Public Pay Talks - see mod warning post 4293

Principals aren't splitting hours for the craic. If they split roles, it's because they have to split them, because they can't get the Maths and Physics person, for example, so they take the Maths or the Physics person. It's a red herring, nothing to do with the argument about salaries for newly qualified teachers, but you couldn't resist crowbarring it into the discussion, presumably because of some deep jealousy of this fairly basic HR measure, one that is not uncommon in lots of large organisations, large banks, financial institutions, tech MNCs. It's a limited measure, that requires Board approval, and is probably the only thing that is keeping newly qualified teachers from leaving the career completely.

But once you had your fun, that's the important thing.

Take the career break away, and the teachers head for Dubai and don't come back to Ireland, and don't come back to teaching.

Try thinking strategically.

About 20 years ago I was a delegate at a union conference. There was a harmless sounding motion calling for extended flexi-time bands (which have since been implemented). It seemed a no-brainer but there was a speaker against. After the meeting was over I had a chat with him inquiring why he was opposed, and he said:

"The civil service is going to turn into a hobby job for married women".

Well of course I was shocked and stunned and appalled, but really was he wrong? How is anyone supposed to live on a CO salary without the support of parents or a much higher earning spouse? EOs are going the same way. HEOs are going the same way, ffs..

This is what successive "pay deals" have delivered - a gradual but very real erosion of living standards.

Scott free. Explain if you wouldn't mind. They paid taxes...no?

Which older generation? I've got nothing. I expect nothing.

I work very hard. I'm lucky enough to have a roof over our head and food on the table. Good food.

Before anyone says Boomer or any such sort, I'm not.

Sick and tired of excuses. Yes we can do more and I'm willing to pay if it's done properly.

I remember a time when soap boxing was frowned upon…now it’s ignored because it’s generating desperately needed traffic.

I advocated last year for the acceptance of the deal which was the correct thing to do. If we were to agree another 5 or 6 percent this time around that would be a great little bump in the space of a few years.

Yep, all of the above was the teachers fault. Every single bit of the crash.

And absolutely nobody from the older generations, or pensioners got caught in the crash. Yep. Absolutely none of them. They all got away scott free, each and every one of them.

🙄 🙄 🙄

When are we going to stop signing up to deals which leave us worse off?

Pay increases never match inflation and it would be dangerous and foolish if they did. The first rule of inflation is you never chase inflation by throwing money at the problem. In fact the opposite makes sense. Hence why interest rates are going up. You take money out of economy.

With which the employer has to pay greater expenses ... heating, fuel, suppliers. It's not just the income that is going up for the Government.

What are you expecting? If everyone's salary simply stayed in line with inflation, then it wouldn't be inflation any more would it? That's why it's called inflation, everyone has less purchasing power.

Looks like for some reason you expect to be protected from inflation while the rest of the economy has to live with it.

If you increase pay when inflation is high, you'll drive inflation higher. You may not like it, but its a mathematically proven fact. The best you can do is at least index the pay raise in line with inflation.

i.e If inflation increased 10% since the last round of pay increases 5 years ago, then you increase it 10%

However if inflation increased 10% in the last month, you won't be able to afford to increase it 10%. If you do you'll find, as always happens, the economy overcooks, and suddenly you have to make pay cuts, because you are in Recession again, and the economy you rely on to foot the tax bill that pays public sector wages, has contracted.

Really pay should be benchmarked against private sector wages and not inflation. I guess the problem with public sector wages are that they are generally upward only but there is generally a lag that allows time to mostly factor this in

Because benchmarking worked so well before. Its a buzz term but it cant work. Possibly remove job security and have governance around performance issues for example. We in the public sector cant really be fired for under performance. The same cant be said for the private sector.

Falling real wages, while GDP rises, suggests that non-wage incomes are rising faster than wages.

We know that profit margins have expanded in the last year.

This will have to be re-balanced eventually, either by disinflation or rising real wages.