CSO report on public-private pay gap

Japer · 19-10-2012 01:44AM

What about the perks people many in the public sector get. eg Gardai can retire after only 30 years service, and their average pension pot is worth 1.1 million - most of which they did not contribe to themselves.
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/garda-pension-worth-11m-1664588.html

better pay, better holidays, more sickies, better pensions, more job security.....where is the incentive to take risks and create wealth in the economy / be a net contributer to government coffers?

barneystinson · 19-10-2012 02:30AM

Japer wrote: »

What about the perks people many in the public sector get. eg Gardai can retire after only 30 years service, and their average pension pot is worth 1.1 million - most of which they did not contribe to themselves.
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/garda-pension-worth-11m-1664588.html

Ah yes, the old Garda pension chestnut - because that's the typical public sector pension isn't it... :rolleyes:

As if PS pensions weren't generous enough you're using an outlier that applies to what, 2-3% of the PS workforce to make your point; I have the impression of you foaming at the mouth and damaging your keyboard with the venom with which your hitting those keys...

Those Indo figures also overstate the actual economic cost of the Garda pension by over 50% (http://www.tridentconsulting.ie/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Pension-Shock-public-service-pensions1.pdf); it's still very generous alright.

I still think the figure from my link is on the high side, because a post-1995 Garda will have paid A-class PRSI, and I don't think the value of the contributory pension that ends up being rolled up into that 26k Garda pension has been included, but I'm not a pensions expert.

Personally, given my age and circumstances, I'd much rather have my pension levy & contributions back if I could (I can't remember whether we've decided on the pension levy being a paycut or a pension contribution, it changes so often depending on what argument is going on at the time!), and be free to sort out my own pension provision in addition to my contributory state pension, which my A-class stamp gets me anyway.

Japer wrote: »

better pay, better holidays, more sickies, better pensions, more job security.....where is the incentive to take risks and create wealth in the economy / be a net contributer to government coffers?

Unlimited earning potential? Less restraints on engaging in extra work outside of your day-job? The likelihood of a more transferable / marketable skillset, and greater mobility.
The public sector and private sector aren't the same Japer; that's the case all over the world, not just Ireland, and I think it's very sad that you seem to see the entire PS and everyone in it as not being a "net contributer" whatever that is.

Riskymove · 19-10-2012 08:45AM

sarumite wrote: »

My understanding is that the pension levy doesn't actually affect the cost of pensions. It was specifically designed so that it wouldn't affect the cost of pensions as it is neither a contribution nor does it reduce the gross pay.

my inclusion of the pension levy in this context was about partially meeting the cost of pensions each year - i.e. the levy taken off PS workers could be put towards the cost of pensions

You are rigth that the levy will not actually reduce the gross cost of pensions

Farmer Pudsey · 19-10-2012 09:20AM

barneystinson wrote: »

Holy Jebus, are we still stuck on "the average"?! :eek:

.

You have to work off what are mathmatical figures. It amazes me the amount of people that cannot understan basic maths.

If the average is 940 euro/week nobody is disputing it then half the public service pay pot is paid above this 7.15 billion euro. There is no reason that alot of this could not be cut by the region of 25-30%. with some staff on 100K taking these kinds of hits. And yes part of it has to come from the semi=state sector that has suffered no cut in pay. In the last recession the government demanded super dividends from semi-state bodies. If this happened again then it could be used as a way to force the pay of semi state bodies down. It is the same with quango's.

No county manager should be on more than 100K and alot should be on less the same with hospital consultants if in Germany they pay them less than 100K so can we.

abd yes may some staff below 40K may have to take modest cuts but the bulk of the fat and the largess is at the top where most of the travel expenses are as well.

It was a disgrace that public service managers did not take a pay cut the same as the rest. how can we sit accross from senior French and German CS who are earning little more than half the irish rate.

