support for the british worker

Andrew1978 · 1 Feb 2009 at 23:47

No i said a hard days work in the office is easier than a comparable manual job.

arknor · 1 Feb 2009 at 23:48

Pudney@work said:
Right, so lets get this straight. This has all started because I, and others, have said you can do a hard day's work in an office and you disagree. Just to let me know, what kind of pay scale are we talking here? Because apparently work becomes easy when you're paid more.

ofcourse work is easier when you have a bigger incentive..... its easier to get out the bed in the morning if your earning more, its hard to get out of the bed in the money when your expected to compete with the wages foreign workers are willing to work for which is less than your used to recieving.

but a lot of people who live in there detached houses seem to think its the workers fault for not beeing competitive, have you seen the types of places a lot of these people live in while they are working in our country?

a lot of people were renting out what were pretty much garden sheds with electricity to polish people so ofcourse they can work for crap wages they dont need to properly live in this country.
your expecting english people to do the same? then you demonise anyone who is on the dole because they are obviously lazy brits!

Pudney · 1 Feb 2009 at 23:59

Andrew1978 said:
No i said a hard days work in the office is easier than a comparable manual job.

Right, so money is the only benchmark we're using for comparative purposes here? £15k-£16k region acceptable? How about personal tax returns all day long, every day including weekends as this has just been the season of that! Also doing them with not all the information needed, and you have a very finite deadline, fines cometh otherwise. So, we're doing legal documents, for other people, with not enough information, those people dont want to be asked questions, or just plain worse dont know the information needed, and you're doing lots of different peoples. All in the same deadline. That's a nice stressful job that requires hard work.

arknor said:
ofcourse work is easier when you have a bigger incentive..... its easier to get out the bed in the morning if your earning more, its hard to get out of the bed in the money when your expected to compete with the wages foreign workers are willing to work for which is less than your used to recieving.

but a lot of people who live in there detached houses seem to think its the workers fault for not beeing competitive, have you seen the types of places a lot of these people live in while they are working in our country?

a lot of people were renting out what were pretty much garden sheds with electricity to polish people so ofcourse they can work for crap wages they dont need to properly live in this country.
your expecting english people to do the same? then you demonise anyone who is on the dole because they are obviously lazy brits!

No, what I actually want is people who like to classify themselves as "workers" to not label office workers as having cushy and easy jobs who all earn bucket loads and dont need to work hard to earn their money. I also dont like to see those people demonise the "middle class" because obviously only the downtrodden workers have to actually put effort to earn money and everyone else it just falls into their laps with no effort.

Durzel · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:01

I wonder how many people would be so supportive if they ended up having to pay a premium on whatever it is these companies employing foreign labour are making because said companies were being forced to pay a premium for British labour?

It's all well and good sitting back and talking about it in relative comfort, it's a different story altogether when it hurts your back pocket.

Whilst I'm not in that line of work the company I work for has to compete with others that outsource to India, Russia, etc - and whether you're prepared to accept it or not these outsourcing companies get results, maybe their work is not always to the same standard as the UK, but it's not like we have a great standard to be proud of here is it? Record numbers of people coming out of school with little/no literacy or numeracy skills, etc.

There's blame to be placed a bit closer to home imo - if these awesome British workers were so invaluable to the companies they worked for, they wouldn't be so easy to replace would they? Fact is - I suspect a lot of them want to basically work half as hard for twice the money, that's the British way - generally speaking anyway.

Andrew1978 · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:03

Sorry but i dont consider filling in forms hard work.

Pudney · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:06

Have you ever done a tax return for a self employed person?

arknor · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:08

Pudney@work said:
Have you ever done a tax return for a self employed person?

yea really gets the muscles pumping , the blood flowing , the sweat flowing, and the heart racing ! proper hard graft that

Andrew1978 · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:09

No but if i had the releveant skills and training or even the desire to do it i doubt i would be sat at my desk thinking omg i wish i was a labourer.

Pudney · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:10

So hard work can only be physical? Well in that case then of course office jobs are easy and dont require hard work, my mistake.

