Has benchmarking been a catalyst in our economic problems?

Tipp Man

I think that anyone who tries to dismiss the contributory factor of benchmarking to our current mess is living in cuckoo land, its obviously a factor, not the only, but still a major factor.

The worst thing about benchmarking is that we have seen absolutely no reform for the billions it has cost us, in fact there are thousands and thousands more PS workers than 10 years ago, teachers are still getting 5 months holidays, productivity has not increased 1 iota.

What exactly was the money for??

jimmmy

Tipp Man wrote: »

What exactly was the money for??

I remember asking one retired public servant on this board what the retired public servants did with their 18 months tax free lump sum pension payment, and he was honest enough to say in his experience one of the things was to buy property for offspring. Thanks for helping the bubble, lads;)

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

I remember asking one retired public servant on this board what the retired public servants did with their 18 months tax free lump sum pension payment, and he was honest enough to say in his experience one of the things was to buy property for offspring. Thanks for helping the bubble, lads;)

You refer to me, and you are wrong. Never let the truth get in your way.

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

You refer to me, .

no actually, I was not.

P. Breathnach wrote: »

and you are wrong. Never let the truth get in your way.

In your experience, what do you currently think retired public servants spend or spent their 18 months tax-free lump sum payment on ?

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

no actually, I was not.


In your experience, what do you currently think retired public servants spend or spent their 18 months tax-free lump sum payment on ?

I don't believe you. I could ask you to back your claim up, but I am well used to what happens when I do that: you fail to do so. What the hell, I'll ask you anyway: can you back up this claim:

I remember asking one retired public servant on this board what the retired public servants did with their 18 months tax free lump sum pension payment, and he was honest enough to say in his experience one of the things was to buy property for offspring.

Dannyboy83

jimmmy wrote: »

I remember asking one retired public servant on this board what the retired public servants did with their 18 months tax free lump sum pension payment, and he was honest enough to say in his experience one of the things was to buy property for offspring. Thanks for helping the bubble, lads;)

Wheter its true or not, nobody has the right to dictate to another person how they spend their own money. They are entitled to spend it how they choose.
The fault is at the foot of the government here, not the PS employees, for allowing the situation to occur.

(You can't take last nights debacle out on the French people who have benefited from it. You have to take it up with Fifa and henry.)

If we are going to find effigies outside of government and banking, there are plenty of devious property agents across the country where we can start first.

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

I don't believe you.

I do not care if you do or not...I have more to do with my time than to read through over 2000 posts to show you a sentence.:D

Now, any chance you will answer the question already asked of you :
In your experience, what do you currently think retired public servants spend or spent their 18 months tax-free lump sum payment on ?

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

I do not care if you do or not...I have more to do with my time than to read through over 2000 posts to show you a sentence.:D

Now, any chance you will answer the question already asked of you :
In your experience, what do you currently think retired public servants spend or spent their 18 months tax-free lump sum payment on ?

I already answered that question for you. I have more to do with my time than repeat what I told you.

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

I already answered that question for you.

Not in this thread or in the recent past.
So go on, ah go on, go on, go on, ..."what do you currently think retired public servants spend or spent their 18 months tax-free lump sum payment on ? Property ? Retirement homes ( even though some retired public servants on full pension are in their late forties / early fifties )? Hardly shares ? It must be a worry to know what to do with 80 or 90 k lump sum tax free ( and sometimes € 300,000 plus ) these days. Some much so I am reliably informed "retirement courses" lasting two days are on offer to at least some retiring people with problems such as that.;)

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

Not in this thread or in the recent past.
So go on, ah go on, go on, go on, ..."what do you currently think retired public servants spend or spent their 18 months tax-free lump sum payment on ? Property ? Retirement homes ( even though some retired public servants on full pension are in their late forties / early fifties )? Hardly shares ? It must be a worry to know what to do with 80 or 90 k lump sum tax free ( and sometimes € 300,000 plus ) these days. Some much so I am reliably informed "retirement courses" lasting two days are on offer to at least some retiring people with problems such as that.;)

Find my previous answer. And find the other post on the subject that you claim exists. Prove that I am wrong in my belief that jimmmy doesn't do evidence.

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

Find my previous answer.

I am not willing to trawl through over 2800 posts. In any case, I am more concerned with what do you currently think retired public servants spend or spent their 18 months tax-free lump sum payment on ?

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

I am not willing to trawl through over 2800 posts.

Of course not. Nor are you willing to use the search function. Or find evidence for anything.

In any case, I am more concerned with what do you currently think retired public servants spend or spent their 18 months tax-free lump sum payment on ?

I think the same as I did last time I posted on the matter.

And I still think that you invented the "retired public servant on this board [who] was honest enough to say in his experience one of the things was to buy property for offspring".

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

`
Of course not.

would you trawl throgh 2800 posts either ? I would not expect you to.

P. Breathnach wrote: »

`
Nor are you willing to use the search function.

I have often used the search engine but I doubt if the search engine would be able to pluck that one sentence out of the many hundreds of posts you made about the public service.