Riskymove · 19-10-2012 09:38AM

Farmer Pudsey wrote: »

If the average is 940 euro/week nobody is disputing it then half the public service pay pot is paid above this 7.15 billion euro.

nope

thats the median, which is lower, so less than half are paid over the average

There is no reason that alot of this could not be cut by the region of 25-30%. with some staff on 100K taking these kinds of hits.

that's just unrealistic

And yes part of it has to come from the semi=state sector that has suffered no cut in pay.

while I dont disagree that pay rates remain high in semi-states, their wages are not part of the PS wage bill so wont really affect efforts at tackling the deficit.

itzme · 19-10-2012 09:58AM

Farmer Pudsey wrote: »

You have to work off what are mathmatical figures. It amazes me the amount of people that cannot understan basic maths.

If the average is 940 euro/week nobody is disputing it then half the public service pay pot is paid above this 7.15 billion euro. There is no reason that alot of this could not be cut by the region of 25-30%. with some staff on 100K taking these kinds of hits. And yes part of it has to come from the semi=state sector that has suffered no cut in pay. In the last recession the government demanded super dividends from semi-state bodies. If this happened again then it could be used as a way to force the pay of semi state bodies down. It is the same with quango's.

I'm afraid its not a lack of understanding of basic maths that is the problem it is where this basic form of maths is applicable and what information, meaning and substance can get obtained from it.

If you use the average/median and are going to attribute any meaning to it, you first have to examine its statistical significance. This includes calculating the standard deviation or variance in the data. If these are high then there is little meaning to the data. That is the whole reason for this CSO report, it is trying to use regression modelling to try and overcome the problems with interpreting average/medians. Take a look at the first two paragraphs of the CSO report

Comparing pay in the public and private sectors is not a straightforward task. A range of different results can be derived depending on the methodology or model specification used to estimate pay differentials. Complexity also arises as the composition of the two sectors are heterogeneous, comprising of a variety of different industries, occupations and workers who themselves come with a variety of education, experience and skill sets. Using simple average mean (or median) hourly or weekly pay to compare earnings across the public and private sectors will therefore, most likely, be misleading. For example, pay differentials may arise from a range of structural differences: skill levels required for a particular job; experience; qualifications; or location. Typically the relative distribution of men and women also has an impact. For these reasons CSO have employed a number of multivariate statistical techniques in an attempt to standardize these effects and present comparable data.

For a breakdown of the actual pay in the public service please take a look http://www.rte.ie/news/2012/0723/howlin-defends-public-service-pay-increments.html
Now if you honestly think that a 25-30% reduction can be achieved I would assume you would do some maths from these figures and show how it can be done.

Again I don't disagree with reductions in PS pay or tackling the pension problem. I always have a problem with the bandying about of random (in my eyes) figures like 30%. Especially since there is no consideration of the other side of the balance sheet. Take 30% out of PS pay would not save 30% of the 14(ish)bn, it would save 15% at best (this has been explained many many times on boards).

fliball123 · 19-10-2012 11:09AM

cosbloodymick wrote: »

I am well aware of the hardship in the private sector and anyone that loses their job has my utmost sympathy.
With regard to your point regarding allowances and increments, I would also prefer if their were none of either. But unfortunately in the Public Sector workers have to undergo an incremental progression to get to the proper rate for the job they do. If the powers that be don't want an incremental scale and a never ending rising Public sector pay bill they can put staff on the correct rate for the job (as what happens in most private sector companies). Leo Varadkar who recently called for an end or suspension of increments is in the happy position of starting at the rate for the job he does, which happens to be remunerated at double what most Public servants earn.
I also agree some of the allowances are wrong, especially the ones politicians get, but unfortunately over the years rather than give a pay rise for extra work they gave an allowance which in my opinion should never have been the way to go about things.
I pay the same taxes as any private sector worker and I also use public services. Am I happy with the service provided? Overall no. But hammering ordinary people at the coalface trying their best to provide same services with reduced resources is counterproductive.

Dont make it personal about Varadkar, IMO Varadkar is has his finger on the pulse of the mood of the people who voted his party the biggest party in gov. He may be as you say earning the top of his salary..We are broke and borrowing and yet increments some of which reached 1/4 of a billion are still being paid over the last 4/5 years and yet every December the tax payer and services get hit continuously the PS got one hit of a pay cut at about 7% and where asked to pay a bit more for a pension that in the majority of instances will never be covered by what they pay either by the levy or their other pensions contributions. See this is the other thing...People in general dont want ps workers earning at the lower end to be hit but anyone earning from say 30k onwards can take a hit we cant afford it. The public sector is out of kilter with other countries in the OCED and with the private sector...Yet in December the tax payer will pay more and services will yet again be slashed....so paying more for less...How long did the PS think people would take this..we are now 5 years into it and finally we are getting pressure from the troika to say we are paying too much to our public sector...I would like to leave cpa alone and when it finishes a 3rd bout of benchmarking and bring the PS back in line to whats going on in the country

fliball123 · 19-10-2012 11:12AM

not yet wrote: »

So why don't all the people so desperate to save money go chase this..

