Public Sector Strikes

[alchresearch]

Funny that the public sector are whinging about final salary pensions that the private sector are funding,

 

Correction, a minority. The figures show that those who didn't vote for strike action and those who haven't gone on strike are far lower than the rabble who have.

[Mister M]

WHo do you reckon my office should send the bill to for all the hours we've not been able to get any work done today due to the noise and terrible singing outside?

 

Funny that the public sector are whinging about final salary pensions that the private sector are funding, when theirs (mine!!) has been stopped, with no recourse for action?

 

Pathetic. We're broke.

 

What I wouldn't give for a water cannon full of manure.

 

But a large part of the reason for the financial crisis is due to the public sector (government) having to bail out the private sector (banks / financial services).

 

I see in todays papers and over the last few weeks the Government and their supporters have been quick to play one worker off against another (i.e stoking up resentment against public sector workers) - that way it is a race to the bottom.

 

Sooner or later, people in this country will have very few employment rights or a welfare state that generations earlier fought hard for.

[Mecky]

But a large part of the reason for the financial crisis is due to the public sector (government) having to bail out the private sector (banks / financial services).

 

I see in todays papers and over the last few weeks the Government and their supporters have been quick to play one worker off against another (i.e stoking up resentment against public sector workers) - that way it is a race to the bottom.

 

Sooner or later, people in this country will have very few employment rights or a welfare state that generations earlier fought hard for.

 

 

That's true but people knew what was going to happen if they voted in the Tories in the last GE, or any GE for that matter, and it's far too late for them to change their tune now.

[Ms Macbeth]

That's true but people knew what was going to happen if they voted in the Tories in the last GE, or any GE for that matter, and it's far too late for them to change their tune now.

 

What do you think would have happened if we'd kept the same government in power? If we'd maintained the same borrow and spend levels I fear we'd be further down the slippery slope like Greece who appeared to lose any control on public sector spending. I believe even their publicly funded actors are on strike.

 

I have worked in different bits of the public sector, local government (reasonably well paid), civil service (not so well paid) and the Gas Board, before and after privatisation (reasonably well paid). Its human nature to get used to a certain standard and want more, but I don't believe a public sector strike will achieve much. It mainly affects those who need the services most and not those in power.

[L00b]

But a large part of the reason for the financial crisis is due to the public sector (government) having to bail out the private sector (banks / financial services).

Not quite so. The financial crisis caused the government to bail out the banks (which have been quite busy repaying the bill since, btw).

 

The private sector excluding banks hasn't been 'bailed out' at all, it's been brought to its knees - because too big a portion of it was technically insolvent (relying on overdraft/credit facilities to go on) at the time the crisis started, and the banks turned the taps off. All of them. Fully.

 

One of the knock-on effects, is hundreds of thousands of private sector workers redundant (lastly no less than 15.000 at Lloyds bank) over the past 3 years, who went overnight from taxpayer putting in the pot to benefit claimant taking out of the pot.

 

Another of the knock-on effects, is thousands of businesses making a loss or breaking even, and not putting anything in the pot either, over that period.

 

Although, thankfully, that has now begun to change and tax receipts are increasing. Slowly.

 

At its simplest, it's been economical/commercial Darwinism at play. But you cannot abstract away the corresponding loss of tax income in the period, as the public and private sector are entirely inter-dependent in that respect.

[Mecky]

What do you think would have happened if we'd kept the same government in power? If we'd maintained the same borrow and spend levels I fear we'd be further down the slippery slope like Greece who appeared to lose any control on public sector spending. I believe even their publicly funded actors are on strike.

 

I have worked in different bits of the public sector, local government (reasonably well paid), civil service (not so well paid) and the Gas Board, before and after privatisation (reasonably well paid). Its human nature to get used to a certain standard and want more, but I don't believe a public sector strike will achieve much. It mainly affects those who need the services most and not those in power.

 

This is only news because of the economic status due to the global crash in 2008 and has little to do with borrowing levels as people have pointed out.

[Rupert_Baehr]

...

 

The issue is not of recognising the positive contribution that the public sector makes to society (the private sector contributes just as positively), but recognising that that portion of society which by and large pays for the public sector today, does not have the means anymore that it had a few years ago. It really is as simple as that ...

 

Quite so. If that portion of society (we could say the government) can't afford to pay for such a large public sector, then it must either cut the numbers it ermploys or reduce the amount it pays them. That's the amount it pays them for future work, not the amount it owes them for work already done.

 

On a much smaller scale, if I can't afford half a kilo of foie gras this week, I'll either go without, buy less or buy a cheaper alternative.

 

I would not be able to get away with telling the butcher I'm not paying last week's bill.

[Mecky]

Quite so. If that portion of society (we could say the government) can't afford to pay for such a large public sector, then it must either cut the numbers it ermploys or reduce the amount it pays them. That's the amount it pays them for future work, not the amount it owes them for work already done.

 

On a much smaller scale, if I can't afford half a kilo of foie gras this week, I'll either go without, buy less or buy a cheaper alternative.

 

I would not be able to get away with telling the butcher I'm not paying last week's bill.

 

But it is afforable as Hutton pointed out http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-13972855

[L00b]

If that portion of society (we could say the government)

You can't. The Gvt cannot afford anything without tax income.

I would not be able to get away with telling the butcher I'm not paying last week's bill.

Yet, you would be surprised how often this happens in the private sector these days, even when the Gvt is the debtor (but which would never dream of not paying its own employees instead).

[sharrowman]

"either cut the numbers it ermploys or reduce the amount it pays them"

 

This is a problem the private sector faces just as much as the public sector - continued growth is no predictor of future employment levels as automation creeps in to more and more niches. I can't see the free market model protecting the standards of living we have come to expect. I don't have any faith in our government to do it either. I'm filling my cellar with dry beans.