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Just found this old blog about wages in 98 interesting

  • 23-04-2010 06:51PM
    #1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 955 ✭✭✭


    And i am not affiliated to any party

    Scrooge bosses named

    Workers Solidarity reporter Joe King spent a couple of hours each month up to last Christmas tracking down the bosses who pay a pittance. Giving himself a good Leaving Certificate, some shop and restaurant experience and a false name he set about answering advertisements, phoning personnel officers and going to interviews. He did his job hunting in Dublin. The story in other cities and towns is, if anything, even worse.

    "I set out in July not sure what I would find. There certainly seemed to be a lot more jobs around. Maybe there was something to be said for the Celtic Tiger. The summer months are usually the toughest time to find work, all those school leavers and students added to the unemployed makes it a lot more competitive. But last summer there definitely was more demand for staff in shops, restaurants, and bars.

    "My first port of call was the Stephen's Hall Hotel who wanted a porter. £3.00 an hour the woman said, maybe £3.50 after a few weeks. Next was the Irish Celtic Craft Shop on Lord Edward Street. Expensive goods, lots of wealthy tourist business. This would have to be better. £25.00 a day. That's £3.12 an hour. Things are looking up.

    The Chocolate Bar in the POD night club wanted a lunchtime waiter for the princely sum of £3.00 an hour. The Garden Restaurant in Tallaght's Square Shopping Centre advertised for a kitchen cleaner. Got them on the phone. £3.50 an hour and a free meal when on duty. Next I spotted an advert for a waiter in the Mahogany Gaspipes restaurant. This is a dear eatery. They would surely be paying a bit more. Yeah, right! £2.00 an hour but I might get some tips.

    The Phibsboro Service Station on the North Circular Road needed a night cashier. That paid £4.05 an hour. Noonan Cleaning were taking on office cleaners. I phoned up, it would be early mornings or early evenings and paid £3.91 an hour plus a 70p daily travel allowance. I phoned a few other contract cleaners. They all paid exactly the same rate. So much for competition and the free market!

    A music school, Walton's, in South Great Georges Street wanted an evening receptionist. £2.50 an hour. Sorry, said I, did I hear that properly? No mistake, £2.50 an hour but I could have a discount on lessons or hiring rehearsal space. Hooray! Anything had to be better ...or did it? Park House, near Heuston Station, had need for a night porter. £2.08 an hour for a 12 hour shift.

    Time to try some bigger employers. The Mont Clare Hotel wanted lots of waiters. £4.00 an hour. I later learned that boss Noel O'Callaghan is not short of cash, having made at least one sizable donation to Mary Harney's PDs. Onto Brown Thomas in Grafton Street. Sent in my application to be a shop assistant. If I got the job, I was told, the pay would be £3.63 an hour.

    Oh well, try some of the other big stores. They can't all be paying wages so low. And I was right. The one other store which was advertising, Roches Stores, did pay more. 2p an hour more, to bring their rate up to £3.65 an hour. A few weeks later I saw that Brown Thomas had increased their rate, all the way up to £3.65 an hour.

    Envy Menswear were opening a shop. £3.50 an hour but it could rise to £4.00 if I had sufficient experience. Experience of what? Surviving on air? Argus Security wanted extra staff to mind 24-hour shops, watching out for drunks, dippers and downright dangerous characters. How much? £4.00 an hour. One more try before giving up. Bewley's advertised for catering assistants in their Mary Street restaurant. £3.33 an hour.

    Out of wages like these we are supposed to pay rent or a mortgage, buy food and clothes, maybe raise a child or two, have an occasional holiday, put some money aside for emergencies, pay bus fares, have a few drinks at the weekend, pay for the TV licence, etc. etc. I don't know how anyone manages on poverty wages like these, I have enough trouble just getting by and I'm on £16,000 a year. I do know I'll be on any demonstrations in support of a minimum wage."

    This article is from Workers Solidarity No 53 published in January 1998


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Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,121 ✭✭✭RichardAnd


    Good find. It does seem very low, some of them, but how much did 4 punts go in 1998?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,635 ✭✭✭maninasia


    I remember getting 5 pounds an hour around then for a part-time security job. The pay wasn't up to much if you liked your beer or going out. So even in the recession now minimum wage workers are probably better off than back then.