I believe they are chasing it.. But how hard and how expensive would it be to have someone monitoring babysitting, giving grinds...even things that are very very easy to spot such as building work most of the builders are legitimate and will do cash deals providing no one is inspecting or if they dont get rumbled...It would cost a hell of a lot to actually do...The best way to tackle it is to stop taxing the fcuk out of work which when you take the costs of doing work in this country is very high.

itzme · 19-10-2012 11:40AM

fliball123 wrote: »

every December the tax payer and services get hit continuously the PS got one hit of a pay cut at about 7% and where asked to pay a bit more for a pension that in the majority of instances will never be covered by what they pay either by the levy or their other pensions contributions.

In another thread I addressed this misconception that you keep propagating, please stop telling this mistruth about the pension levy. For clarity I am quoting the act and linking to it again.
The truth is that the contributions from the pension levy do not go to the pension for public servants and do not give any additional benefit to the payees pension themselves. The money goes to the exchequer. To prove this, I bring your attention to page 9 of the act

15 7.—
(1) Nothing in this Act is to be read as conferring any
additional benefit payable, or that may become payable, under a public service pension scheme.
(2) A deduction under section 2 is not a pension contribution for the purposes of the Pensions Act 1990.

ardmacha · 19-10-2012 11:45AM

but anyone earning from say 30k onwards can take a hit we cant afford it.

Presumably if people in the PS earning over €30k can "afford" to "take a hit" then everyone earning over €30k can afford to pay more tax?

Gumbo · 19-10-2012 12:06PM

fliball123 wrote: »

anyone earning from say 30k onwards public ans private can take a hit

I look forward to the tax payer paying my mortgage again then.
After the last round of cuts, i then qualified for FIS. Might get more now in January

Head The Wall · 19-10-2012 12:35PM

cosbloodymick wrote: »

But unfortunately in the Public Sector workers have to undergo an incremental progression to get to the proper rate for the job they do.

Another deluded poster that thinks everybody should start on the top of their scale because that is the correct rate for it. Obviously gaining experience (supposedly, according to PMDS) doesn't factor into your thought process.

cosbloodymick wrote: »

Pension Levy of 7.5% + Pay cut of 8.5 % = 15% reduction aswell as the USC and other tax increases.
The Taoiseachs right hand men walked into his office and said the public sector pay cuts don't apply to me and my senior public sector colleagues and amazingly the Taoiseach agreed. Quelle surprise!!
One rule for the elite another for the rest of us

You don't do cold hard facts very well do you,

Public Servants earning from 125,000 – 165,000 will see an 8% pay reduction.

You must be on a pretty good wage if you received an 8.5% cut

cosbloodymick wrote: »

It is true. They appealed to Brian Lenihan on the grounds that they no longer got a bonus so they should be spared the pay cut and he acquiesced.

You may not like to hear it but the reason they got it reversed was because they considered the bonus as part of their core pay. This is the very same reason all these ridiculous allowances and "increments" are still in place. That makes you a hypocrite if you ask me.

Farmer Pudsey wrote: »

The average PS wage is 930 euro's there are 295,000 of them costing 14.3 billion. If we could save in the order of 20% over the next 3 years through targated wage cut on those above 40K and especially those above the average as well as through natural wastage and through targated redundancy schemes.

Farmer Pudsey you constantly ask for wage reductions but not on the lower paid when they are the ones that get overpaid the most. What's your connection to this situation because if you really cared about it you would want to get rid of all waste but especially the waste that is so out of kilter with comparable roles elsewhere?

