Good article on why we should not be borrowing to pay increases to public servants

Jon Snow said:

Genuine question: what do other countries do? Who should we be trying to emulate, or do people here have unrealistic expectations?

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You know nothing Jon Snow (sorry, couldn't resist!)

The Nordic countries are always referred to in studies of good public service. Those looking for higher PS pay here usually point out that taxes are much higher in these countries and look at how good the services are. There's a difference between correlation and causation though...Alas, with all the pay increases and massive increase in expenditure in this country during the bubble, we saw very little (if any) real increase in services. Throwing money at the problem doesn't seem to work here. I think perhaps the issue is cultural. We have a great little country for sure and I wouldn't live anywhere else, but I've given up on us ever having public services approaching the best in class - culturally I just don't think we are made up like that. Therefore, rather than throwing good money after bad, I would just stop borrowing or else divert the money into infrastructure or the like.

It's been thrown out there that salaries are not high enough and doctors are emigrating - this may be true for doctors, but how many of the other almost 300,000 public sector workers left their jobs since 2008? And if not, why not? If I am not happy with my pay and conditions, I look for work elsewhere (it seems logical). If so many in the PS didn't leave, then either they lack marketable skills or are happy with their T&Cs.

ardmacha said:

Just as a driving instructor for my son will be paid more than when I learned to drive, that person's "productivity" is training learners to pass today's test.

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Hi ardmacha,

That's true but if you find the instructor to be lousey, you can easily go somewhere else

ardmacha said:

Likewise a teacher or lecturer is currently productive by teaching a modern curriculum using modern It, and not by adding in spurious hours and the risible pretension that classes do not have to be prepared.

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I totally agree on the hours thing...makes no sense to me and I couldn't care if a teacher spent the minimum time or 12 hours a day in the school. It's the quality of the teaching that should be the focus. But without any measure of this, the only way a teacher becomes and stays a good teacher is through a moral requirement they may have. It would be far easier to be a poor teacher, and sure you're going to get the same pay as someone working far harder anyway so what's the point?

ardmacha said:

Any suggestions along the lines of that the recovery should be spread in tax cuts or the like rather than pay restoration is conflating apples and turnips and is basically corrupt.

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Tax cuts put money most people's pockets. Pay rises put money into some people's pockets. I think tax rates and pay rises should stay as they are until we start running a surplus and can start to pay down our national debt.

ardmacha said:

There is little hope for this country, arbitrary increases were followed by arbitrary cuts, that neither reflected the previous increases nor the employment market. You might expect after the recession that some sort of plan would emerge, but it is the opposite and the media and discussion boards like this are encouraging this dysfunction.

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Excellent point, and as I said, this "One for everyone in the audience" approach to pay rises (and cuts) means that until the productive stop subsidizing the unproductive in our PS nothing will change.

Firefly said:

The Nordic countries are always referred to in studies of good public service. Those looking for higher PS pay here usually point out that taxes are much higher in these countries and look at how good the services are. There's a difference between correlation and causation though...Alas, with all the pay increases and massive increase in expenditure in this country during the bubble, we saw very little (if any) real increase in services. Throwing money at the problem doesn't seem to work here.

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Throwing money does not work because there is no measurement of whether it will work or not. Blaming culture is too easy, you need to being the measures and that will change the culture.

Firefly said:

It's been thrown out there that salaries are not high enough and doctors are emigrating - this may be true for doctors, but how many of the other almost 300,000 public sector workers left their jobs since 2008? And if not, why not? If I am not happy with my pay and conditions, I look for work elsewhere (it seems logical). If so many in the PS didn't leave, then either they lack marketable skills or are happy with their T&Cs.

