Why is everyone going on strike?

newwan

Drivers, teachers, nurses likely and guards blu flu...
What is going on?

Are they justified or is it a case of everyone wanting their slice of the pie?
To my mind we are still super vulnerable. Brexit hasnt bottomed yet. We still have a lot of emigration and unemployed youth.

I understand striking for better conditions, but it seems to me like its all for more pay.

Reading all of the terrible nursing stories are gut wrenchers so i was looking into it a bit. A lot of these stories are from student nurses. Its tough for everyone as a student. And those stories from 16 years qualified nurses, well from the freely available hse payscales these nurses have to be on more than 40k. I dont understand how it is so difficult to survive on over 40k. As an engineer i never earned over 40k and had a decent life (no house or flash car but definintely not on the bread line).

from a freedom of info article about 2 years ago in the middle of the HRA and LRA it seems 48% of nurses earn over 40k.

What is the story?
Are we repeating the same mistakes of the past and is another housing bubble or similiar bubble inevitable!?!

Jawgap

newwan wrote: »

Drivers, teachers, nurses likely and guards blu flu...
What is going on?

Are they justified or is it a case of everyone wanting their slice of the pie?
To my mind we are still super vulnerable. Brexit hasnt bottomed yet. We still have a lot of emigration and unemployed youth.

I understand striking for better conditions, but it seems to me like its all for more pay.

Reading all of the terrible nursing stories are gut wrenchers so i was looking into it a bit. A lot of these stories are from student nurses. Its tough for everyone as a student. And those stories from 16 years qualified nurses, well from the freely available hse payscales these nurses have to be on more than 40k. I dont understand how it is so difficult to survive on over 40k. As an engineer i never earned over 40k and had a decent life (no house or flash car but definintely not on the bread line).

from a freedom of info article about 2 years ago in the middle of the HRA and LRA it seems 48% of nurses earn over 40k.

What is the story?
Are we repeating the same mistakes of the past and is another housing bubble or similiar bubble inevitable!?!

People don't want to just 'survive' - it's nice to have a bit of a life!

And there's more to it than just 'more pay' - people are looking to have restored what was taken away from them, they are also looking to remove the discriminatory element of it whereby two people doing the same job get significantly different salaries just because they started on different dates.

And yes we can pay our public servants subsistence wages but then don't be too surprised when no one wants to work for the public services and/or we end up with pretty poor public services - take the example you used - Nursing - we should be more than capable of turning out enough nurses to meet our own needs and we do, but too many emigrate because quite simply the pay and conditions here aren't great.

Now, you might 'benchmark' a nurse's salary against your own, or the average industrial wage, or whatever, but the nurse is benchmarking their salary against other nurses in the UK (not so hot now with Sterling), the US, Canada, Oz, the Middle East - as well as looking at other issues around career progression/development, cost of living etc and making their decisions based on that calculation.

As for me, yes my sympathies lie with our public service workers because I spent a good few years working their.......I left because the pay became rubbish!

Charles Babbage

The government has reneged on agreements, strike seems an appropriate response.

BoJack Horseman

Jawgap wrote: »

they are also looking to remove the discriminatory element of it whereby two people doing the same job get significantly different salaries just because they started on different dates.

It was the unions who demanded that.
F*ck over the new entrants in order to keep the veterans gold plated instead of taking pay cuts across the board.
How would one strike against their own union I wonder?

PirateShampoo

We had cuts, cuts, cuts.

Then TDs are the first to reward themselves, then when normal folk want a slice of the pie as well they get **** on by the media and Irish people do what they do best and turn on each other.

maryishere

Its just greed plain and simple, coupled with the excessive power of the unions in some sectors, with no power in others. According to the c.s.o., our average public sector wage is over €49k, which is way more than the average private sector wage. Indeed our public servants in Dundalk are paid nearly double what the public servants in Newry are paid. Then you get people on golden pensions. Irish society is very unfair.

Jawgap

BoJack Horseman wrote: »

It was the unions who demanded that.
F*ck over the new entrants in order to keep the veterans gold plated instead of taking pay cuts across the board.
How would one strike against their own union I wonder?

Actually the unions didn't (for a start the GRA weren't event part of the negotiations) - it was imposed by DPER on the final day of the negotiations as a 'take-it-or-else' option - there was zero negotiations around it.

newwan

PirateShampoo wrote: »

We had cuts, cuts, cuts.