  • Posts: 5,250 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    I got £2.50 per hour during the summer of '98 working in a meat factory.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 725 ✭✭✭rightwingdub


    3.50 an hour working in Tesco in 98, also bar work in 99 I worked for 5.00 an hour.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 725 ✭✭✭rightwingdub


    In 1997 at 16-17 as a lounge boy doing part time work during school term I earned 2.50 punts per hour and then 2 punts for staying behind to clean up after work.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 38,227 ✭✭✭✭Guy:Incognito


    I started workign in Spring 97. It was £3.05 an hour.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,364 ✭✭✭ei.sdraob


    A Workers Solidarity, god bless them, did they get themselves jobs in the Unions now?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 955 ✭✭✭Pot Noodle =


    I was on 32 an hour then


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,808 ✭✭✭Ste.phen


    I started in Tesco in 2001 on £4.11 (as an under 18) which went up to £5.04 (i think) when I turned 18, I think this was about standard at the time for supermarket work like that


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 925 ✭✭✭billybigunz


    THere are plenty of jobs that pay $5 an hour today in the States. Our hourly dole payments are higher assuming a bone idle 40 hour week of lying on the couch.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 14,389 ✭✭✭✭SteelyDanJalapeno


    Also known as "the good life"


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,251 ✭✭✭Sandvich


    Horgan wrote: »
    Also known as "the good life"

    I can guarnatee the majority of people currently on the dole do not want to be. While the average office job is pretty soul destroying; so is being stuck at home doing nothing. €200 might seem like a lot but an awful lot of the things people like doing in Ireland require quite a bit of money.

    At least our welfare is high enough to afford people to actually do things while on the dole, so they don't fall into a depressive slump like many on UK welfare. If unemployed people are getting out and about then it's at least better than doing nothing, both for themselves psychologically and for the economy in the long run.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 5,426 ✭✭✭testicle


    Pot wrote:
    Workers Solidarity reporter Joe King

    For some reason, I can never take anything he writes seriously


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,121 ✭✭✭RichardAnd


    Sandvich wrote: »
    I can guarnatee the majority of people currently on the dole do not want to be. While the average office job is pretty soul destroying; so is being stuck at home doing nothing. €200 might seem like a lot but an awful lot of the things people like doing in Ireland require quite a bit of money.

    At least our welfare is high enough to afford people to actually do things while on the dole, so they don't fall into a depressive slump like many on UK welfare. If unemployed people are getting out and about then it's at least better than doing nothing, both for themselves psychologically and for the economy in the long run.


    Yeah but there is a feeling of uselessness that comes with being unemployed. Even if being on the dole allows a person to have a few pints now and again, the feeling of uselessness will always be there. Personally, I wouldn't draw the dole if I was unemployed unless I absolutely had to. This is part of the reason why I save 60-70% of my wages each week, you never know when it might be needed.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,551 ✭✭✭SeaFields


    I earned £2 an hour when I was 16 (late 90's) working in a local garage. My buddy, who got me the job, earned £2.50 because he was more experienced! We both made about £20 on a saturday morning in tips washing cars and fcuking loved that job.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,751 Mod ✭✭✭✭Gumbo


    earned 2.02 an hour working in a big brand off licence in 1997.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 204 ✭✭caesarthechimp


    RichardAnd wrote: »
    I save 60-70% of my wages each week, you never know when it might be needed.
    You are overpaid.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,251 ✭✭✭Sandvich


    Speaking of relatively low underage wages, I used to do work in school(running the library and computer room) and got paid **** all. Cleaning up the canteen got you a can of coke and a mars bar at least(which was a pound at the time). Unsure why I did it, my friends were swots and I guess they roped me into it.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,121 ✭✭✭RichardAnd


    Enrate wrote: »
    You are overpaid.

    You have no right to tell me that. You don't know what I do or how much I earn and that is a monumentally stupid comment to make. I'm a web developer, I work my ass off 41+ hours plus a week for less than 30k a year. I've no wife, no kids, no mortgage, I don't drink, I don't smoke and I don't drive a 10-D car.

    I live simply, I work hard and yet you have the audacity the label me as over paid simply because I am good with money?


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,362 ✭✭✭Sergeant


    Interesting article OP, gives an overview of the varying wage rates at the time. This is an article by a hard left reporter, complaining about the wage for low skilled jobs at the time.

    He makes the fatal mistake of presuming that the people applying for these jobs needed to pay a mortgage, take an occasional holiday, and have a couple of children on these wages. As opposed to young, casual workers, and those starting out on a career in a non-professional industry.