Andrew1978 · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:10

I never said it wasnt hard, i said it was easier. there is a huge difference.

Pudney · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:10

Andrew1978 said:
No but if i had the releveant skills and training or even the desire to do it i doubt i would be sat at my desk thinking omg i wish i was a labourer.

Quite frankly, having done both, i'd prefer being a labourer, although admittedly not at this time of year.

Edit: My previous post wasnt directed at you Andrew.

arknor · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:12

Pudney@work said:
So hard work can only be physical? Well in that case then of course office jobs are easy and dont require hard work, my mistake.

they can be draining on the brain but when someone says "boy that was hard work" people dont think of someone filling in a few forms.

we all went to school and we all used the old pen and pencil a hell of a lot and it was boring but you dont think of it as "hard work" do you.

anyway laying brick after brick is just as boring as data entry but the pen ways a hell of a lot more

Pudney · 2 Feb 2009 at 00:13

As i'm going to bed my point is this. A hard day's manual work just leaves you physically tired at the end of a day. A hard day's office job leaves you mentally tired and stressed at the end of a day. Preferably i'd much rather do manual work, but unfortunately i can't earn as much so i don't. Either way both types of jobs are hard work.

Andrew1978 · 2 Feb 2009 at 01:03

Just remember that once the manual workforce is outsourced you're next in line.

PikeyPriest · 2 Feb 2009 at 01:19

arknor said:
they can be draining on the brain but when someone says "boy that was hard work" people dont think of someone filling in a few forms.

we all went to school and we all used the old pen and pencil a hell of a lot and it was boring but you dont think of it as "hard work" do you.

anyway laying brick after brick is just as boring as data entry but the pen ways a hell of a lot more

Ive done factory work and it is not as bad a something like medical note summarising, which is pretty mentally destroying due to boredom. I guess doing 12 hr shifts in a hospital is pretty easy as well, i mean you can only kill people, much easier than laying some concrete right??

Then again I would say that you don't know what tiredness is until you work 27hr shifts in a trauma department with breaks totalling <1hr for food

Andrew1978 · 2 Feb 2009 at 01:25

Factory work in general is easy, some of them are soul destroying. Try working in a sheet metal factory on a press. The constant clunking, which isn't just a noise, its actually inside your head then combine that with the total boredom and risk of chopping off your fingers.

to give you an idea there was a woman who worked there and they had a "celebration" of her 25yrs work , she got a clock for never being late then she broke down crying and never came back, she got a job working in a nursery looking after kids.

Skidder · 2 Feb 2009 at 08:22

There are two things going on here - the hard graft mob are comparing physical work with "office work", whatever that is, and have no experience of challenging non-manual jobs and secondly, they are excersising the chips on their shoulders.

Trust me when I tell you the stress, pressure and axiety of a role in the commercial world (and I'm not talking about some mundane office admin or data entry role) is easily comparable with the physical labour you are talking about and of course far surpases it in some senses of challenge.

The fact is in the UK the education was there for the taking, people are mobile and can set their goals, if you don't like your lot and you have the drive and potential, change it.

Crilly · 2 Feb 2009 at 19:36

Lovely racist and protectionism overtones.

I hope the government tells them where to go.

Andrew1978 · 2 Feb 2009 at 19:52

I havent got a chip on my shoulder thanks very much.

I had a problem with people who are no doubt in decent paying jobs telling manual workers that if they should expect to keep their jobs or be able to get work they should work for less money due to penny pinching fat cats who no doubt will receive a huge bonus because they realised they could ship in workers cheaper from another country.

ElvisFan · 2 Feb 2009 at 19:59

Andrew1978 said:
I havent got a chip on my shoulder thanks very much.

I had a problem with people who are no doubt in decent paying jobs telling manual workers that if they should expect to keep their jobs or be able to get work they should work for less money due to penny pinching fat cats who no doubt will receive a huge bonus because they realised they could ship in workers cheaper from another country.

You tell him.

These office puffs wouldn't know work if it hit them in the face.