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There is a bit more to HR management than concluding all is well because everyone hasn't left and there is a large gap between being happy with conditions and leaving, especially as the government is a monopsony employer in many cases so leaving means emigrating. People are leaving from some jobs, the type of job where they cannot be easily replaced, but these jobs are less easily understood than doctors so the media doesn't talk about them. With the economy picking up the pace of leaving will increase. Most PS employment is a bit more than an assembly line, people work better when motivated, you want the person teaching your kids to be content and willing to do the drama and GAA after school, you want the nurse attending your granny to be in good humour and go the extra mile.

It is all very fine to ignore things, but damage done over a decade takes two decades to repair.

Isn’t it marvellous that one sector, good, bad or indifferent feels vindicated in criticizing another sector, good, bad or indifferent?

As a consumer, I use both sectors. Both need to seriously buck up and move on!

Sophrosyne said:

Isn’t it marvellous that one sector, good, bad or indifferent feels vindicated in criticizing another sector, good, bad or indifferent?

As a consumer, I use both sectors. Both need to seriously buck up and move on!

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Can you expand on what you mean?

Purple said:

That’s the problem with relativity Gerry, everyone gets paid the same so nobody gets paid what they are worth.
Nobody in the private sector should get a pay increase because of what someone else gets paid in the public sector. That's just daft.

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...................
Not quite (daft) .
Wages public/private have a habit of drifting up towards what someone else gets paid, it is a handy benchmark.
. A lot in Public service think self-employed get a fortune, a lot in Private work think Public servants are all too well paid.
The argument appears to run in the lower/middle income cohorts, it has the net effect of lowering wages.
Most workers in Private work are not well paid,
Most workers in Public work are not well paid.
I think more pertinent is this .
Is anyone in Private Work worth more than K100 .
Is anyone in Public Work worth more than k100.
There is NO doubt those in upper echelons are over -paid.

Or is the poor sap in a drain NOT worth more than k25.
Or is the poor clerk NOT worth more than k25.

Gerry Canning said:

...................
Not quite (daft) .
Wages public/private have a habit of drifting up towards what someone else gets paid, it is a handy benchmark.
. A lot in Public service think self-employed get a fortune, a lot in Private work think Public servants are all too well paid.
The argument appears to run in the lower/middle income cohorts, it has the net effect of lowering wages.
Most workers in Private work are not well paid,
Most workers in Public work are not well paid.
I think more pertinent is this .
Is anyone in Private Work worth more than K100 .
Is anyone in Public Work worth more than k100.
There is NO doubt those in upper echelons are over -paid.

Or is the poor sap in a drain NOT worth more than k25.
Or is the poor clerk NOT worth more than k25.

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The thing is that when benchmarked against other public sectors, or even against the private sector here, the upper echelons are under paid and those on the lower wages are over paid.
The real question is are there too many people in the upper echelons, what are they measured against and what's the sanction for not doing their job.

Not quite (yet again!)
I think we can all accept that in the Private sector, the upper echelons are grossly overpaid.
From memory one of the old Robber Barons said the owner should be paid no more than 7 times his lowest paid staff member.That keeps him level headed and he still owns the company wealth.

I am not so sure there are many (bosses) in the upper echelons in Private sector , a lot of middle management has been taken out.
Without the ears of middle management, the upper echelons become a tad infallible!.
I just don,t know about the Public Sector.There would seem to be a lot of middle management.

I think history shows us, in putting too much power into upper echelons, it results in eventual carnage for most companies.
That might be ok for Private Companies eg close down, sell the assets and move on.
That would, in Public service terms be a dictatorship ,and history again tells us they, dictatorships also foul up in time.

Every organisation needs real and measurable targets to meet.
In most SME's it's simple; make a profit and stay in business.
In larger companies and in the public sector it is harder to define and quantify the correct measurements but it is all the more important that it is done.
Every state body should establish a clear performance matrix, or KPI's, and publish the results.

If lean processes have resulted in clear improvements in services and reductions in cost then employees who contribute to those savings should be rewarded with a proportion of the savings. Those who did not contribute should not be rewarded.