    Instead, we were festooned with a minimum wage, which was one of the factors that made this country so uncompetitive. It produced an un-natural floor on the cost of goods and services, and is a glaring example of the damage overt government regulation can have on the macro economy.


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  • Moderators, Home & Garden Moderators, Regional Midwest Moderators, Regional West Moderators Posts: 16,716 Mod ✭✭✭✭yop


    Started off working for AST Computers in 1997 in tech support for 13k punts. Thought I was a millionaire :)


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,091 ✭✭✭dearg lady


    oh god I remember working for £2.50 an hour back in 99-00 I think it was, my friends thought I was mad, but a job's a job, and apparently I wasn't alone to be earning that!! The job I had after that I earned £5.38 ph and I felt so rich!!
    RichardAnd wrote: »
    You have no right to tell me that. You don't know what I do or how much I earn and that is a monumentally stupid comment to make. I'm a web developer, I work my ass off 41+ hours plus a week for less than 30k a year. I've no wife, no kids, no mortgage, I don't drink, I don't smoke and I don't drive a 10-D car.

    I live simply, I work hard and yet you have the audacity the label me as over paid simply because I am good with money?

    Richard I'm pretty good at saving but you really take it to the next level, what do you do for fun???!!! ;):D
    Nah, I'm just kidding, I like to have a rainy day fund myself, ya never know what might happen


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,582 ✭✭✭WalterMitty


    in 1998 i had a summer job working in a toilet roll factory and we got around 7or 8 punts an hour which was a lot at that time for an unskilled general operative job. a year earlier i had been working in Quinnsworth for 1.80punts an hour! didnt last long and got a job in a garage for 3punts an hour plus tips for washing cars.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,251 ✭✭✭Sandvich


    I suppose 10k a year(if you're saving 2/3s of it) is sustainable if you've no mortgage etc., just about. That's around what welfare is. You'd have to pay a good bit more on rent, but I had a friend who managed that just about since he didn't get RA.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,121 ✭✭✭RichardAnd


    dearg lady wrote: »
    oh god I remember working for £2.50 an hour back in 99-00 I think it was, my friends thought I was mad, but a job's a job, and apparently I wasn't alone to be earning that!! The job I had after that I earned £5.38 ph and I felt so rich!!



    Richard I'm pretty good at saving but you really take it to the next level, what do you do for fun???!!! ;):D
    Nah, I'm just kidding, I like to have a rainy day fund myself, ya never know what might happen


    To be fair, I'm a special case in that I have asperger syndrome thus, I rarely socialise. But for fun, well I practice music, I write short fiction stories and I paint pictures. None of those cost money and they are extremely rewarding. The only things I regularly buy that isn't an essential would be books. I must sound like a rather dull person :rolleyes:


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,091 ✭✭✭dearg lady


    RichardAnd wrote: »
    To be fair, I'm a special case in that I have asperger syndrome thus, I rarely socialise. But for fun, well I practice music, I write short fiction stories and I paint pictures. None of those cost money and they are extremely rewarding. The only things I regularly buy that isn't an essential would be books. I must sound like a rather dull person :rolleyes:

    not at all! oh to be musically minded...!! :)
    Well I do tend to socialise quite a bit but I never spend a lot of money on it, nor do I have expensive tastes or habits, ie gadgets or make up or clothes so I find it quite easy to save. Holidays are my most exp habit, and even at that I backpack so can do it quite cheaply but people often comment that I must be loaded when they hear I'm going away, despite me being on quite a modest wage. It's funny how people make these assumptions without knowing the full story.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,489 ✭✭✭iMax


    I found a payslip from 2000 the other day during a clearout. My takehome then was (the equivelent of) €430 per month more than I make now.

    Now I have a mortgage & kid to support... but as my boss keeps telling me, I'm lucky to have a job... :(


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3 thebuzzer


    Hi, Can any1 plz tell me how to post a new thread??


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 955 ✭✭✭Pot Noodle =


    Look for new thread button like post reply one its usually on the top of a topic page


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,745 ✭✭✭Eliot Rosewater


    Sandvich wrote: »
    At least our welfare is high enough to afford people to actually do things while on the dole

    But that's not what welfare supposed to be for. It's supposed to tie you over with the bare minimums until you find new work. It's not supposed to be used to pay for Sky subscriptions or nights out.


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