They wouldn't want to. A decent plumber, builder or electrician makes tons of money (you do remember the bills they charge us, so you?) if they are prepared to work hard. By the time they are 50 they are either all handsomely retired or making a good living in property investment or as a project manager. Any sensible privately employed person whose job has a physical age limit plans their career accordingly, and charges accordingly.
Sure. Remove the price of the material from the money you paid him. Remove the travelling costs. Remove the different taxes, price of the accountant... And you end up with "not-so-great" salary.
ATL has been on strike about 0 times up until now, so im not too sure what you are talking about. I was never angry at bank workers on the floor - tbh they deserve raises more than anybody as they are the people who always have to deal with the angry public, as opposed to the guys who caused it at the top. RE Plumbers et al: Not a job that always has work so they prices reflect that - also remember they are skilled and trained people and so require pay based upon this.
Maybe in Slovakia but Plumbing or any form of skilled manual work here commands a very nice salary becuase people in the UK are too lazy/busy to get their hands dirty (fit a bathroom), legislation has meant that an individual is no longer allowed to perform the maintenance (fit a boiler change a fuse block) or it is too complicated (fix almost any thing on a modern car)
When I started secondary school in the UK, we still had teachers who weren't afraid to dole out phyiscal abuse/punishment (delete as you think appropriate) to instill discipline. This was in 1994, in my second year of secondary school (my first was abroad in Germany). Not all of them were like this, but we had one or two who would throw a piece of chalk at you (or even the blackboard eraser), hit you across the knuckles/back of the head with a wooden ruler or simply physically haul you out of the class rather than ask you to leave. This didn't happen all the time of course, only when kids really stepped out of line. Most of the time it was a stern bo****king - either in front of the rest of the class, or by the headmaster or head of year. The physical punishment only really lasted a year or so while I was there - after that it was just the stern bo****kings, but they were generally reserved for those who were really in trouble and were usually conducted by the head of year behind closed doors. I'm not saying that this is the right way to do things or that discipline is a teacher's responsibility. What it did do however is instil discipline and a healthy respect for authority. You didn't dare step out of line when you were in one of their classes and you didn't dare piss the headmaster around. You didn't really want to tell your parents about it because you'd either be afraid of what the teacher would do or that your parents would side with the teacher. You do end up with an obedient and disciplined class, but of course the problem with this approach is that it's not exactly the best atmosphere in which to learn. Pupils are afraid to ask questions or put their hand up because they're afraid of getting shouted at, told off or getting a whack from a big wooden ruler. That's certainly the effect it had on me.
Not all builders etc are earning what you see on Rogue Traders. Certainly most builders etc work for self employed or bigger businesses and earn a wage rather than commanding their own numbers. This wage can also be affected by seasons and demand. If demand falls off they can easily find themselves out of work. Educating kids is pretty constant I'd say. Those that do well at the game usually put in the extra 3-4 hours per night for extras. It's also worth looking at teachers pay scales to make the comparison. I had a brief look and an unqualified teacher certainly earns a lot more than an unqualified builder, plumber or electrician. (added) Also, there is hardly any comparison between teacher's holiday entitlements and most other job titles ...
So do you want to penalise people for making a better career choice? I can think of some people who do ****-all, comparatively speaking, for the same money I earn. Then again, I make a very decent living compared to people grafting on a building site. Oh, hang on, there was that time, of course, when I spent long hours studying and pulling all-nighter cramming sessions for my multitude of exams, when my peers were down the pubs and nightclubs. There were the hours bussing to Uni when my peers were driving their first cars, because they were already earning money. There was the small matter of emigrating for a job and passing numerous exams again to find a job, while my peers... Well, you get the idea. Everybody pays. If not sooner, then later. Some people earn more because they worked for it.
Oh hang on ... I was just debating your "A decent plumber, builder or electrician makes tons of money". Nevermind.
Ouch ... bugger. Fair cop. I still stand by not believing anyone should receive a higher state pension, pay less towards it, or retire earlier than anyone else - unless they have paid for it themselves. We all belong here equally, we should put in equally, and we should get back equally. I've not heard any arguments in this thread or the police one, or the student one, nor the uproar about womens pensions (about bloody time if you ask me) that make me think the government is doing anything I disapprove of. Except if they try and raise my retirement age ... then I'll say NO! dammit.
They're not. As salaries go up so do NI contributions and hence State pension contributions. Employer pension contributions are a percentage of earnings, so also go up as salaries go up (the payout is higher as well so it's all even-Stevens). NHS staff, like teachers, can retire early (or could, but that has already been changing) but they are penalised for that in lower pension payouts. They put less money in, and it has to last over a longer period, so they get less in return. Don't get me wrong; I think teachers will have to dude up like the rest of us. But I challenge the whole public sector witch hunt that the government is encouraging to distract us from a problem that was basically caused by a private sector failing.