A great thread, and I kept out of it. In my old age I have learned that there are those who look at Public and Private Sectors and patting themselves on the back suggest that I'm fine, I've worked my butt off, I'm in clover and nobody else should be there. Other than me, how dare anybody seek any kind of reward!

It's like the old Hollywood battle of Men -V- Women; the Plus -V- the Minus, the battles will never end.

For the record Civil Servants are working extra hours at nil rate of pay now and that is forever, not just for the length of Haddington Road or Lansdowne Road Agreements. Consequently, their hourly rate has been reduced further. Remember a draconian pay cut was cast on the civil service before Haddington Road Agreement. The overtime and premium payments are not about to be restored to their former levels either.

Whatever way you look at the Civil Service, the staff there have been inflicted with draconian cuts. Civil Servants do not like wastage either. A tiny bit of what was stolen from them is being restored. Try taking a Mars Bar from a child and replacing it with a Jelly Tot. The child will scream and dance. The unions of civil servants have fallen down on the job too. In reality they have become management. Consequently, after over 40 years of being a member of trades unions, I have decided to resign my membership. Trades Unions should behave like trades unions.

Like somebody said earlier, things are not gung-ho in the private sector either. There is lots of wastage there too. Whether we like it or not, it is still the customer that pays for the wastage.

I've just heard a report on morning radio that Irish nurses working in the UK haven't a notion of returning to the Auld Sod because they are so much more appreciated in the UK. The private hospitals and the HSE are spending lots on trying to recruit the nurses they spurned some years ago. The nurses are not buying and I don't blame them.

Ireland is changing, but is it changing for the better? I think not.

There won't be any 'big' payrises. For someone like me, on €40K (salary dropped from 43K plus addition of pension levy and USC), there will be a €1000 increase in 2016 through a reduction of the pension levy and and a €1000 pay increase in 2017 as part of pay restoration. In other words, an extra €20 approx net a week by 2017. I won't be cracking the champagne open any time soon. Try reading the actual agreement. Details are available online. [broken link removed]

Danmo said:

There won't be any 'big' payrises. For someone like me, on €40K (salary dropped from 43K plus addition of pension levy and USC), there will be a €1000 increase in 2016 through a reduction of the pension levy and and a €1000 pay increase in 2017 as part of pay restoration. In other words, an extra €20 approx net a week by 2017. I won't be cracking the champagne open any time soon. Try reading the actual agreement. Details are available online. [broken link removed]

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Sorry Danmo, your €20 to the good is in gross pay. After deductions you'll be lucky to receive around €10.00. I knew that would cheer you up.

Firefly said:

The Nordic countries are always referred to in studies of good public service.

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I'm always amazed that the Irish in particular swallow the guff that “if only we were like the Nordics and taxed higher, we'd have better public services”, as if having better (however judged) public services were the be all and the end of of society. It's the standard of living that counts. If you want to emulate a country that provides a better deal for its less well off we should emulate the USA, because the less well off in the USA have a higher standard of living than many middle income families in Europe. For example, 40% of Swedish households would rank as low income households in the USA. (Source: “EU vs USA”, Timbro Research,2004). If it comes down to a choice between a higher standard of living and better public services what would a rational person vote for? A higher stand of living of course. And high standards of living are associated with low tax regimes and pro growth economic policies.

Purple said:

That’s the problem with relativity Gerry, everyone gets paid the same so nobody gets paid what they are worth.
Nobody in the private sector should get a pay increase because of what someone else gets paid in the public sector. That's just daft.

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Its not true that ever one get paid the same as some get promoted and other don't, but the problem can be that in some positions opportunities for promotion are few. Increments are widely used in public sector. Germany uses them. France uses them. England uses them. Pay for performance is very hard to implement and its implementation costs may be substantial. There is no easy way to replace increments with pay for performance for a nurse or teacher but what you can do is increase the number of grades and decrease the range of salary bands.