Then TDs are the first to reward themselves, then when normal folk want a slice of the pie as well they get **** on by the media and Irish people do what they do best and turn on each other.

Well this is it in a nutshell. It's not conditions. If they're getting some then I want some too.

And its not turning on our own. It's an attempt to save our country from repeating the same failures. The asti proposals will cost over 2 billion...
We don't have it!!

There is this rabid mob mentality... Strike strike strike. But why and for what potential gain is not being fully thought out.
About 2020 to 2022 we'll be back cap in hand to the imf

I've no problem being pissrd off with politicians but vote them out then... Don't make another problem to fix something else...

Jawgap

Jawgap wrote: »

People don't want to just 'survive' - it's nice to have a bit of a life!

And there's more to it than just 'more pay' - people are looking to have restored what was taken away from them, they are also looking to remove the discriminatory element of it whereby two people doing the same job get significantly different salaries just because they started on different dates.

And yes we can pay our public servants subsistence wages but then don't be too surprised when no one wants to work for the public services and/or we end up with pretty poor public services - take the example you used - Nursing - we should be more than capable of turning out enough nurses to meet our own needs and we do, but too many emigrate because quite simply the pay and conditions here aren't great.

Now, you might 'benchmark' a nurse's salary against your own, or the average industrial wage, or whatever, but the nurse is benchmarking their salary against other nurses in the UK (not so hot now with Sterling), the US, Canada, Oz, the Middle East - as well as looking at other issues around career progression/development, cost of living etc and making their decisions based on that calculation.

As for me, yes my sympathies lie with our public service workers because I spent a good few years working their.......I left because the pay became rubbish!

This narrative is dangerous for a host of reasons.

The person who bought a 1 bed apartment in Spencer Dock for €425k in 2007, how do you propose to 'restore what was taken away from them'?

The prices paid were unsustainable.

Now, abstract away the emotion and look at the business case. Be cold.
Can we apply this exact logic elsewhere in this thread?

Jawgap

Deleted User wrote: »

This narrative is dangerous for a host of reasons.

The person who bought a 1 bed apartment in Spencer Dock for €425k in 2007, how do you propose to 'restore what was taken away from them'?

The prices paid were unsustainable.

Now, abstract away the emotion and look at the business case. Be cold.
Can we apply this exact logic elsewhere in this thread?

There's a difference between someone buying property and someone entering into an employment contract of service.

For a start, property prices go up as well as down - my parents wouldn't be too happy if the reciprocal logic used in relation Spencer Dock was applied to the Corpo house they bought for a few grand in the 1960s was applied to them.

Second, the property market did for owners of property - people borrowed and bought, the market moved against them - that's just tough luck. If they borrowed prudently and/or bought earlier in the market and/or got out earlier then that's good luck to them.

PS salaries were forcible changed by fiat - the market wage for teachers didn't collapse, the government used its executive powers to ram through a change, and now people are complaining that workers are standing up and using their power. Well, if you are a PS worker and you've had your wages reduced, and you are facing a government who serially renege on various parts of and 'agreement' what power have you got left? You only have the power of withdrawing your labour and if the government won't listen to rational argument, won't be swayed by ethical argument and are happy to ignore legal argument then it's no wonder people are heading for the picket lines.

BoJack Horseman

BoJack Horseman wrote: »

It was the unions who demanded that.
F*ck over the new entrants in order to keep the veterans gold plated instead of taking pay cuts across the board.
How would one strike against their own union I wonder?

"It was the unions who demanded that"

LOL. Seriously. The unions have always fought that and still do - in fact it is one of the reasons ASTI are currently threatening to strike.

In some people's minds the unions cannot win. If they had gone on an all out strike to oppose two-tier pay they would be intransigent and greedy. They very reluctantly accept it being imposed and they are selling out their members.

Jawgap

Jawgap wrote: »

There's a difference between someone buying property and someone entering into an employment contract of service.

truism.

Jawgap wrote: »

For a start, property prices go up as well as down - my parents wouldn't be too happy if the reciprocal logic used in relation Spencer Dock was applied to the Corpo house they bought for a few grand in the 1960s was applied to them.

Wages go up and down too, what is the difference?

Jawgap wrote: »

Second, the property market did for owners of property - people borrowed and bought, the market moved against them - that's just tough luck. If they borrowed prudently and/or bought earlier in the market and/or got out earlier then that's good luck to them.