Gumbo · 19-10-2012 12:43PM

Head The Wall wrote: »

Farmer Pudsey you constantly ask for wage reductions but not on the lower paid when they are the ones that get overpaid the most. What's your connection to this situation because if you really cared about it you would want to get rid of all waste but especially the waste that is so out of kilter with comparable roles elsewhere?

Are you really qualified to ask that question considering you neither reside in or pay taxes in Ireland?

southsiderosie · 19-10-2012 02:31PM

Head The Wall wrote: »

Farmer Pudsey you constantly ask for wage reductions but not on the lower paid when they are the ones that get overpaid the most. What's your connection to this situation because if you really cared about it you would want to get rid of all waste but especially the waste that is so out of kilter with comparable roles elsewhere?

kceire wrote: »

Are you really qualified to ask that question considering you neither reside in or pay taxes in Ireland?

MOD NOTE:

People in this forum do not need to justify their 'connection' to a situation in order to discuss it, so please stop with this line of argument/questioning.

Farmer Pudsey · 19-10-2012 02:31PM

Riskymove wrote: »

nope

thats the median, which is lower, so less than half are paid over the average

that's just unrealistic

while I dont disagree that pay rates remain high in semi-states, their wages are not part of the PS wage bill so wont really affect efforts at tackling the deficit.

Sorry that is the average, total pay bill divided by the no of workers. Haif the wage bill is above this and half below.The median is totally different this is where you try ( and you can only try to find what wage is the middle worker it is on 295K workers divides by 2. This serves little or no purpose in calculating paybills or costs.

Anything that affect public sector workers is unrealistic as far as I can see.

There is no reason that semi-state bodies cannot make a contribution in the form of a super divident to the exchequer. This happened in the late eighties where I think Ray MacSharry as Finance Minster made Telecom Eireann ( even though it was looseing money) and the ESB pay a dividend to the exchequer after the state is the only shareholder in these bodies. If as the result of this these bodies have to reduce pay so be it The level of pay at the ESB, Board Gais, RTE the DAA etc is way out of line with private Industry.

southsiderosie · 19-10-2012 02:41PM

MOD NOTE:

As usual, a thread involving the public sector is turning uncivil. If you cannot discuss the topic without leveling personal insults and snide remarks at other posters, then don't post.

frankosw wrote: »

Without meaning to sound unpleasant you really are in no position to offer ecnonomic advice with that level of written English.

Completely inappropriate. This is the Politics forum, not the Spelling and Grammar forum.

fliball123 wrote: »

Attack the ball not the man

sarumite wrote: »

If you are going to attack someone on their spelling and typographical errors, you really need to be beyond reproach yourself. Otherwise you end up looking like a foolish hypocrite.

If you see posts that you feel are insulting or inappropriate, please report them rather than chastising on-thread. The latter veers into backseat modding territory.

itzme · 19-10-2012 02:55PM

Farmer Pudsey wrote: »

Sorry that is the average, total pay bill divided by the no of workers. Haif the wage bill is above this and half below.The median is totally different this is where you try ( and you can only try to find what wage is the middle worker it is on 295K workers divides by 2. This serves little or no purpose in calculating paybills or costs.

I'm sorry but your understanding of average is wrong. An average is not a guaranteed 50/50. Only if the distribution of the input data is a normal distribution is this true. Please take a look at page 20 (Figure 1.16) of the CSO report which demonstrates that the data is not normally distributed. So it is fair to say that this 50/50 split you are claiming is incorrect.

Also please take a look at the link I posted in response to you which shows the breakdown of numbers and wage groupings in the PS where you can work out the actual breakdown. To help you out I've done it for you, it shows that for 930/940 (you seem to switch between the two) a week wage you are quoting which works out at 48.8k a year (ish) then 60% of the workforce is under this amount with 40% above. (in this case I have taken all those earning below 50k, so it would be fair to say that it is not 60.54/39.46 split but less than 60%, but at the same time I would find it crazy for someone to try and imply that 10% of the workforce earn between 49-50 either.)

Farmer Pudsey · 19-10-2012 02:55PM

Head The Wall wrote: »

Farmer Pudsey you constantly ask for wage reductions but not on the lower paid when they are the ones that get overpaid the most. What's your connection to this situation because if you really cared about it you would want to get rid of all waste but especially the waste that is so out of kilter with comparable roles elsewhere?

