How best to react to a slash in your wages..
- Thread starter Raumarik
- Start date
![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}
Vanilla said:
Not insulting at all!, I started off in the private sector and could quite easily move back there. The thing is I absolutely love my job, I more far harder than I would in the private sector as I see everything I do having an impact and improving things for those around me. There aren't many jobs like that.
Security is good with public sector jobs but as you've said there's a lot of deadwood in these institutions that really should be cleared out. Unfortunately there simply isn't the mechanism, slashing wages will only force those good employees to leave, the deadwood won't, they're too institutionalised to do so. You may save money but all you do is remove the good workers and replace them with lower paid and generally poorer staff.
Sadly my council is pushing on without the unions consent, I'm not a member of a union as I don't believe in them and consider them to simply be a great way of skiving gits to get a cushy number.
I foresee strikes, but as in the past I won't be taking part, even if my wages are frozen.
Caporegime
- Joined
- 13 May 2003
- Posts
- 34,564
- Location
- Warwickshire
dark_shadow said:
Lol
At last, the council are crapping out useless workers!
The only way round this is to tell your boss that you will work as hard as you damn well can for a promotion.
Soldato
- Joined
- 2 Nov 2004
- Posts
- 24,654
Dolph said:
The tenure of a council worker is relatively higher, they are harder but not impossible to sack and it is not as if a private sector worker could be sacked on whim but a good point nonetheless
You're not a customer, you are a subject. You do not consume, you are subject to pay money that they have decided that you owe them in return for a service they decided to provide.
cleanbluesky said:
Which is why I believe the state should not be involved in much of what it takes upon itself to forcibly provide...
The nature of state managed monopolies funded by taxation results in horrific inefficencies and expense, poor performance and generally a much worse service all around, that's not something I beleive should be encouraged. Taxation is a charge for services, it does make us customers, we just have no choice in the matter...
I worked as an accountant when I was younger. Was always under time pressures to finish work. Asked every day if i could work evenings and weekends. Loved the work and the people but the wages were pants untill I could qualify.
Decided I liked the look of a job at the council finance dept offering three times my current salary.
Got the job but was amazed to find that I was finished my given workload usually by about ten o clock in the morning every day. Got bored really quick but was buoyed by the amazing wages!
After about a year and a half I couldn't take it any more and just didnt go back one day. Woke up in the morning and said "enough is enough".
There was an organisation and methods study done on the finance dept whilst I was there which basically studies how a dept works for a few months and publishes its conclusions. As it turned out the work being done by the finance departments 88 staff was enough for 37 employees only which means quite a few people should have lost their jobs. However it was brushed under the carpet because the chief dept officer (the director of finance and asset management as he was known) got higher rates of pay for having more employees (no thought for productivity or efficiency).
The pension scheme was even better (bear in mind that this is about 15 years ago). Your pension was worked out as a percentage of your final years salary. What happened was that anyone who was due for retirement got promoted in their final year so that their pension rights would increase accordingly. Coupled with the twice yearly pay rises to get you to the top of your salary scale (just for turning up day after day), I initially though this was my dream job for life. Unfortunately, I couldn't fit in with the deadbeats who couldn't hack it in the real world and just got depressed that I had let myself fall into this trap. No-one would even consider me in the private sector after working for the council so I had to change career or start at the bottom again.
Not everyone had it as easy as me. There were many people in my dept who were overworked and stressed but I was not allowed to offer assistance even when I had nothing to do "because its not your job".
When people question my disdain for the levels of council tax we pay, I relate this story ofhow innefficient councils really are. If there was some method of rewarding managers and bosses for being cost effective or attaining some sort of notional profits, then things wouldd be a lot different and our taxes would be much much lower!
OOOh - dont get me started.
Decided I liked the look of a job at the council finance dept offering three times my current salary.
Got the job but was amazed to find that I was finished my given workload usually by about ten o clock in the morning every day. Got bored really quick but was buoyed by the amazing wages!
After about a year and a half I couldn't take it any more and just didnt go back one day. Woke up in the morning and said "enough is enough".
There was an organisation and methods study done on the finance dept whilst I was there which basically studies how a dept works for a few months and publishes its conclusions. As it turned out the work being done by the finance departments 88 staff was enough for 37 employees only which means quite a few people should have lost their jobs. However it was brushed under the carpet because the chief dept officer (the director of finance and asset management as he was known) got higher rates of pay for having more employees (no thought for productivity or efficiency).
The pension scheme was even better (bear in mind that this is about 15 years ago). Your pension was worked out as a percentage of your final years salary. What happened was that anyone who was due for retirement got promoted in their final year so that their pension rights would increase accordingly. Coupled with the twice yearly pay rises to get you to the top of your salary scale (just for turning up day after day), I initially though this was my dream job for life. Unfortunately, I couldn't fit in with the deadbeats who couldn't hack it in the real world and just got depressed that I had let myself fall into this trap. No-one would even consider me in the private sector after working for the council so I had to change career or start at the bottom again.