This doesn't seem to be a difference, just an opinion. You believe that what has applied to the property market (i.e that unsustainable prices have been moved away from) should not be applied to the labour market.
That's not a difference between the two markets though, it's a difference in your approach to them.

Jawgap wrote: »

PS salaries were forcible changed by fiat - the market wage for teachers didn't collapse, the government used its executive powers to ram through a change, and now people are complaining that workers are standing up and using their power. Well, if you are a PS worker and you've had your wages reduced, and you are facing a government who serially renege on various parts of and 'agreement' what power have you got left? You only have the power of withdrawing your labour and if the government won't listen to rational argument, won't be swayed by ethical argument and are happy to ignore legal argument then it's no wonder people are heading for the picket lines.

I would argue that you have plenty more options than that. You can re-enter the private labour market in Ireland. You can re-train for a position in either public or private sectors in Ireland. You are entitled to apply for positions within the entirety of the EU to better your circumstances too. There are many options open to you that don't involve withdrawal of duty.

You may not like any of these options, but they are certainly available.

It is simply a question of what you subjectively choose to base your opinion on. If you believe that PS salaries in 2007 ought to be the base, then yes of course you see it as a 'restoration'. However, we've already understand that the property market at 2007 is not an adequate choice of 'base' for property prices. It shouldn't take too much reasoning to come to conclusions about a host of costs in the country in the bubble era.

Which are these arguments btw?

If the government won't listen to [1]rational argument, won't be swayed by [2]ethical argument and are happy to ignore [3]legal argument then

Jawgap

Deleted User wrote: »

Wages go up and down too, what is the difference?

the difference is, teachers wages (and PS wages) didn't go down because of market forces they went down because of heavy-handed, hard government intervention......in my own case the market wage payable for my profession rose steadily from 2010 until it was too far ahead of my PS salary to ignore - although in wake of the recent collapse of sterling I'm pretty sure the market has now moved it back down significantly - but it was market forces not legislative ones that have changed it.

Deleted User wrote: »

This doesn't seem to be a difference, just an opinion. You believe that what has applied to the property market (i.e that unsustainable prices have been moved away from) should not be applied to the labour market.
That's not a difference between the two markets though, it's a difference in your approach to them.

Hey, you're the one who brought the property market to this thread, not me.

Deleted User wrote: »

I would argue that you have plenty more options than that. You can re-enter the private labour market in Ireland. You can re-train for a position in either public or private sectors in Ireland. You are entitled to apply for positions within the entirety of the EU to better your circumstances too. There are many options open to you that don't involve withdrawal of duty.

You may not like any of these options, but they are certainly available.

.....or the government can removed the discriminatory elements of the salary scheme.

and of course you can re-train, re-locate etc, which is why my nephew works in the UK (as a teacher) instead of here - the State spent a small fortune educating him and training him as a teacher (Science & Maths) but it's kids in Gloucester who are benefitting from that.

Deleted User wrote: »

It is simply a question of what you subjectively choose to base your opinion on. If you believe that PS salaries in 2007 ought to be the base, then yes of course you see it as a 'restoration'. However, we've already understand that the property market at 2007 is not an adequate choice of 'base' for property prices. It shouldn't take too much reasoning to come to conclusions about a host of costs in the country in the bubble era.

Which are these arguments btw?

There were and are other ways to reduce the PS paybill - the government chose this way for reasons of political expediency, so as the saying goes - "They that sow the wind, shall reap the whirlwind"

Jawgap

Jawgap wrote: »

the difference is, teachers wages (and PS wages) didn't go down because of market forces they went down because of heavy-handed, hard government intervention......in my own case the market wage payable for my profession rose steadily from 2010 until it was too far ahead of my PS salary to ignore - although in wake of the recent collapse of sterling I'm pretty sure the market has now moved it back down significantly - but it was market forces not legislative ones that have changed it.

How did they go up in the first place?

Was it hard government intervention when they went up?

Why choose 2007 as the 'fair price' for PS salaries? And not 2001?

Jawgap wrote: »

Hey, you're the one who brought the property market to this thread, not me.

