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.

Hahahahaha, now I know you are obviously deluded!! Maybe I could show you my pension forecast? I think you’d be surprised.

edited to add: I’m now 63 and still working full time. Go figure.

You misunderstand how many of these pensions work. The contributions being made today are paying the pensions of those already retired. We are paying, as public sector employees, into a "promise " scheme for the future. They are unfunded schemes

Why are you not advocating a rise in private sector pensions then instead of advocating making people poorer?

I work for a local authority and we aren’t even allowed to accept a tin of biscuits at Christmas anymore, let us keep our pensions at least 😂

@Monwmum you do realise that the old final salary scheme you are probably referring closed a number of years ago and everyone is in career average schemes.

The schemes are self funded in that the current workers pay the retired workers. We don’t get to chose Investment strategies.

The more we earn the higher we contribute eg 7% up to 34k up to just over 11%

Or are you actually referring to the state pension?

Lets take a police officer. Max pay after 7 years, around £48k. A DS around £53k. £53K to deal with the worst of society, carry incredible risk and work unsociable hours. A DS is essentially a manager dealing with high level crime, rapes, murders, has to go out and see dead bodies and gets paid £53k a year. A lidl manager gets up to £59k a year.....

There needs to be some perks to working in the public sector, because the pay is certainly not one of them!

I don't agree with you. The private sector taking the piss and underpaying people is not an argument for the public sector to do the same.

It's actually really important for the public sector to set a benchmark so that the private sector cannot take the piss any more than they already do. Most people who argue against public sector pay in the political sphere are lobbyists for the private sector who want to drive wages and conditions down further for everyone.

At 63 with a 30 year public sector career behind you I'd be astounded if you had anything other than a very high pension considering your salary level.

Indeed and you can take this argument a step further too. 30 years ago, a DS could pretty much buy a family home on one wage in almost every town in the country. Now they cannot and this is in no small part due to the obscene wages at the top end of the private sector and the extreme wealth that comes with it (and causes hyperinflation in the housing market for example).

A DS today is not as well off as a DS 30 years ago so why should they be punished by losing their pension just because those in the private sector have fared even worse?

Instead of fighting over the scraps, we need more union friendly labour laws, a much higher minimum wage and a wealth tax. Let's talk about pulling each other up, not about how we can let employers take the piss more than they already do.

YABU
The NHS pension was in excess eg workers paid in more than was taken out via pension pay outs. Instead of paying out dividends as per the contract, the then government (May I think, maybe Boris) ripped the contract up and made everyone contribute yet more.

since I’ve been in the pension scheme it has been changed three times, each time getting worse. It’s now lifetime contribution- no final year pension, your overtime isn’t added to the pot and my contributions have risen to double figures. At the same time my pay was frozen, on a lot of responsibility, being paid at least 10k less than private sector jobs.

so honestly it’s not the huge perk you think it is. Additionally it’s funded by the existing workers. Can’t speak for the other public sectors. If we all quit the NHS for private jobs or service industry- then what?

Substitute public sector for public service. Many public sector workers give, day after day, public service. That's what your tax money pays for. It pays for teachers, doctors and nurses, it pays for the people who keep children safe, who stand outside in the dark at night,reaching out to young people, it pays for the people who try to house the homeless, who give or try to give some hope to the lonely, the sick, the vulnerable, the frightened and the desperate. And the problem with their pension is?

I get paid significantly less as a public sector surveyor than I would in private practice. I do it for the flexibility and pension!

Actually husband didn't have a payrise for good 7 years (public service) and pays something like 19-20% from his salary into the 'gold plated' pension. Why should he reduce pension if he paid that much into it?

I am a planning lawyer working in local government. I’ve worked in both the public and private sectors and work just as hard as I did in the private sector. In fact, I feel like I have to work harder because we don’t have the admin or technical support. At planning inquiries it is often just me against legal teams of two or three lawyers who have access to technical and admin support.

I manage two entirely separate teams and am still expected to maintain my own caseload (so effectively 3 jobs). I am paid less than £50k as a qualified solicitor and the head of the team. The solicitors on my team are paid around £43k. We could all earn at least double in the private sector and I am seriously considering this as an option.

We can’t recruit (that’s when we have any money available to fund posts). People just cannot justify the drop in salary from private practice. All of our neighbouring authorities are in the same position.

