Public / Private sector pay gap widens

Andy_L

noodle_doodle wrote: »

public sector employees include teachers, doctors, lecturers, university researchers - all require postgraduate qualifications, all provide essential services (hence why they are in the public sector) and are all thus deserving of higher pay. Compared to your average laminated paperclip salesman it's not surprising they get paid more.

Just to show how tricky the comparison is, universities count as Private Sector employers

chewmylegoff

Andy_L wrote: »

Genuine question, are the drivers drivers counted as public sector or private or do they exist in some twilight PPP zone?

i'm fairly sure that the drivers are employees of london underground, which is public sector, given that it is owned by TFL and therefore the government.

i think the private sector / twilight PPP zone only really applies to maintenance staff employed by things like (the now defunct) tube lines.

that said, i've no idea what randomising equations are applied to the formulation of the ONS' stats.

noodle_doodle

Andy_L wrote: »

Just to show how tricky the comparison is, universities count as Private Sector employers

So I'm private sector then?

*volte face*

These public sector leeches need to get themselves out into the real world and do a real job instead of shuffling eco-friendly disability questionnaires and then claiming it gave them infected paper cuts and going on the sick for 6 months.

olly300

noodle_doodle wrote: »

public sector employees include teachers, doctors, lecturers, university researchers - all require postgraduate qualifications, all provide essential services (hence why they are in the public sector) and are all thus deserving of higher pay. Compared to your average laminated paperclip salesman it's not surprising they get paid more.

There are now quite a lot of public sector people in the group mentioned who are on short term contracts without pensions particularly if they are a university researcher. I actually still know enough teachers to be told of how new recruits can't get positions, and how older ones don't want them.

BTW you don't need a postgrad qualification to be a teacher or a doctor. You can do them as undergraduate degrees. Though like with many skilled jobs you will need to gain professional qualifications once you have your degree.

michaels

I happened to have the ONS report come across my desk this morning http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/lmac/public-and-private-sector-earnings/2011/rep-public-and-private-sector-earnings.html and the 7.8% is supposedly adjusted to take account of the different types of roles etc. However for example for 'degree level employees' private sector wages are 5.7% higher. Also in London public sector workers are lower overall.

I am still not sure whether the private sector wages are particularly skewed by the few very high salaries pushing up the mean.

However I go back to my previous comment, there is nothing stopping public sector workers moving in to the private sector if they think they are underpaid in comparison.

Esoog

chewmylegoff wrote: »

it's not surprising, because in the private sector a pay freeze means that you get a 0% payrise, but in the public sector a pay freeze means that the staff on long term pay deals all get what they were originally promised, and even those on a pay freeze who are not at the top of their pay band still get salary increases by moving up "spine" points.

there have been numerous reports of companies cutting their pay by e.g. 10% across the board to prevent redundancies. whilst i think this has been going on to some extent e.g. local council staff i think have been given pay cuts, i don't get the impression that there have been widespread pay cuts in the public sector.

thus i think the fact that since 2007, public sector pay has increased faster than private sector pay is probably the expected result.

lots of people on here go on about how all low paid jobs have been moved from public to private so may be the cause of the ONS comment you have quoted.

With regards to the CS;

Average civil service pay is £22,850 a year, compared to £24,970 in the private sector.
35,000 (7%) civil servants are paid less than £15,000 a year.
40.5% of civil servants - 210,000 people - are paid £20,000 or less. And 63% of civil servants - 330,000 staff - earn less than £25,000 a year.

RobertoMoir

michaels wrote: »

However I go back to my previous comment, there is nothing stopping public sector workers moving in to the private sector if they think they are underpaid in comparison.

Or vice-versa, for that matter. If people think the public sector is so pampered then they're more than welcome to have a crack.

I know there's an element of sensationalism in the headlines about wages and pensions, etc. and I think there's an element of "the grass is greener" about other sectors - most people feel themselves to be underpaid wherever they work.

The whole damn country - private and public - is pretty much in the toilet if you ask me, and the govt (I'm talking in general terms here, elections are about picking the brand of lube, not deciding whether or not you're going to get screwed by politicians or not) and the media are doing a bit of divide and conquer / bread and circuses with these news stories about who is and who is not overpaid.

tartanterra

Esoog wrote: »

With regards to the CS;

Average civil service pay is £22,850 a year, compared to £24,970 in the private sector.
35,000 (7%) civil servants are paid less than £15,000 a year.
40.5% of civil servants - 210,000 people - are paid £20,000 or less. And 63% of civil servants - 330,000 staff - earn less than £25,000 a year.

I can't find any source for these figures. Can you please post the link.

Andy_L

michaels wrote: »

I am still not sure whether the private sector wages are particularly skewed by the few very high salaries pushing up the mean.

Probably not. AIUI ONS always use the median rather than mean to damp down the effect. Although I suspect that a lot of the highly paid are not PAYE but self-employed/Ltd companies so aren't included

michaels wrote: »

However I go back to my previous comment, there is nothing stopping public sector workers moving in to the private sector if they think they are underpaid in comparison.

or, indeed, vice versa.

Graham_Devon

What's really important, and shouldn't be overlooked, as it's the biggest basis for the private / public discrepancy, is that those collating the figures stated:

A) They had trouble matching public / private sector jobs to make a comparison.
Bonuses were not included in the overall figures.

These two things make the comparison very difficult. It's very difficult to compare like with like, and they have tried to warn of this in their summary.

Comparisons between the two sectors were difficult, the ONS said, due to differences in jobs and the characteristics of employees. Workers in the public sector are older on average than those in the private sector, with higher pay levels linked to experience.

A bit like comparing cats and dogs. Depends on the breed of dog the comparison is based on as to the results of the comparison.