To demonstrate how we can all understand the effects that unsustainable policies have on the state. And to question the logic of ignoring the simple corollaries that it offers

Jawgap wrote: »

.....or the government can removed the discriminatory elements of the salary scheme.
and of course you can re-train, re-locate etc, which is why my nephew works in the UK (as a teacher) instead of here - the State spent a small fortune educating him and training him as a teacher (Science & Maths) but it's kids in Gloucester who are benefitting from that.

So you agree that it is not the 'only power' that a PS worker has.

Jawgap wrote: »

There were and are other ways to reduce the PS paybill - the government chose this way for reasons of political expediency, so as the saying goes - "They that sow the wind, shall reap the whirlwind"

Lovely.

Any of the rational, ethical or legal arguments available for discussion instead of prose?

Jawgap

Deleted User wrote: »

.....

Which are these arguments btw?

Rational argument - "you need to attract and retain a decent quality of graduate to teaching if you are going to have good schools and a decent eduction system, therefore salaries (and professional development opportunities) have to be attractive on an international basis; pay plays an important part in incentivising people to take on more responsibilities and pursue advanced qualifications;"

Ethical argument - "It's not fair that two people working side-by-side doing the same job with essentially the same pressures, workload, risks etc have their pay determined on an arbitrary basis such as which union someone is or is not a part of, or when someone started working."

Legal Argument - "The discriminatory wage/payment system was required to meet and financial emergency, as defined in FEMPI, the emergency has passed, meaning the legal imperative has subsided."

Chips Lovell

maryishere wrote: »

According to the c.s.o., our average public sector wage is over €49k, which is way more than the average private sector wage.

That's only to be expected. There's not that many low-skilled jobs left in the public sector. In short, there's no one flipping burgers in the public sector.

Jawgap

Deleted User wrote: »

How did they go up in the first place?

Was it hard government intervention when they went up?

Why choose 2007 as the 'fair price' for PS salaries? And not 2001?

They were negotiated up and forced down - the government struck a bad deal. That's just tough - either you honour the agreements you freely enter into or you don't. And if you don't then don't be too surprised when people are not embracing of you next time you want to talk.

Deleted User wrote: »

To demonstrate how we can all understand the effects that unsustainable policies have on the state. And to question the logic of ignoring the simple corollaries that it offers


So you agree that it is not the 'only power' that a PS worker has.

Absolutely, I'm sure the teachers could engage in various other forms of protest and activate other sources of power, but which power do you think will get the government's attention in the short-term?

Just as the government has its big sticks, so to do the workers - and as the government have proved time and again, the biggest stick isn't necessarily the one you use last.

Godge

Deleted User wrote: »

Wages go up and down too, what is the difference?

Historically, there is no other period than that since 2008 where wages went down. As an example, here is the table from 1998 to 2006:

http://www.cso.ie/quicktables/GetQuickTables.aspx?FileName=QIJA.asp&TableName=Industrial+Earnings&StatisticalProduct=DB_QI

_Brian

The unions waited in the long grass and the government have played directly into their hands.

For the six months up to the election we listened to Enda talking up the great revenue the country had from tax based on the recovery he engineered. This was a signal to ready the troops, then they tried to slip through a double pay rise for themselves ahead of everyone who had taken cuts in their pay.

This was a shocking tactical error and I feel has tipped the balance to the unions who will no doubt siege the chance and bring out the troops to have their pay restored.

I feel the government have lost any grasp on public pay now. They discredited themselves while giving the signal that there is money available for the getting.

It's time now to restore public pay and strike a pay deal for maybe the next 5 years. Otherwise we're going to be dragged down in a quagmire of strikes, each deserving and each capable of grinding their sector to a stop until their demands are met.

Enda and co we're happy to borrow money to pay themselves, we may as well borrow it and pay public servants correctly, enough of this two tier system of payments.

blackwhite

Deleted User wrote: »

How did they go up in the first place?

Was it hard government intervention when they went up?

Why choose 2007 as the 'fair price' for PS salaries? And not 2001?

To demonstrate how we can all understand the effects that unsustainable policies have on the state. And to question the logic of ignoring the simple corollaries that it offers


So you agree that it is not the 'only power' that a PS worker has.


Lovely.

Any of the rational, ethical or legal arguments available for discussion instead of prose?

I think the part in bold is the core of the "logic" the PS unions seem to want to employ.
Demanding that pay and conditions revert to the unsustainable rates that had been vasatly inflated by property bubble-fueled benchmarking.

The unions now see what they believe to be a weak Government, so they see an opportunity to make a power-play.