I despair when I see posts like this because my team and I are already so demoralised and we work so hard to try and make a difference to the lives of our residents. The fact of the matter is that if conditions erode any further, we won’t be able to function as an authority because we will likely have no staff.

What more do people want from us?

Like I say, I’ve always been very low level, due to moving around a lot as a military wife. Please believe me when I say, all things considered, it’s not great!!

I'm fairly confident in asserting that I think the public sector is better organised and works both harder and smarter too. A lot of people who claim to work hard in the UK like BTL landlords or senior managers spending all day on emails probably don't work as hard as they like to think.

Additionally my employer’s contribution percentage has not risen in line with mine.

additionally my age to access my pension has risen by 8 years.

so in every sense this has been a pay cut.

i don’t see why I should have less pension because the private financial model of choice is to try and strip out maximum profit, year after year by exploiting anything and anyone? Like huge companies making huge profit margins? Why not make 5% less profit and just pay people more? It’s your business choice to be greedy and underpay people. It’s a choice.

Husband police too. Don't forget the 20% deduction from salary to the gold plated pension.
PTSD, broken bones and dead bodies.
I was on 6 figures many moons ago, working in the office, also with final salary pension (private one).
The two don't compare and I wouldn't do his job, even if it was similarly rewarded.

The joke is that I think a lot of public sector workers reassure themselves that the low salary is worth it for a good pension. But very few have actually done the maths and compared it realistically to what a private sector salary and pension would get them. Many of them don't realise their pension isn't actually all that good unless they're on one of the old style final salary pensions. Once people wake up to that fact, I think the public sector will struggle even further.

I'm a teacher on the career average pension who's leaving for a private sector job at end of this term. I used to think that my pension would suffer when I left. But when I do the maths over what my current DB career average pension would likely be if I stayed in teaching compared to what my private sector pension is likely to be (assuming a few promotions and reasonably average returns over the next 30 years), the private sector wins.

While you are thinking about that, add thinking about how infrequently people think about how the profits of companies are spent - but those some out of your pocket as well. Seriously. In the end "our tax money" is a price we pay to provide a commodity (service) just as the price of a car is what you pay to for that particular commodity. Do you ever sit and wonder what Rolls Royce or Seat or any other car producer does with their money?

A career average salary is far more valuable than most private sector pensions. Pensions are a significant issue for many people
People with more variable incomes who have bought buy to let properties with the aim of having an income from it in retirement feel that their pensions are being eroded by tax .
There needs to be a good look at pensions and retirement provision generally; particularly with changing demographics. Non of this should be a race to the bottom- it should be about making sure more people have a decent retirement

Weirdly, no one seems to want to slash MP's or former government pensions (looking at you BoJo etc) or expenses or Lords.
Why is no one outraged that Liz Truss will be paid her PM salary for rest of her life? For precisely nothing.
Why does no one question that richer are getting extremely rich but poor are getting very poor and seemingly are cause of everything bad?

its my brother in the police. PTSD is real. As is the overtime, massive workload and no staff.

You couldnt pay me enough to do it. He's thinking of leaving as its so shit, the pay does not compare to the job, years of no payrises, but yes, lets take away the half decent pension, that is nothing like it used to be! Lets see how many people want to do the job then! Whne my brother joined he was one of about 10,000 applicants (c.20 years ago). THe latest recruitment drive didnt even fill the posts available, go figure!

This.

When I had a baby my maternity benefits were were also way lower than anyone I knew in a professional job in the private sector.

As everyone else has said public sector is career average pensions, not final, pay is pretty shit and been held down for many, many years and we don't get any of the other perks people I know in the private sector do.

YANBU OP. Forget whether it's 'final salary' or 'career average' public sectors pensions are DB schemes as opposed to the DC schemes in the private sector.

The total pensions liability for the public sector is £1.3 trillion it's completely unsustainable. RR is faffing about destroying private sector businesses, raising £25bn through NI raises, destroying kids education by adding VAT to school fees to raise £1.5bn. It's the £1.3 trillion public sector pensions that need dealing with.

And those saying people should campaign for better private sector pensions completely miss the point that the sheer cost of funding a decent pension (like the £1.3 trillion public sector pension liability) means it's quite clearly unaffordable for the private sector.