To wonder why my job is so low paid and feel frustrated by it?

[eggsontoast9]

I’m a nursery nurse and I earn £8.72 an hour (minimum wage for over 25’s, I’m 26).
I’ve been in this job for the last three years and do enjoy it apart from the odd day but I’ve always wondered why it’s so low paid. It’s a hard job. I know a lot of people assume we just sit on our bums all day and play with children but that’s really not the case. I work in the baby unit and we can have anywhere up to 15 babies on a busy day, which in itself is bloody hard work. We have to deal with sick, poo, unhappy/unwell children, difficult parents etc. We have to complete paperwork now, normally whilst looking after the children because we’re short staffed and can’t always have time away from the room. We work long hours not because we want to but because we have to as the wages are so low (I work 7:30-6:00 four days a week and 7:30-5:00 another day). Holidays aren’t very generous. I guess the only bonus is we have weekends off unless we have training. I suppose it’s the same as health care jobs such as care assistants.

I like the job and work with a good team but can’t see myself staying here long term just because of the money which is a shame as it’s really hard to find a job that you enjoy sometimes. I was speaking to my younger cousin who’s 18 and she told me she’s just started a job in Asda earning £9.20 an hour and whilst I’m extremely happy for her and proud of her, it has made me realise my job is incredibly low paid and not very well respected in terms of how hard we all work. Before anyone jumps on me, I’m not saying my cousin shouldn’t earn that amount as I appreciate working in a supermarket is hard work to and any job should be paid a fair wage.

What is more frustrating is that we have to complete training each year and work towards gaining qualifications yet our wages are based on our age, so IMO there isn’t any progression available.

AIBU?

Parents do not want to pay for childcare
I don’t think that’s the case. Parents don’t earn enough to pay for childcare. Someone earning an average salary of £30k is getting £90 per day after tax and paying £60 to the nursery. They’re already making very little profit from working and can’t afford to pay more. Now consider that half of parents earn less than that average salary. Many rely on government subsidies to be able to just break even.

The fact is, for the majority of parents it’s not really profitable to work while they have kids in nursery. We as a society either need to normalise taking years out for childcare and support parents in subsequently reentering the workforce, or fund nurseries so parents can afford to work (which benefits everyone in the long run).

I pay £80 a day for my son's nursery fees ... Don't know what staff get paid. But I totally sympathise. I could not do it. In fact, I went back to work despite not earning much more per day after tax than nursery fees, because I found looking after my son harder work than being at work! (Part time so balance is good actually). I think you definitely deserve a lot more... But can the nurseries afford it? I don't know what sort of profit a private nursery makes ... And the wages have to come from somewhere!

@AnnnaBananna

what people can afford to pay for childcare will generally be based on the lowest household income in a 2 parent family This. Childcare has to be paid less than average for an average parent to be able to afford it.

If the nursery couldn’t recruit enough people at the skill level they needed they’d increase the salary until they did
No because if the salary was too high the demand would drop, because people couldn’t afford it.

I do agree. There’s a fine supply demand balance and unfortunately as it stands enough people are willing to work in that role for that money so it all keeps ticking along.

I’m not sure what the solution is as I agree it’s poorly paid for important work. Definitely gov paying a reasonable rate for free hours for a start. Beyond that not sure as you’re also right about parents not being able to pay more for the service.

Free nursery places full time from birth paid for out of general taxation? Maybe

Levy on businesses to ensure enough nursery places to allow women to work? Maybe

There are several reasons, and everyone of them applies pressure to ensure that the pay will be essentially the minimal possible:

a) As with every animal, we are expected to all be able to look after young, so the skillset needed to perform the role is almost universal. Regulations, slightly reduce the pool - but not much.

b) People (typically) do not have children to then aim to be away from them - at least during the early years. The service you are providing is tolerated, rather than truly desired.

c) There must be a substantial benefit to leaving children at Nursery, and this benefit is simply income. The market will aim to ensure the service can benefit the most people, and so the cost overall will be reduced to an optimal amount - as the flexible costs are essentially the pay rate, this will be minimised.

d) Regulations ensure the care is acceptable, so is not related to payment.

e) Workers have to pay for childcare to enable work out of post-tax wages

Pay has nothing to do with the societal benefit, it is purely economic. The default costs of looking after children is close to zero - but the opportunity cost can be high.

However, if you believe owners are making a huge profit - there is an answer - simply setup your own nursery and take slightly less profit.

The question you need to ask is, economically (nothing to do with how important you feel your role is), why would people want to pay you more?

It's a sign of how horribly topsy turvy our values are (as a society). Looking after children is up there with one of the most important roles (for most people, their children are the most important things in their life) Part of the reason for low pay is that the job is seen as doable without academic skill but I don't think that is fair as the personal characteristics required to work with young children requires a balance of personality and skill. Of course , the other reason is the lack of collective voice for nursery nurses as there is no trade union effectively bargaining for them. Compare with teachers - fairly vocal trade unions representing teacher interests and demanding pay deals. Years of Tory Govt have made trade unions weaker and therefore there isn't much a collective voice for lots of employees now. Nursery nurses included.