The Muppet

newwan wrote: »

Drivers, teachers, nurses likely and guards blu flu...
What is going on?

Are they justified or is it a case of everyone wanting their slice of the pie?
To my mind we are still super vulnerable. Brexit hasnt bottomed yet. We still have a lot of emigration and unemployed youth.

I understand striking for better conditions, but it seems to me like its all for more pay.

Reading all of the terrible nursing stories are gut wrenchers so i was looking into it a bit. A lot of these stories are from student nurses. Its tough for everyone as a student. And those stories from 16 years qualified nurses, well from the freely available hse payscales these nurses have to be on more than 40k. I dont understand how it is so difficult to survive on over 40k. As an engineer i never earned over 40k and had a decent life (no house or flash car but definintely not on the bread line).

from a freedom of info article about 2 years ago in the middle of the HRA and LRA it seems 48% of nurses earn over 40k.

What is the story?
Are we repeating the same mistakes of the past and is another housing bubble or similiar bubble inevitable!?!

Because they want to be able to afford to keep a roof over their head and food on the table. My daughter is a UK trained Mental Health nurse who came back here to work after she graduated, she's working in Dublin on approx 23k a year that's along way from your 40k. With rents averaging £1500 a month in Dublin it doesn't take mathematician to see how its struggle to get by on such a low salary and explain why they want more.

Jawgap

blackwhite wrote: »

I think the part in bold is the core of the "logic" the PS unions seem to want to employ.
Demanding that pay and conditions revert to the unsustainable rates that had been vasatly inflated by property bubble-fueled benchmarking.

The unions now see what they believe to be a weak Government, so they see an opportunity to make a power-play.

....and if you made a similar post in and around 2013 you'd say.....

"The government now see what they believe to be a weak set of unions, so they see an opportunity to make a power-play" - which in that case was the HRA.

The government have managed this badly, they may have gotten kudos at the time for ramming the HRA and LRA down the unions' and representative bodies' collective throats but they did it at the expense of long term sustainability - it wouldn't take a genius to figure out that the unions and representative bodies would simply bide their time and wait until power had ebbed from the government before deciding to make their move - in short the government are simply getting back what they dealt out 3 years ago.

mariaalice

I don't know the government seem to be sticking to there guns on this one it will be interesting to see how it pans out the teachers union seem to be in a very weak position other unions in the education sector have settled.

Maybe thing really are changing.

newwan

The Muppet wrote: »

she's working in Dublin on approx 23k a year that's along way from your 40k. With rents averaging £1500 a month in Dublin .

She's a first year so
That's 2k more than what I started on way back in celtic boom times as an engineer and that's before her overtime is added etc which I never got and I survived as I commuted...

And lastly your point is bordering on irrelevant as it's a case study of 1 looking at the extreme...

Its not 'my 40k'. Those numbers are freely available freedom of info act numbers. They are the inmo and government of Ireland numbers

Oh and lastly... Are you actually serious re 1500 average rent in Dublin? That's the avg rent for a 3 bed house in dub. You think a first year nurse should be able to afford to rent a 3 bed house apartment by herself in our capital?

The Muppet

newwan wrote: »

She's a first year so
That's 2k more than what I started on way back in celtic boom times as an engineer and that's before her overtime is added etc which I never got and I survived as I commuted...

And lastly your point is bordering on irrelevant as it's a case study of 1 looking at the extreme...

Its not 'my 40k'. Those numbers are freely available freedom of info act numbers. They are the inmo and government of Ireland numbers

Oh and lastly... Are you actually serious re 1500 average rent in Dublin? That's the avg rent for a 3 bed house in dub. You think a first year nurse should be able to afford to rent a 3 bed house apartment by herself in our capital?

Yes she is working here for 1 year now.

With respect I have a son who's and engineer and I would not compare the work an engineer does with that of a mental health nurse or any nurse , school teacher or garda for that matter.

My point is no more irrelevant than the average figures you used in your op.

And yes I am actually serious that she should be able to put some money by to save for a deposit so she can get her own place.

newwan

OK that's fair enough. Do you see any danger to the economy if every first year nurse was to earn that much?

The Muppet

That's a completely different question and irrelevant to this discussion . Nurses are not responsible for management of the economy . Perhaps if they were sheep they would fare better.

newwan

The Muppet wrote: »

That's a completely different question and irrelevant to this discussion . Nurses are not responsible for management of the economy . Perhaps if they were sheep they would fare better.