I will try to answer even though maybe I should not. My connection is that I am an ordinary tax payer I am both a PAYE worker and Farm part time.

I think that there is a misconception out there about the issues concerning our problems. If we look at other countries the level of pay at higher levels in the PS are nowhere near in Ireland. Our Semi-state bodies have over the last 10 years failed to contribute anything to the economy (privatising them will not rectify the issue as we cann see from Eircom/Aer Lingus and Greencore) Rather at the top of the PS we again need to employ people (not necessarily the best and brightest as this has failed) who have an intrest in Public Service and not in there pocket

When I see a public servant quoting what they will recieve in the private sector and not taking into account there present term and conditions my attitude is let them off to the faraway green hills. Guards/Teacher/Middle Management in the public service now earn as much if not more than people middle management in the private sector.

I am absolutly astonished that so called unionised workers can allow a situtation where
1. we will have a two tier Public service wage rates because as long as mine are not touched it alright jack
2 Unions are no longer to any great extent involved in the private sector and do not seem to care about these workers
3.There cannot see that we cannot pay present rates of pay and not affect services
4 A Cabal of politicians/senior PS/unions/semi-state management fail to see the connection between reward and work and what is right for the country.
5 What about our childern what will this country be like in 10 years time

Riskymove · 19-10-2012 03:02PM

Farmer Pudsey wrote: »

Sorry that is the average, total pay bill divided by the no of workers. Haif the wage bill is above this and half below..

er..well perhaps I just dont see what point you were trying to make then by "half the public service pay pot is paid above this 7.15 billion euro". we know what the paybill is and we know what half of the paybill is. What point are you making?

the average is as you say, but I also dont see how its any use to "calculate pay costs"...you need to know the overall cost and the number of workers in the first place in order to calculate it!

the median is lower than the average in this report and therefore, in this case, the person "in the middle" earns less than the average therefore more people earn below the average than above- a more relevant point in these discussions

Head The Wall · 19-10-2012 03:05PM

Farmer Pudsey wrote: »

I will try to answer even though maybe I should not. My connection is that I am an ordinary tax payer I am both a PAYE worker and Farm part time.

I think that there is a misconception out there about the issues concerning our problems. If we look at other countries the level of pay at higher levels in the PS are nowhere near in Ireland. Our Semi-state bodies have over the last 10 years failed to contribute anything to the economy (privatising them will not rectify the issue as we cann see from Eircom/Aer Lingus and Greencore) Rather at the top of the PS we again need to employ people (not necessarily the best and brightest as this has failed) who have an intrest in Public Service and not in there pocket

When I see a public servant quoting what they will recieve in the private sector and not taking into account there present term and conditions my attitude is let them off to the faraway green hills. Guards/Teacher/Middle Management in the public service now earn as much if not more than people middle management in the private sector.

I am absolutly astonished that so called unionised workers can allow a situtation where
1. we will have a two tier Public service wage rates because as long as mine are not touched it alright jack
2 Unions are no longer to any great extent involved in the private sector and do not seem to care about these workers
3.There cannot see that we cannot pay present rates of pay and not affect services
4 A Cabal of politicians/senior PS/unions/semi-state management fail to see the connection between reward and work and what is right for the country.
5 What about our childern what will this country be like in 10 years time

That still doesn't answer my question, benchmarking should be imposed on everyone. Those still underpaid should get increases while those overpaid should get decreased. If that happened it would be the lower paid getting cut the most backed up by the recent reports.

You still don't seem to accept that they should be cut alongside the rest of those that are overpaid.

I can't ever see the unions agreeing to a benchmarking situation where some staff get increases while others get decreases. While this kind of thing goes on we have porters earning more than paramedics, it's madness

Riskymove · 19-10-2012 03:09PM

Farmer Pudsey wrote: »

I am absolutly astonished that so called unionised workers can allow a situtation where
1. we will have a two tier Public service wage rates because as long as mine are not touched it alright jack

tbh this is human nature, it has happened many times before in pay deals

these other future PS workers dont exist yet so it is easier to screw them

2 Unions are no longer to any great extent involved in the private sector and do not seem to care about these workers

imo it is the other way around, in the good years many workers did not see any benefit in a union and numbers fell. We also saw the introduction of many multinationals with union unfriendly approaches