@BillMasen - The problem is it wouldn’t be free. It would simply be the government paying the nursery for more hours at £5 an hour, which wouldn’t even enable the nursery to break even after paying rent, never mind about the staff wages.

If they cut out the middle man (the local authority) and paid the nurseries directly, this would also save huge amounts of money which would enable staff to be paid more. The local authority takes at least 20% of the funding for ‘administration’ costs. It’s a complete waste of money. Family Support and Early Years should be funded separately by the local authority - as things stand, they use part of the childcare funding to finance these departments and give the nurseries the change. It’s an absolute scandal actually.

I don’t know why the nurseries put up with it. Well, I have an idea. It’s quite exhausting dealing with parents and nursery staff (there’s always some big drama to have to manage), and then there’s the stress of balancing the books every month, so you don’t have any energy left to kick up a fuss about the unfairness of it. It is broken though - you are quite right about that.

It’s absolutely nothing to do with the patriarchy or fucked up societal values, or rather it is, but not in the way some of you are talking. It’s because young men are taught to look for jobs that will be secure and well-paid and offer progression, and to walk away if that’s not on the table. And young women are STILL brought up and educated to think that keeping a roof over their and their family’s heads isn’t ultimately their responsibility, and all they need to worry about is doing something nice and socially rewarding that fits around school pickup times. As others have said, if female school leavers weren’t falling over themselves to look after other people’s children for pennies, they wouldn’t get offered pennies for it.

Christ Alive you’ve just described patriarchy and how societal pressure inhibits and curtail aomwn choices
“young men are taught to look for jobs that will be secure and well-paid and offer progression ⬅️ Taught by whom?
Society,peers,school, all reinforcing and maintaining institutional sexism.

Ask your employer to put you through qualifications. Nvq 2 and then 3. Then move jobs and find an employer who will put you through nvq 5 while working at a higher levels of responsibility. it most likely will be in a different care set up.

It is wrong that you are paid so little. Anyone with such responsibility should be paid much more

Workers have to pay for childcare to enable work out of post-tax wages
I honestly don’t know why people aren’t allowed to pay for childcare before being taxed. It seems nuts to make it harder for someone to afford to work. Put up the price of childcare but let people claim tax back to pay for it!

@AnnnaBananna we can can't we? Isn't there a tax free childcare scheme? I'm sure we use it... You pay into an account and the government top it up to compensate for tax? My husband manages that so I apologise if I'm actually talking rubbish...

You’re not talking rubbish. You mean the tax-free childcare scheme.

www.gov.uk/tax-free-childcare

@Iamthewombat

The staff there work long hours and I’ve often thought it’s a very much undervalued role. Nursery gets our children off to the best start in life, children are bloody hard work and these early years are important to shape their future.

I hope a lot of these messages from parents make you realise that you really are valued OP

I think that she’d probably prefer a better salary to being told how much she is valued. Would you pay higher fees, or more tax, to improve salaries for childcare workers? How much more?

I’ve asked the same question of several posters with children at nursery, who were bemoaning the low pay of the staff. Not a single reply. Quelle surprise.

Unfortunately I can’t afford to as I’m also I’m a low-paid, undervalued job. I don’t actually pay that much income tax as my salary is low. We do two days a week in nursery - it would be pointless me working if she went in full time. Not all parents with children in nursery earn the average wage, maybe that’s why you don’t have many responses to your question.

@Iamthewombat

Agreed, but I’m astonished that those posters boo hooing over the plight of the underpaid women looking after their children don’t get that they themselves are part of the problem.

Like I said above, I can’t afford to pay more. My child does 2 days a week in nursery, even with tax free childcare this uses 40% of my take home pay after tax, NI and pension deductions.

I did used to be in a better paid job (around £10,000 a year more) but the hours I worked and the travelling required didn’t work with a baby and childcare. I now generally get to start and finish when I am supposed to, I work at the same place every day and that is so helpful when you have a toddler to deposit somewhere while you go out to earn a pittance to contribute to the household bills.

£8 an hour for a nursery nurse is shite. I’d be pissed off too

I agree I put my child in nursery and the staff are amazing it’s a tough job and should be rewarded more.

Feel your pain OP. I've been a nursery practitioner since leaving college 25 years ago. I am now a manager so my pay has increased but not by much! I am qualified up to level 4 and looked into the Foundation degree leading to the EYP. It just wasn't worth it - 5/6 years of study and I wouldnt have earnt much more...I do love my job however and I look at my team as family.

Not all parents with children in nursery earn the average wage, maybe that’s why you don’t have many responses to your question.

No, the reason I haven’t had many responses is that for the people simultaneously sympathising with the OP’s low pay and wishing that childcare was cheaper or free, there is no good answer. The truthful answer would be, “I don’t want to pay more, hard luck nursery nurses, but know that you are valued for your cheap labour”.

@EYProvider actually runs a nursery and has helpfully posted upthread about the genuine financial pressures of doing so. I found that illuminating.

I noted that early in the thread, posters were suggesting that nursery owners were all coining it because somebody knew somebody who both owned a nursery and lived in a house with a swimming pool. In the real world, it’s not as simple as forcing what you consider to be fat cat nursery owners to sacrifice profits to pay the staff more, is it?

