To think public sector pensions should be slashed?

[Monwmum]

I'm probably going to be slated for even suggesting it....but in the private sector, high percentage final salary pensions were phased out in the early 2000s because they are a money pit and unsustainable. They were continued in the public sector as a sweetener because (apparently) public sector jobs were lower paid.

This simply isn't the case anymore. After years of frozen pay or meagre 1 or 2% pay increases in much of the private sector versus mainly regular inflation based pay increases in the public sector, this gap has been reduced if not closed completely. However, public sector pensions are still getting contributions of the high 20% figures while private sector pensions range from 4% -10%.

Quite a difference! Am I being unreasonable to say this would be a good place to start saving some of our tax money? And before people start saying there would be outrage just remember this was done to every private sector employee in the early 2000s so it can be done.

i'm guessing something involving night shift work. there have been studies on it. there was a big one in america on nurses doing night shifts, mostly women, who were tracked for about 20 years. the risk of early death was noticeably higher in those who did night shifts, and the risk increased the longer they did the shifts.

Fast Stream takes you to G7 upon successful completion of the scheme. Whitehall departments also have rapid promotion for HEOs. Not sure how it works outside of Whitehall but you can advance quickly inside, in policy. Not Ops.

it's also a false economy as the knowledge gap is then plugged through private consultants. which costs more in capital and operational terms, than recruiting and having that talent as a permanent part of your team.

good quality candidates and graduates are specifically creamed off by private firms, as they are then leased to the civil service through contract work, but at a much higher cost, and without the benefit of being able to retain that talent and grow your own in-house knowledge.

ian dunt's book on westminster covers this and the problems it causes. like pfi it's short term thinking to make numbers work on a spreadsheet in the short term, but without looking at the overall long term impact.

Why are people so insistent on making public service workers miserable? You do realise that we pay taxes? That we pay for our pensions? That we work hard? Were not fucking free loaders living off private sector workers tax contributions?

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The OP already explained FSP are unaffordable in the private sector that has to compete in a global market place. Even in the recent Labour budget the NI increases were added to the private sector but NHS etc were excused these increases, this in turn will reduce further private sector pay.
The reality is that FSP are unaffordable in the public sector, many councils, for example, pay 20%+ of their budget to their pensioners instead of into services which is where the money is really needed.

Good thing that final salary pensions have been phased out in the public sector then, eh?

Or those roles (nursing, police, prison officers...) where dealing with violence and the potential for serious injury is a routine part of your job.

I think it is you who is missing the point. When wages for public sector jobs are calculated independently, they are much lower than the equivalent comparators in the private sector to adjust for the fact that the public sector worker is accruing a good pension at the same time. So each year a civil servant works, they are paid with both their actual salary now and an accrued pension later - and the total is set to represent the lower end of the equivalent private sector remuneration..

it makes no more sense to suggest cutting public sector pensions than it does to cut public sector salaries - they are both something that is earned for the job, and just because the pension is paid out years later, it’s already been earned so can’t be taken away retrospectively.

as people have tried to explain, the pensions are higher then the equivalent private sector pensions BECAUSE the salary part of the package is lower than the private sector salary. This isn’t guesswork, there are complex economic calculations underlying public sector salary levels.

You can’t take away the pensions already earned.

and if you reduce pensions going forward, salaries will have to rise to adjust for this.

public sector workers are no different to private sector workers who give up some of their salary voluntarily to have a bigger pension - the difference is they didn’t actively choose to do it, it’s just part of the pay deal.

Oh I fully agree with that. But PP seemed to be saying her pension isn't generous, when it likely is. Just one part of a whole package, but a good part of it.

Well it will be even cheaper as you won't have a workforce to pay anymore.. at that point they'll have emigrated and earn more than they do now. We're both public sector and under paid. My dh massively so. The stability and pension appeal whilst we bring up 3 young dc. Also being able to be part time. In different circumstances I would have considered emigrating and my dh regularly thinks about the private sector. Public sector has pension, good holidays and often stability. Without these people would leave

"Full pension" isn't 100pc of salary. It's probably an outdated term but I think there used to be a cap of 2/3rds salary and that was full pension. Whether that was legislation, tax or just the standard for most scheme rules I can't remember.

If this is me you’re referring to, you are very wrong. But keep on believing it, if that’s what you need to believe. My colleague is 65 and single. Been in the CS longer than me, same low grade, still working full time.

Shift work definitely. Husband worked 999 calls, it called for 2 early shift (7am-3pm), 2 lates (3pm-11pm) and 2 nights (11pm-7am).
Previously done five nights shift in a row. Ages the body, sleep all over the place etc. Also imagine racing 100mph whilst your body is wanting to sleep. The cortisol/adrenalyn stays in your body for hours.

😕 yes that makes sense.

Yes, my point was it isn't top whack for really quite a lot of responsibility and less than 10% of civil servants are SCS.

www.gov.uk/government/statistics/civil-service-statistics-2023/statistical-bulletin-civil-service-statistics-2023#grade

CS salaries are rubbish. I'd love to do my job in a particular department but I'm not prepared to take the required pay cut (and that's from a public sector, not CS, salary).

I agree OP. Also not sure why everyone is saying that pay in the private sector is higher. Maybe for some people up higher in the food chain but I always had fairly low paid jobs, no regular pay rises (my last rises were peanuts), never had a bonus in my life. Just saying.

What do you mean by compound interest in the context of a salary raise? Do you mean if they were to save the amount of the increase into a high-interest savings account?

I do think there's a decent case for public sector pay and benefit reform, as increasingly the public sector is missing out on people who need money for high living costs in their younger years rather than a more comfortable retirement. More pay/pension/benefit flexibility would massively increase the pool of potential talent. But that wouldn't achieve OP's desire to "slash".

I do wonder if OP gets that these are contractual obligations, and "slashing" pension entitlements today wouldn't bear financial fruit until at least a couple of decades down the line?

Completely agree. In the nhs at least, I have yet to meet a single employee able to work 50 years! There isn’t the personal capacity for that, physically or mentally. The absolute max I’ve seen is 40 years. Working nights, weekends well into your 60’s- not a chance! The patients will be in better condition by that point.

In the main, public sector employees such as nurses, firefighters, social workers, etc are earning modest salaries so it's only fair that after a lifetime of service they receive a decent pension.

A friend retired from nearly 40 years as an inner-city district nurse - just imagine how hard that job has been over the decades; she deserves every penny of her pension. Plus as a result of this pension her State Pension is reduced.

It's hard enough as it is these days to recruit front line public sector workers, without the perk of a half-decent pension.

At my public service workplace the pension contributions are not huge for the vast majority of employees. Only the high earners get a decent contribution. It's on a sliding scale starting at 5.5% for lower earners and up to 12.5% for the highest paid.

The public sector pay and pension structure is such that it attracts people who think and plan long-term.

Politics is full of people who think and plan from one election cycle to another, business is full of people looking to make money NOW. It is vital that people hard wired to work to 40, 50 or 100 year goals are there in the decision-making process as well, and that the best and brightest of them can get promoted, and that they have the freedom from distraction and worry that lets them do their jobs.

This is a very fair perspective

In the main, public sector employees such as nurses, firefighters, social workers, etc are earning modest salaries so it's only fair that after a lifetime of service they receive a decent pension.

They also don’t have the mobility available in the private sector, so can’t negotiate a higher salary in a competitive job market. Swapping one local authority for another as a social worker might get you a point up the salary scale but there’s little room for negotiation. Having a secure pension helps keep people in jobs others wouldn’t do for all the money in the world.