I would say that there are still many areas of the private sector unionised - indeed most disuptes/labour court cases appear to involve private sector

Unions such as Unite and SIPTU are particularly active

itzme · 19-10-2012 03:22PM

A more entertaining example of the danger of putting importance on averages without examining the underlying data its worth checking out hans rosling
http://www.usablellc.net/the-joy-of-statistics.
What is the average number of legs for Swedish people? 1.9999
That means that the vast majority of people in Sweden have more than the average number of legs.
We should be wary of placing significance or our own interpretation on averages, and any scientist or mathematician is.

Godge · 19-10-2012 04:03PM

Farmer Pudsey wrote: »

I will try to answer even though maybe I should not. My connection is that I am an ordinary tax payer I am both a PAYE worker and Farm part time.

Rather at the top of the PS we again need to employ people (not necessarily the best and brightest as this has failed) who have an intrest in Public Service and not in there pocket

#

You see I have a problem with this type of sentiment.

I could come on here and say that instead of paying farmers money from Europe that would be better spent on say public sector salaries or social welfare, that the farmers should survive on subsistence farming because of their "love of the land", I would be rightly castigated. Or that musicians should not be paid because of their love of what they do.

Yet many many times, posters come on here and say that for reasons of "public service" or "patriotism", public servants should settle for second-best salaries. These posters think there is nothing wrong with expecting someone else to survive on less for the "good of the country" and for "public service".

I am not talking about those who argue (rightly in some cases) that public servants are overpaid because of comparisons with Europe or the private sector - at least those are empirical arguments that can be dismissed with facts. But to argue that somehow that public servants should accept less because of a love of public service doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense when you similar demands are not made of other groups.

sarumite · 19-10-2012 05:02PM

Godge wrote: »

#

You see I have a problem with this type of sentiment.

I could come on here and say that instead of paying farmers money from Europe that would be better spent on say public sector salaries or social welfare, that the farmers should survive on subsistence farming because of their "love of the land", I would be rightly castigated. Or that musicians should not be paid because of their love of what they do.

Yet many many times, posters come on here and say that for reasons of "public service" or "patriotism", public servants should settle for second-best salaries. These posters think there is nothing wrong with expecting someone else to survive on less for the "good of the country" and for "public service".

I agree with your argument, however it does go both ways. Its quite often you will hear someone on here say "well next time your house in on fire and look for a public servant fireman......" or "next time you are in the hospital" etc. Both sides play emotive argument. If you can't (and shouldn't) use 'public service' as a reason for supporting a reduction in PS pay it should equally apply that you can't use the fact that an employee does a 'public service' as a reason to why that reduction should come from somewhere else in the budget and not in PS pay.

Head The Wall · 19-10-2012 05:18PM

Riskymove wrote: »

I would say that there are still many areas of the private sector unionised - indeed most disuptes/labour court cases appear to involve private sector

Unions such as Unite and SIPTU are particularly active

70.4% of the PS are in a union while it's 19.4% for the private sector.

tayto lover · 19-10-2012 05:35PM

Head The Wall wrote: »

70.4% of the PS are in a union while it's 19.4% for the private sector.

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the socialists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for me,
and there was no one left to speak for me.

Martin Niemöller

cosbloodymick · 19-10-2012 06:59PM

Head The Wall wrote: »

Another deluded poster that thinks everybody should start on the top of their scale because that is the correct rate for it. Obviously gaining experience (supposedly, according to PMDS) doesn't factor into your thought process.

You don't do cold hard facts very well do you,

You must be on a pretty good wage if you received an 8.5% cut

You may not like to hear it but the reason they got it reversed was because they considered the bonus as part of their core pay. This is the very same reason all these ridiculous allowances and "increments" are still in place. That makes you a hypocrite if you ask me.

Farmer Pudsey you constantly ask for wage reductions but not on the lower paid when they are the ones that get overpaid the most. What's your connection to this situation because if you really cared about it you would want to get rid of all waste but especially the waste that is so out of kilter with comparable roles elsewhere?

You are making my argument for me. You can't have it both ways. You either accept an incremental scale or you don't. If you don't then you accept that one starts at the rate for the job. If you do then you accept an incremental scale of progression. Which is it?