No its not different. Public sector pay is the majority of the budget spend and costs literally billions. A group of 1000s of people who want to strike so they can rent a 3 bed in Dublin 1 year into their career are responsible for the economy

Graham

Jep Gambardella wrote: »

That's only to be expected. There's not that many low-skilled jobs left in the public sector. In short, there's no one flipping burgers in the public sector.

That doesn't explain why many public sector workers are paid significantly more than their private sector counterparts. That's before you even start to consider the non-pay benefits of the PS.

The Muppet

I think you're missing my point

it's unfair to nurses garda teachers etc to expect them to work for less than their worth and less that colleagues doing exactly the same work for much more money.

It's up to the people managing the economy to do just that not frontline workers . '

If we can afford to turn down 13 billion owed in taxes we should be able to pay nurses garda etc a proper wage .

Graham

The Muppet wrote: »

f we can afford to turn down 13 billion owed

We can't afford to stiff one of our largest current tax payers for tax that isn't owed to us.

Even were the nation to find itself the beneficiary of a sudden windfall it would be economically ludicrous to use it to inflate the costs of an already inflated public sector however worthy certain sectors of the public sector may be.

newwan

48% of nurses earn over 40k.

Donal55

mariaalice wrote: »

I don't know the government seem to be sticking to there guns on this one it will be interesting to see how it pans out the teachers union seem to be in a very weak position other unions in the education sector have settled.

Maybe thing really are changing.

I'd say its the Govt thats in the weak position. Beholden to Fianna Fail before the likes of Halligan is even considered. After 4 days of strike in Nov a deal will be cut.

Donal55

newwan wrote: »

48% of nurses earn over 40k.

52% of nurses earn less than 40k.

L

Graham wrote: »

That doesn't explain why many public sector workers are paid significantly more than their private sector counterparts. That's before you even start to consider the non-pay benefits of the PS.

Surprisingly, they usually aren't (look at the figures on glassdoor or the like for the semi-states or the public salary ranges for the teachers, gardai and civil servants. They're not exactly appealing).

There's a bunch of different things that give the impression of pay being higher in public/semi-state service:

• FOI info on salaries is usually reported by journalists as averages not ranges/medians (average of three 20k salaries and one 200k salary is 65k).
• Pension figures are often lumped onto public sector salary quotes but not onto the private figures they're compared to (this is particularly wonky for semi-states like ESB where the pensions are paid for by the employees like in private sector).
• Like is rarely compared with like. Specialists/professional heavy public sector groupings are compared against the average industrial wage rather than against equivalents in private sector. So you have state civil engineers and doctors having their salaries compared against a broad basket low-wage to extreme wage national average rather than against the average salary of their private sector equivalents.

I genuinely wouldn't be surprised if the number of strikes snowballed now that it has started.

PeadarCo

Jawgap wrote:

They were negotiated up and forced down - the government struck a bad deal. That's just tough - either you honour the agreements you freely enter into or you don't. And if you don't then don't be too surprised when people are not embracing of you next time you want to talk.

The thing just because you sign an agreement you can't force a person/company to adhere to that agreement if they can't follow through with it. The alternative to pay cuts would have been job losses. That wouldn't have suited either sides

If the unions had done proper due diligence they would have realised that the the government was highly reliant on property based taxes. There was enough information out there at the time. The unions and the government of the timemade the judgement that 07 levels of spending and the governments taxation structure was sustainable. All sides made a massive mistake.

When circumstances change deals change. A good example of this would be the dispute between Tesco and Uniliver. Sterling drops dramatically Uniliver renegotiate their contract. Its normal business. The unions accepted the pay cuts because they knew circumstances had changed. Circumstances have changed again and with more money available they're trying to grab as much of it as they can. Normal business if a bit hypocritical given that all the talk from them against public service cuts and talk about the vulnerable.

The Muppet

Ah we're back to averages . I'm sure you don't need me to explain the flaw in using them but I will any way .

Take 4 people in an office. one earns 125 k the other 3 25 k . On average they are all equal earning 50 k each the reality of the situation of course is very different.

lawred2

newwan wrote: »

Drivers, teachers, nurses likely and guards blu flu...
What is going on?

