do you know any other head teachers?

Heads get paid more than that. Just saying.

Also it is an incredibly stressful job with huge levels of financial, safeguarding and other responsibilities.

Maybe you should head back to Uni and become and head. It’s a long road of classroom teaching first then, departmental heads/leadership roles. Moving areas, taking on troubled schools, showing real change at micro levels.

You can do it!

@schoome clearly some people are made to be management and some (you) are not 🙄 there’s a hell of a lot more to bring a HT and your lack of knowledge of what they do astounds me!! Do you even work in a school??!!

If you think that's a big gap try working in a university. Our last VC got paid £718,000 and all he did was fuck everything up.

How much do you think your HT should get paid op?

Headteachers do paperwork and admin all day and teaching assistants do the real work

Ha ha ha ha

You’re either as thick as pig shit, or a goody fucker troll

I suggest you volunteer to become a governor and find out what senior management really do.

You couldn’t live with yourself getting paid so much to tick boxes all day? Be thankful this head teacher is taking one for the team then. It leaves you free to do what you want to do on 12k. HTH

I agree.

Where I work those at the bottom haven't had a pay rise for 15 years, targets become more and more like punishment, several people have developed mental health problems because of the pressure and stress and most of us barely have time in the day to go to the toilet.

Meanwhile, those further up the ladder get annual pay rises, sit about chatting most of the day and spend the rest of the day in "meetings" discussing how to get 'more for less' out of those beneath them.

And I thought this was going to be an interesting, thought provoking thread about social injustice. Gutted.

Head teachers are far better qualified than a lowly TA so of course they get paid accordingly.

Can't believe you ask.

And I thought this was going to be an interesting, thought provoking thread about social injustice. Gutted.

It can be. Are you going to add anything other than criticism of the thread? The did give a bad example but there are good examples all over the place.

Go work in the private sector then.

However I will acknowledge that TAs are increasingly being asked to work with more demanding and vulnerable children and their pay should increase.

Name changer yes i agree

what a peculiar thread

i thought the examples were going to be care workers vs bankers or something

headteachers are not the "rich" in our society. you need to look elsewhere for them!

Very poor example. You obviously have no understanding of the headteacher role or accountability.

What a shame you used such a ridiculous example, it would have been a valid debate otherwise.

Where complaints like this fall down is, if you think there's a better job for you to do, then do it. No one is forcing you to do a lower paid job.

Op, you know full well the reason you're not a HT is not because you'd feel bad ticking boxes, that comment just makes you seem silly.

Do TAs have the same qualifications as HTs?

You are looking in the wrong place. I earn a good salary, more than your HT example, and have colleagues who are on probably 1/4 to 1/3 my salary. My global CEO though earns something like 100X what I do, around £6 million/year. Makes the HT look like a pauper.

However I will acknowledge that TAs are increasingly being asked to work with more demanding and vulnerable children and their pay should increase

All low-paid workers, no matter how menial or 'unworthy' their job is deserve better pay. It is criminal that a fulltime worker can not survive without government top-ups. I have to work around 45-55 hours a week in order to keep us a float on one income. It's not sustainable.

TAs, care workers, nurses and others who have a lot of responsibility for little pay deserve more of a rise but any low paid worker should have a decent standard of living if they work fulltime.

The gap does need to close. It's obscene that in some sectors senior management can bring in 5x the national average wage or more while those doing the daily grind can't afford to feed their families without help from food banks and tax credits. That's not to say we should close the gap by pulling down those in the middle like care home managers or head teachers but those at the very top (100k or more) need a pay freeze and profit margins need to narrow and government funding of the social sector needs to increase in order to pull those at the bottom up and close the gap.