Not just that. Labour enjoyed 14 boom years while in power yet look at this. http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=jnhjj7mtl7cmt_&met_y=gd_pc_gdp&idim=eu_country:GB&dl=en&hl=en&q=uk+government+debt
You want to blame Labour for the recession now? Get with the real world. The only thing Labour can be blamed for is two expensive, futile wars and not saving for a rainy day. The Bush administration made similar mistakes: it blew its wad on two military campaigns and at the sane time cut taxes, so reduced government income. Add the two together, and you get a financial figure that strangely resembles the exact increase in the current US deficit. The tragedy is: had most Western nations been a bit wiser and less greedy over the last decade, the recession would have been a mere blip. It is not only citizens who took out sub-prime loans that they couldn't afford.
Undoing years of underspending by a government who somehow managed to raise national debt, sell off much of our state industry, and neglect every service they could get away with, isn't free. I'm surprised they manage to keep debt roughly constant over the years, not that reducing it would have been supported by pretty much any current economists in that climate.
No, Labour had lots of money in Gold Reserves. Until that is Brown sold off the Gold at the market low. Soon after the market boomed and now it's at its highest point.
The people wanted services ... boy did Labour deliver on that ... at our expense, as it has now become crystal clear. It is perfectly fair to lay blame at Labours feet, because guess who was holding the reigns between 1997 and 2010 ... stop defending the indefensible. Was it their fault the worldwide economic crash happened? No, I don't think anyone is suggesting that. Was it their fault we weren't ready for it? Yes, of course it was.
Naturally it wasn't their fault, but focussing too much on the financial sector (started with Thatcher and heavily continued - possibly more so, even - by Labour) - along with overspending even out of recession - did mean that when we got into a financial-oriented recession, we were one of the worse place countries to deal with it. It wasn't Labour's fault, of course, that a global recession occured, but Brown breaking his 'golden' fiscal rules repeatedly and being short-sighted made things a heck of a lot worse. I agree with that last bit; if all nations (and political parties; left and right) been a bit wiser over the past decade, the recession would have been a whole lot better. 1) They didn't underspend 2) They balanced the budget (and Labour quite rapidly screwed that one up) - agreed that doesn't mean anything with respect to national debt though 3) Certain industries - health, police, etc etc - should always be national of course, but I'm happy that utilities and various other industries were privatised Labour were in power for 13 years, and at the end of their reign some were still blaming Thatcher (even not-so-thinly-veiled in PMQs) - even though she had been out of office for two decades. There comes a time when the responsibility must fall with the encumbents (probably around 5 years which should be enough time for even fairly big SS reforms to start taking effect). I wouldn't say that Labour had a hard time due to the previous Government. In-fact, they had 10 years straight of great economic growth (and they handled it badly and then - as above - we got hit hard when the recession came along) - this great economic growth was partly due to Thatcher's supply side reforms (which didn't destroy manufacturing as many suggest). Which is why Labour - for all their moaning - never sought to change any of the big Thatcherite economic policies... In-short: Labour didn't have a hard time due to the previous Government. They didn't struggle to keep the budget balanced due to the recession, or teh evizl Thatcher. It was - especially under Brown - since Labour liked ordering IT projects which sounded 'sexy': http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-12905303 Due to arrogance they ignored plently of advice that they were overspending without much benefit: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/pol...lls-ignored-warnings-and-wasted-billions.html Leading to the civil service effectively rebelling against the Labour leadership: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/may/18/civil-servants-labour-spending So no, it wasn't all Thatcher's fault. Especially when she hadn't been in power for 2 decades
Errm have you seen the state of the rail way? Ask the families of the people who died at Hatfield if there was the adequate spending. Have you seen the state of English water? Compare that to Scottish water, and you'll see an 'Industry' which should never have been privatised ditto with public transport the only industry that has worked ok privatised has been Telecoms but its taken nearly 20 years to sort that mess out and the regulator has some teeth.
@tristanperry I agreed with all your post, except this: Add shareholders to the equation and things get expensive. See recent EDF price hikes. Thanks to the French for that. I honestly think that UK should be run exactly like a business - although I'm not suggesting privatising for the same reasons I mention EDF above. Take a successful self-made businessman like Branson. Turn the government in to the equivalent of non-exec directors and they should be the top experts in every industry in the UK. Make Branson/whoever the Chairman, bring in a massively successful CEO, like Land Rovers or Tescos, put in place the best board UK has to offer. Their job is to make the whole public service work as effectively and cheaply as possible, but entirely maximising the benefits to the end user - ie, us. Then create the new public service structure from the top down. Keep it publicly controlled so shareholders aren't waiting to be fed dividends. Business is well-practiced, functional, efficient, shrewd and successful. Exactly how our country should be run. I think this would work as long as there isn't the incentives to de-fraud, to sell-out, to fail.