Not everyone had it as easy as me. There were many people in my dept who were overworked and stressed but I was not allowed to offer assistance even when I had nothing to do "because its not your job".
When people question my disdain for the levels of council tax we pay, I relate this story ofhow innefficient councils really are. If there was some method of rewarding managers and bosses for being cost effective or attaining some sort of notional profits, then things wouldd be a lot different and our taxes would be much much lower!
OOOh - dont get me started.
Dolph said:
If it wasn't for privatisation, we would have a first class railway (privatisation sold the assets and kept the funds without reinvesting). publicly funded stuff is very good as long as it's regulated, which unfortunately council and highway doesn't seem to be.
doopydug - sounds very familiar and similar to my last post, which is why I left. I saved the group of schools I work almost £80,000 last year by cancelling contracts we didn't need, buying from different suppliers and generally just using common sense. The chap before me more or less sat on his backside all day from what I can see.
Deadwood/deadbeats - same thing but as councils are so integrated with unions it's almost impossible to fire people. I know of people who have stolen thousands of pounds yet still have a job, all that happened is they were moved away from the money and it was covered up.
Dont' even get me started on how useless councillors are
Deadwood/deadbeats - same thing but as councils are so integrated with unions it's almost impossible to fire people. I know of people who have stolen thousands of pounds yet still have a job, all that happened is they were moved away from the money and it was covered up.
Dont' even get me started on how useless councillors are
AcidHell2 said:
Privatisation itself wasn't the problem with the railways, the specific method of privatisation used was. Making several private monopolies instead of one large state owned one was a stupid idea and led to exactly the kind of thing you discuss.
Competition is the key to workable privatisation, and when they privatised the railways, they ensured it didn't actually exist...
Vanilla said:
i find your reply quite interesting. i share much of your opinion about the matter, and whilst it is a little off topic i would like to expand on one of the points that you made, more specifically 'it's the reason much of the private sector wont touch employees from the public sector'. is it *really* that hard to move between the two? my personal circumstances are such that i may be looking to move in the very near future, am i going to be fighting an uphill struggle?
Soldato
- Joined
- 2 Nov 2004
- Posts
- 24,654
Dolph said:
What AcidHell said, then remember that the idea of 'the council' is that it is run by 'a council' of elected representatives who you can theoretically accost for neglecting their theoretical duties to provide services.
The more 'private sector' you go with such things, the further from that you will travel.
Also, there is the potential to cripple industry by attempting to force market principles onto it if it is socially funded - that's a long debate though
AcidHell2 said:
Like air travel?
Air travel is exactly how a privatised rail system should work, central scheduling (and track upkeep in the case of railways) but independant companies.
I haven't noticed any real safety issues with the airlines.
Dolph said:
air traffic is a little different as you dont have a large track. it's very feasible for each airport to keep it's own standards.
the rail at the moment is a good system, although network rail should be a public company after all that is what it is.
The problem with (or maybe not) is that private companies will cut trains/carriedges ect to maximise profits. if the train companies where public then you could keep those services open and provide better trains.
AcidHell2 said:
I would happily keep the network itself under a public banner, and enforce minimum standards on stations etc.
I guess the question then is should services that don't meet costs keep runnning? Overall the company has to make a profit, but there's a case for only allowing access to the very profitable services to those who also provide the less profitable 'social' services that fits just fine. (This is already done in the case of Buses).
The problem with it being a public service is that, once again, I'm expected to fund something by force, irrespective of whether I consider it an acceptable use of my money, and irrespective of how well they are spending money. Generally, that's a position I really don't like to be in, and it's one that I feel should be avoided unless there is literally no alternative option.
Dolph said:
I agree, however there's somethings I think should be kept under public sector regardless of cost that is
National grip and power
gas and infrastructure
Water and infastructure
Roads and infrastructure
Rail
Health and education.
If the goverment wants to force us out of cars they need to reopen all the small stations and either make it a public service or give grants to the private companies tio rub trains/buses at sensible times and destinations.
Although I know how much money is wasted, we made a billion profit this year and we could have made so much more if they
a) had managers that could manage
B) less managers.
Thats the problem with public sector.
we've had expensive resources sat at around the country and because they spent so much on resources they did have enough money to pay our over time to install it, it's absolutely crazy and criminal.
Last edited:
AcidHell2 said:
I think this is where we will have to agree to disagree. Out of that list, I'd only go with the National Grid, Roads and Rail infrastructure (but not rolling stock or services) as being necessary state management, and add Policing to the list.
Everything else I'd much rather see in the private sector, with minimum standards and guaranteed minumum access (such as state mandated health cover and education provision), but give the schools, hospitals etc their independance and encourage efficiency and high performance through competition.
But why should I pay for that?