P. Breathnach wrote: »

`
Or find evidence for anything.

I often found evidence for you, many times. The most recent time being ( yet again ) the link to c.s.o. pay.

P. Breathnach wrote: »

`
I think the same as I did last time I posted on the matter.

So its property no.1, followed by retirement homes, followed by what else...please elaborate to save people trying to find your post from a few months ago. Maybe there is a business in this ...trying to market to people who have high disposable income, after their kids are reared, mortgage paid off etc. Maybe a thread if not new business could be started on that. Thanks.;)

namenotavailablE

In general it is beneficial if the money is spent in the economy- spending supports economic activity and employment as well as contributing to the government's taxation revenues.
It doesn't terribly matter on what exactly it's spent on, whether it's a house or a handbag. I don't think anyone can dictate that another person should spend their capital on anything in particular or indeed spend it at all- it's a free market and a matter of personal preference and choice.

jimmmy

namenotavailabl wrote: »

In general it is beneficial if the money is spent in the economy- spending supports economic activity and employment as well as contributing to the government's taxation revenues.
It doesn't terribly matter on what exactly it's spent on, whether it's a house or a handbag. I don't think anyone can dictate that another person should spend their capital on anything in particular or indeed spend it at all- it's a free market and a matter of personal preference and choice.

I still think maybe there is a business in this ...trying to market to people who have high disposable income, after their kids are reared, mortgage paid off etc. Public servants who retire after completion of service with a tax free lemp sum of 18 months salary....mmmmnnn. Another poster who has worked in an auctioneers office revealed that in their experience most people who purchased holiday homes were public servants - specifically teachers. Now that people are not buying property I wonder where does all this windfall tax free lump sum money go ?

namenotavailablE

There absolutely IS a business in it and a well established one at that- think of hotels offering 'Golden years' breaks and the level of advertising of goods and services (especially health and financial) aimed specifically at the retiree/ older market- even Woodie's offer a 10% discount on Thursday's to over 65's.
My own parents are probably typical of people of their generation- once their mortgage was repaid and the offspring fled the nest, they found that they had more disposable income than before. Add in the possibility of an inheritance when their own parents ultimately die and you can see the possibilities.

Dr Galen

could you two please stop bickering and discuss the actual topic. Like two old women arguing all day long!

to respond to the OP, no IMHO it didn't cause the mess we're in right now. Now that we're in this mess, is it causing a major problem, yes.

We can talk about benchmarking adding fuel to the property bubble fire, and that probably has some merit, as it raised the disposable incomes of many workers. This same effect though happened in the private sector too, with people earning increased wages for work done, one of the main reasons that we lost competitiveness over the last decade.

Unsustainable tax revenues and general short sightedness on behalf of the government in power, along with a gullible electorate made more of an effect IMO. Add into that the sub-prime crisis in the US and the knock on effect to the Euro economies and you have the real catalysts. Everything else, is nearly more of a follow on symptom

namenotavailablE

could you two please stop bickering

I presume that you aren't referring to me - I didn't think I was bickering with anyone!

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

... So its property no.1, followed by retirement homes, followed by what else...please elaborate to save people trying to find your post from a few months ago. Maybe there is a business in this ...trying to market to people who have high disposable income, after their kids are reared, mortgage paid off etc. Maybe a thread if not new business could be started on that. Thanks.;)

We are in jimmmy's world of invention again. Don't make things up: it's not honest.

Scofflaw

P. Breathnach, jimmmy, stop bickering, or take it to PM. It's disruptive, which means it will attract the obvious sanction if it continues.

moderately,
Scofflaw

ConsiderThis

Asking if benchmarking has been a catalyst for our economic problems, the answer has to be no. They would have happened anyhow and were not caused by benchmarking. Benchmarking has added to our problems, obviously, by salaries in the public sector being artificially inflated ( it might be interesting to go back and see who first suggested "benchmarking"). At the time we were told that the poorly paid public employees deserved it for no reason other than "everyone else" was being so well paid while they rode the back of the celtic tiger. Its funny how those who said that then are not now coming forward to make the same arguments now that the celtic tiger has fled and killed all her young!

Idbatterim

What about people on the dole or claiming welfare? (excluding OAPS) is the money they receive from the Government theirs to do what they like with?

MysticalRain

I've always wondered why benchmarking didn't work both ways. If private-sector wages go down, and shouldn't public-sector wages go down as well?

P. Breathnach

MysticalRain wrote: »

I've always wondered why benchmarking didn't work both ways. If private-sector wages go down, and shouldn't public-sector wages go down as well?

Mainly because benchmarking is not a continuous process. I think there would be merit in the idea of a body to conduct benchmarking on a regular basis, perhaps annually. It could monitor pay on an ongoing basis, and make recommendations to government once a year.

[The body would probably be counted as a quango!]

gurramok

P. Breathnach wrote: »

Mainly because benchmarking is not a continuous process. I think there would be merit in the idea of a body to conduct benchmarking on a regular basis, perhaps annually. It could monitor pay on an ongoing basis, and make recommendations to government once a year.

