Public sector pay rise demands unreasonable?

[stickershock]

I’m a nurse and outraged that we’ll only be getting (most likely) a 3% wage increase. I’m fully in favour of a strike action. But I’ve also just read that the junior doctors are planning a strike if they aren’t awarded a 22% increase 😮

We have all been losing wages year on year but 22% seems unrealistic. AIBU or have they got brilliant bargaining tactics?

MPs have had several inflation busting pay rises over the last few years while a nurses wage is in real terms more than 7% down on previous wage (article is from 2020 so probably worse now.

i am worried about the long term economic recovery if everyone gets huge pay rises. The experts reckon it will make inflation worse long term. Saying that MPs are about to scrap some cap on bankers pay rise or possibly on their bonuses. So one rule for the elite, one for everyone else?

www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/mps-get-8-pay-rises-in-10-years-while-nurses-salaries-are-slashed-197695/

Oh there’s lots of money around, it’s just not ‘trickling down’ the way the Tories said it would (its actually a long since defunct economic theory but that didn’t stop them). I had a senior city job till recently, and still know plenty of people on salaries of quarter of a million plus, never mind partners on three and four times that (before bonuses). The rich have been getting richer as everyone else gets poorer, yet the government still won’t address legal corporate tax evasion, dirty money distorting the housing market, overseas tax havens etc. If they did, there would be enough money to start paying public sector workers a better wage, funding early years support etc. Things that would actually enrich the country (not just economically), but not them and their mates, which is why they won’t do it.

It’s already happening. According to the ONS, roughly 2 million will arrive this decade. According to migration watch, by 2041 a further 4-5 million migrants will arrive through illegal routes. At the height of the EU migrant numbers, there were roughly 5 million in the Uk, many leaving in the last 2 years.

There is no risk of the labour shortage prevailing. The low wage economy is here to stay folks. There is absolutely no incentive for employers to pay more beyond this short term labour shortage.

The money is there, it's just safely tucked away in the 1%'s offshore accounts.

Top 1% have around 24% of all wealth in the UK and enough personal wealth to wipe out the entire UK national debt with around £15,000,000 each left over.

There has never been a lack of money in the UK it has always been a case of too few have too much.

@sst1234

How will illegal immigration help the nhs?

Especially when the tories claim they are sending them to rawanda?

I’m a children’s social worker. I got zero last year and fully expect the same this year, I never had this issue when I worked in the private sector. Bills going through the roof, my car needs a repair I can’t afford. Seriously considering leaving my profession.

Problem is you currently have qualified nurses leaving to go and work in Lidl for a very comparable salary, no nights, no Xmas day and a lot less stress. And that’s qualified nurses, imagine it’s even worse trying to recruit HCSW, porters, etc.

my local hospital currently has over 400 qualified staff vacancies not including doctors. So mainly nurses but also physios, etc. they can’t recruit. When things get really dire they offer a £100 bonus per shift if you agree to work an extra and they’re still not staffing the rotas!

Where I'm actually worried right now is with maternity pay also. So with a public sector pay freeze on my wages (not forgetting the real time pay cuts due to inflation), no chance of a pay rise, and maternity pay also not reflecting the cost of living I'm not sure how we are expected to make do when the baby arrives.

Nurses never strike because the patients suffer and the government knows it so they can get away with it.

Didn’t Boris say there would be £350 million a week extra for the nhs if we had brexit? So he could use this money to pay for a pay rise.

And nurses don't have loans?

They do strike, I remember being on the picket line about 12 years ago.

I was reading on Reddit why American nurses choose to go into Nursing a high amount said the money is good 🤣🤣🤣 what a stark contrast to the UK.

I work in a primary school, support role. Quite surprised to see I could earn £2 an hour more at my local B & Q stacking shelves. It would be a lot less stressful ......

Illegal migrants don’t stay illegal forever. They eventually get absorbed into the system. Since next to 0 actually get deported. That’s additional unskilled labour.

Though I’m a midwife not a nurse but I could have sworn the nurses strikes at the same time? Radiographers did, they brought a skeleton to the picket line!

@sst1234

In 20 years time.

And unskilled.

Nursing isn't unskilled. Neither is being a doctor

So how does it help, now?

I work for a large design agency, currently making redundancies. I had a 1% pay rise last year, my first raise in 7 years. So doesn’t matter who you work for, it’s mostly shit all round.

I’m an EO in the civil service. We’ve not had a pay rise for over a decade. I earn £29,000 a year. Like private sector workers, public sector also pay tax and National Insurance. I’m sick of people assuming all civil servants are fat cats, with lots of perks and none of the stresses of private sector employees, that we’re all working from home , feet up watching the TV- it’s simply not true.
The media has done a great job pushing this narrative and now, we’ve had enough.

Distribution is not the same as collection. Top 50% of households pay 80% of tax take.
And avoidance is completely legal. We may not agree with it, but it is legal whether Rishi’s wife does it, or the wife of Richie next door. If you don’t like the law, lobby your MP, start a petition.

Public sector waste and cronyism is absolutely unacceptable though. It’s out and out corruption. And the fact that it’s referred to as ‘sleaze’ by the media rather than corruption is an insult to the taxpayer.

@sst1234

I'd say tax avoidance is just as bad as public sector waste

What department? As I know my last one everyone has had a pay rise between 3017 and 2020 …

29,000 is very high for an E0 in 2017 (I know SEO on that then…)

sick of the nurses to doctors comparison to be honest - there were F3s running covid resus for 19 pounds an hour during the pandemic with a limit on over time.

We are taking wages. Or at least I thought we were.

Low wages at the bottom keep demand low in the economy and allow comparatively lower wages to be set for skilled roles. Especially in a services based economy which doesn’t produce much of value besides financial services - and even that’s in decline. That’s exactly what’s happened since nu labour introduced tax credits so that employers didn’t have to pay low skilled workers market rates.

And no it does help now. This is a short term blip caused by excessive money printing. Painful as it is.

And the civil service get a huge amount of perks!

I take it you don’t pay into a workplace pension, then?