Are they justified or is it a case of everyone wanting their slice of the pie?
To my mind we are still super vulnerable. Brexit hasnt bottomed yet. We still have a lot of emigration and unemployed youth.

I understand striking for better conditions, but it seems to me like its all for more pay.

Reading all of the terrible nursing stories are gut wrenchers so i was looking into it a bit. A lot of these stories are from student nurses. Its tough for everyone as a student. And those stories from 16 years qualified nurses, well from the freely available hse payscales these nurses have to be on more than 40k. I dont understand how it is so difficult to survive on over 40k. As an engineer i never earned over 40k and had a decent life (no house or flash car but definintely not on the bread line).

from a freedom of info article about 2 years ago in the middle of the HRA and LRA it seems 48% of nurses earn over 40k.

What is the story?
Are we repeating the same mistakes of the past and is another housing bubble or similiar bubble inevitable!?!

An engineer who never earned 40k?

No offence but I wouldn't get out of bed for that. What kind of engineering are you qualified as/working in?

maryishere

lawred2 wrote: »

An engineer who never earned 40k?

No offence but I wouldn't get out of bed for that.

There are plenty of engineers ( and architects, and quantity surveyors and people with good qualifications ) in the private sector, who earn a lot less than 40k, and who do not have public service security or pension either ( which is worth an awful lot).

newwan

lawred2 wrote: »

An engineer who never earned 40k?

No offence but I wouldn't get out of bed for that. What kind of engineering are you qualified as/working in?

None taken. Well a lot actually. That's far above the average industrial wage.
But I earn enough now

This is the problem with Ireland. Pure greed and ignorance in a lot of vocal people. A lot of good people happy with their lot follow along and we end up with lots of small fish wanting their own small slice of the pie. Totally breaks the system

tayto lover

newwan wrote: »

48% of nurses earn over 40k.

52% don't.

The Muppet

newwan wrote: »

lawred2 wrote: »

An engineer who never earned 40k?

No offence but I wouldn't get out of bed for that. What kind of engineering are you qualified as/working in?

None taken. Well a lot actually. That's far above the average industrial wage.
But I earn enough now

This is the problem with Ireland. Pure greed and ignorance in a lot of vocal people. A lot of good people happy with their lot follow along and we end up with lots of small fish wanting their own small slice of the pie. Totally breaks the system

Are you seriously referring to Nurses Teachers Gardai as small fish?

lawred2

newwan wrote: »

None taken. Well a lot actually. That's far above the average industrial wage.
But I earn enough now

This is the problem with Ireland. Pure greed and ignorance in a lot of vocal people. A lot of good people happy with their lot follow along and we end up with lots of small fish wanting their own small slice of the pie. Totally breaks the system

Greed and ignorance?

Have a word with yourself.

newwan

No I'm referring to the attitudes on this thread...
If you think a 1st year nurse should rent their own 3 bed and that is what is driving these strikes then we're finished all over again

lawred2

newwan wrote: »

No I'm referring to the attitudes on this thread...
If you think a 1st year nurse should rent their own 3 bed and that is what is driving these strikes then we're finished all over again

Well whoever claimed that is daft. Most qualified professionals house share for the first decade or so of their working lives..

maryishere

The Muppet wrote: »

Are you seriously referring to Nurses Teachers Gardai as small fish?

Given average public sector wage is 49,000 a year they are very well paid small fish, especially considering their perks of job security and golden pension.

newwan

lawred2 wrote: »

Greed and ignorance?

Have a word with yourself.

Are you the person that said they wouldn't get out of bed for 12k more than the average Irish wage?

lawred2

newwan wrote: »

Are you the person that said they wouldn't get out of bed for 12k more than the average Irish wage?

Yes. And?

newwan

lawred2 wrote: »

Well whoever claimed that is daft. Most qualified professionals house share for the first decade or so of their working lives..

Well its there in black and white a couple of times I believe. And seems to be a prevailing opinion anecdotally

The Muppet

Apologies I got the impression from you opening post that that was exactly who you were referring to. It's that small fish attitude that's the real problem here.

I clarified that and you conceded the point a few posts back. Fact is a first year nurse can quite easily find themselves in charge of a unit, a very responsible and challenging position it's only right they be paid a decent wage.

L

maryishere wrote: »

Given average public sector wage is 49,000 a year they are very well paid small fish, especially considering their perks of job security and golden pension.

Gardai start on 23k. They're not well paid.