Oh OP, don't bloody start me off! First of all, YANBU. That goes without saying. I'm a teaching assistant (Scotland), on not much more than you. I work with children with autism, Down's, ADHD, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome.
The money is shocking for what we do. In many cases, we provide the work for the children. The teacher is supposed to, but often they don't bother. Inclusion is a joke. Our breaks and lunch breaks are unpaid, even though we're often doing first aid in the playground right into them.
It's a modern day scandal.

@Iamthewombat

Not all parents with children in nursery earn the average wage, maybe that’s why you don’t have many responses to your question.

No, the reason I haven’t had many responses is that for the people simultaneously sympathising with the OP’s low pay and wishing that childcare was cheaper or free, there is no good answer. The truthful answer would be, “I don’t want to pay more, hard luck nursery nurses, but know that you are valued for your cheap labour”.

@EYProvider actually runs a nursery and has helpfully posted upthread about the genuine financial pressures of doing so. I found that illuminating.

I noted that early in the thread, posters were suggesting that nursery owners were all coining it because somebody knew somebody who both owned a nursery and lived in a house with a swimming pool. In the real world, it’s not as simple as forcing what you consider to be fat cat nursery owners to sacrifice profits to pay the staff more, is it?

Ok, so if I rephrase “I can’t afford to pay more” to “I don’t want to pay more, hard luck nursery nurses” will that make you feel better? Which part of my post where I explained that I’m on a low salary too and therefore can’t realistically afford to pay out any more did you not understand? Or did you choose to ignore that? I’ve never suggested that our nursery owner was “coining it” so I don’t get why you’re using that argument?

@Iamthewombat - You’re right, it’s not as simple as that at all. I have had to sell furniture to pay my staff in really hard times.

Nursery workers are not that badly paid either. I get emails all the time from agencies trying to place nursery nurses, and most are asking for 25K + for term time only work.

It’s the nursery owners who are really struggling in reality. You only have to think about it: the turnover for a small nursery might be £200,000 a year, the same as a small shop. But where the owner of a small shop might employ one other person, the owner of a small nursery would need to employ five or six members of staff. Minimum wage is £8.72 an hour, but most nursery staff are qualified and won’t work for that. There has to be a hierarchy, so only the unqualified staff would be on minimum wage, with the hourly rate steeply rising for the Level 3’s and above (which half your staff must be). When you factor in employer’s NI and pension contributions, those five or six staff members are likely to cost in the region of £130,000 a year.

Shops are relatively cheap to rent and tend to be exempt from business rates. Nurseries on the other hand are expensive to rent because they are bigger and there are fewer available, meaning that landlords can charge extortionate rents. Churches are by far the worst - though at least church halls are exempt from business rates. Most nurseries pay £50,000 - £60,000 a year in rent, though this would be on the lower end of average - some (certainly in London) pay much much more.

So, you see, out of £200,000, nothing is left.

What’s even more unfair is the rule on VAT, which means you have to pay 20% extra on everything you buy. All businesses do, right? But the difference is, all other businesses charge VAT so can claim it back. Nurseries are not allowed to charge VAT, but must pay it on everything they buy.

And don’t even get me started on the unfairness of business rates. In Scotland, nurseries do not have to pay business rates. In England, business rates cost nurseries about £20,000 a year more. How is that fair? Yes, you need more floor space and the amount of floor space is ruled by what Ofsted says. But there is no adjustment for the fact that you only bring in as much as a small shop with five times the amount of staff.

The government does not understand the sector - this is the main problem. But unless you run a nursery, it’s just impossible to comprehend, I think. Parents don’t understand either. Even the staff don’t understand. But this is the truth of it and I’ve only scratched the surface.

@bloodyhairy

Oh OP, don't bloody start me off! First of all, YANBU. That goes without saying. I'm a teaching assistant (Scotland), on not much more than you. I work with children with autism, Down's, ADHD, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. The money is shocking for what we do. In many cases, we provide the work for the children. The teacher is supposed to, but often they don't bother. Inclusion is a joke. Our breaks and lunch breaks are unpaid, even though we're often doing first aid in the playground right into them. It's a modern day scandal.

"The teacher is supposed to, but often they don't bother."

It's not because they don't 'bother'! In most cases it's because teachers are so overworked that some jobs naturally fall down to the teaching assistants. Who are there to assist the teacher. Should this be happening? No - but there is not enough time in the day to everything that teaching demands and if something can be left to a TA, then so be it. Should TAs be paid more to balance this out? Absolutely, and so should teachers.

It’s terrible, it really is, but unless government subsidises childcare extensively, most people can’t afford to pay more for childcare, which means wages stay low. When we had our twins there was no way we could have afforded full time childcare for them both even at current rates.

Are you interested in the SEN side of things? I know someone who went from being a nursery worker to a TA at an SEN school (initially similar pay, shorter hours and longer holidays) and did lots of training, became a higher level TA and then specialised in certain areas and now works in SALT specifically.

Someone else became a nursery SENCO and is now a portage practitioner which she absolutely loves.