[The body would probably be counted as a quango!]

Do the unions agree to that?

westtip

Hollyg'lightly wrote: »

Has the fact that the public sector compared their wages prior to benchmarking, to Tommy Joe the carpenter who was earning 1,000 euro plus in the boom time, and aligned it with his wage at the time, caused our country to crumble, or would the situation still be as dismal without benchmarking?

Op when the history of this period is written economic historians will label benchmarking as one of the primary causes for derailing this economy - benchmarking only came about becasue that idiot Ahern did not understand that the windfall profits of the boom - PAYE from the builders, stamp duty and VAT on the consumer boom spent in places like land of leather was a mere blip that should have been banked it was not ... it was presumed it would continue year in year out - and they really believed it would be like that every year so they could overpay the public sector.

Ahern burdened this state with a public sector pay requirement (and pension requirement) it simply could not afford and was unsustainable going forward.

He will be hanged by the historians as a fool. OP the consequences of benchmarking is a deadweight dragging this country to the bottom of the ocean - and the budget will not go half way near enough for what actually needs to be done.

The bearded gentlemen will not like it but who cares?

Riskymove

ConsiderThis wrote: »

Asking if benchmarking has been a catalyst for our economic problems, the answer has to be no.

I have to agree although I never agreed with the concept of benchmarking and it should never have happened.

Has it increased the wage bill, yes but the difference is only a fraction of the c. €60bn public expenditure ballooned to.

I think there would be merit in the idea of a body to conduct benchmarking on a regular basis, perhaps annually.

I disagree. Public sector wages should not be benchmarked to private sector wages. Adjustments to pay should, like, they were for most of the time, be based on periodic agreements between employer and employee

Tipp Man

I have a question, in the attached link (the usual CSO one) you will see a dramatic increase in the average wages of most types of public servant from 2001 to 2008, can somebody clarify for me is this completly down to benchmarking or was there another factor at play to cause such rapid increases?? I see a big increase between 2000 and 2002 which as far as i can remember is pre benchmarking, any ideas why??

http://www.cso.ie/statistics/public_sector_earnings.htm

Riskymove

Tipp Man wrote: »

I have a question, in the attached link (the usual CSO one) you will see a dramatic increase in the average wages of most types of public servant from 2001 to 2008, can somebody clarify for me is this completly down to benchmarking or was there another factor at play to cause such rapid increases?? I see a big increase between 2000 and 2002 which as far as i can remember is pre benchmarking, any ideas why??

Most increases over the period came about through Natioanl Agreements, e.g Partnership 2000, Programme for proseprity and fariness etc. These also applied to some areas of the private sector

This tended to be spread over a couple of years, e.g. 2% one year, 1.5% the next etc

There were two Benchmarking Reports, specifically about public pay,

the first one which seems to all to have been purely political, resulting in increases in pay for most grades (but some did much better than others)

The second report recommended increases for very few (and were quite small, e.g. 1.1%) as it applied a discount of 12% in order to reflect the value of pension/security (a point often overlooked)


EDIT: I should add that you are looking at the average for each year which while affected by increases in pay obviously, will also be affected by growth in numbers of staff in the public service

Tipp Man

Riskymove wrote: »

Most increases over the period came about through Natioanl Agreements, e.g Partnership 2000, Programme for proseprity and fariness etc. These also applied to some areas of the private sector

This tended to be spread over a couple of years, e.g. 2% one year, 1.5% the next etc

There were two Benchmarking Reports, specifically about public pay,

the first one which seems to all to have been purely political, resulting in increases in pay for most grades (but some did much better than others)

The second report recommended increases for very few (and were quite small, e.g. 1.1%) as it applied a discount of 12% in order to reflect the value of pension/security (a point often overlooked)


EDIT: I should add that you are looking at the average for each year which while affected by increases in pay obviously, will also be affected by growth in numbers of staff in the public service

But the growth in numbers should not really affect the average, only the total bill, if anything you would expect it to lower the average, for example when increasing the number of Gardai you bring in new recruits on low wages, not higher ranking officers, which is different from how a private company may operate.

If we look specifically at secondary teachers their average salary increased by the following:

2000-2001: 9.95%
2001-2002: 6.37%
2002-2003: 5.86%
2003-2004: 10.27%
2004-2005: 3.7%
2005-2006: 3%
2006-2007: 4.8%
2007-2008: 3.15%
Overall increase 2000-2008: 57.4%

Now i'm going to throw this out here and say that maybe benchmarking wasn't the only/main culprit in this farce, the wages increases given under the national wage agreements were simply outrageous, nearly 16.5% for secondary teachers in 2000-2002 with NO accountability, increase in productivity, nothing in return (only hassle about supervising a yard for 20 mintues)

I'll tell you 1 thing is there a private sector company in the country that will have seen wage increases as huge as this and if there was are they still in business??

With wage increases like this over a relatively short period of time how on earth can anyone have any, and i mean any, sympathy for the PS???