Less of the personal abuse please. I do not consider my position in any way hypocritical. The senior civil servants did not make their case on the grounds that their bonus was core pay. There was no mention of core pay at the time. The reason they were not cut the same as the rest of the Public Service is because they had the ministers ear, simple as.
For what were they getting bonus's anyway? bankrupting the country?
If only the frontline could get a bonus. We don't even get as much as a cracker at Christmas!!

frankosw · 19-10-2012 08:22PM

Farmer Pudsey wrote: »

I will try to answer even though maybe I should not. My connection is that I am an ordinary tax payer I am both a PAYE worker and Farm part time.

I think that there is a misconception out there about the issues concerning our problems. If we look at other countries the level of pay at higher levels in the PS are nowhere near in Ireland. Our Semi-state bodies have over the last 10 years failed to contribute anything to the economy (privatising them will not rectify the issue as we cann see from Eircom/Aer Lingus and Greencore) Rather at the top of the PS we again need to employ people (not necessarily the best and brightest as this has failed) who have an intrest in Public Service and not in there pocket

When I see a public servant quoting what they will recieve in the private sector and not taking into account there present term and conditions my attitude is let them off to the faraway green hills. Guards/Teacher/Middle Management in the public service now earn as much if not more than people middle management in the private sector.

I am absolutly astonished that so called unionised workers can allow a situtation where
1. we will have a two tier Public service wage rates because as long as mine are not touched it alright jack
2 Unions are no longer to any great extent involved in the private sector and do not seem to care about these workers
3.There cannot see that we cannot pay present rates of pay and not affect services
4 A Cabal of politicians/senior PS/unions/semi-state management fail to see the connection between reward and work and what is right for the country.
5 What about our childern what will this country be like in 10 years time

Whoah..the largest union in Ireland is SIPTU..it is a private-sector union.

cosbloodymick · 19-10-2012 08:35PM

Head The Wall wrote: »

Another deluded poster that thinks everybody should start on the top of their scale because that is the correct rate for it. Obviously gaining experience (supposedly, according to PMDS) doesn't factor into your thought process.

You don't do cold hard facts very well do you,

You must be on a pretty good wage if you received an 8.5% cut

You may not like to hear it but the reason they got it reversed was because they considered the bonus as part of their core pay. This is the very same reason all these ridiculous allowances and "increments" are still in place. That makes you a hypocrite if you ask me.

Farmer Pudsey you constantly ask for wage reductions but not on the lower paid when they are the ones that get overpaid the most. What's your connection to this situation because if you really cared about it you would want to get rid of all waste but especially the waste that is so out of kilter with comparable roles elsewhere?

fliball123 wrote: »

Dont make it personal about Varadkar, IMO Varadkar is has his finger on the pulse of the mood of the people who voted his party the biggest party in gov. He may be as you say earning the top of his salary..We are broke and borrowing and yet increments some of which reached 1/4 of a billion are still being paid over the last 4/5 years and yet every December the tax payer and services get hit continuously the PS got one hit of a pay cut at about 7% and where asked to pay a bit more for a pension that in the majority of instances will never be covered by what they pay either by the levy or their other pensions contributions. See this is the other thing...People in general dont want ps workers earning at the lower end to be hit but anyone earning from say 30k onwards can take a hit we cant afford it. The public sector is out of kilter with other countries in the OCED and with the private sector...Yet in December the tax payer will pay more and services will yet again be slashed....so paying more for less...How long did the PS think people would take this..we are now 5 years into it and finally we are getting pressure from the troika to say we are paying too much to our public sector...I would like to leave cpa alone and when it finishes a 3rd bout of benchmarking and bring the PS back in line to whats going on in the country

I mentioned Leo Varadkar because he said increments should be stopped.
Easy for him when he is not relying on them. This is the same Leo who promised pre election "not another red cent to the banks".
See how that turned out!!

Farmer Pudsey · 19-10-2012 09:14PM

frankosw wrote: »

Whoah..the largest union in Ireland is SIPTU..it is a private-sector union.

Yes it is the largest however most of its members are in the state services I imagine.

CSO report on public-private pay gap

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