The years of discontent, 2022/23

[Bonksy+HisChristianParade]

1 hour ago, 19QOS19 said:

The whole argument has been that drivers make enough but no one who was against the rise has given a cut off figure.

 

Probably a bit more than a bus driver.

[Aufc]

How's that going to work for public sector employees?
If you're still talking about Scotrail then even if was making a profit (which it isn't) and paying a dividend to it's only shareholder if it stopped paying a dividend that would mean funding would have to be cut somewhere else in Scotland's budget.

Wasn’t referring to ScotRail. There are lots of stories of huge companies making fortunes and paying out dividends all whilst trying to suppress employees wages

[coprolite]

On 25/07/2022 at 21:38, oaksoft said:

To be fair, we've got people on this thread wittering on about serfdom.

Stupidity is not the sole preserve of the Tories.

It's an aspiration, not a policy

[scottsdad]

40 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

If the rail unions had focussed on terms and conditions and had pressed for either a fixed value pay-rise or a rise tapered so that those at the bottom were given most of the help I'd have been much more supportive of that (maybe something like 10% rise for those under 20k, tapering down to 2% for those on £35k and 0% above that). Given that inflation will come back down again...

Mick Lynch must be crying his eyes out that he hasn't got your endorsement here. 

Plus - folk on £35,001 volunteering a pay rise of 0% when inflation is running at about 10%. What person in their right mind would accept that?  And why should they accept such a huge hit to their finances?

Inflation will come back down - but prices won't. They'll just creep up more slowly than they are now. 

[Left Back]

7 minutes ago, Aufc said:

Wasn’t referring to ScotRail. There are lots of stories of huge companies making fortunes and paying out dividends all whilst trying to suppress employees wages

So no dividends should be paid?

[Billy Jean King]

Can't speak for government but I don't see anyone on here saying 5% is an excessive demand.

Apart from your post minutes previous when you said those earning 35k and above should be limited to 2%.

[scottsdad]

2 minutes ago, Billy Jean King said:

55 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

Can't speak for government but I don't see anyone on here saying 5% is an excessive demand.

Apart from your post minutes previous when you said those earning 35k and above should be limited to 2%.

No - he said folk earning above £35k should enjoy the warm embrace of 0%. 

Those struggling to stuff wads of cash into their wallets after a massive 2% hike are those earning less than £35k. 

[Benjamin_Nevis]

14 minutes ago, Left Back said:

So no dividends should be paid?

Don't think he said that tbh. 

If employees are expected to eat suppressed wages then surely shareholders can eat reduced dividends?

[coprolite]

2 minutes ago, Left Back said:

So no dividends should be paid?

Companies shouldn't be able to make superprofits off the back of exploiting their workers in my (apparently unpopular) opinion. 

Many are and mainly in sectors with low union density.

Neoliberalism says this is ok because they're wealth creating innovators. 

Marxian theory says that there is a power assymetry which means that capital obtains the surplus produced by labour. 

If you've sunk earned £millions into developing an innovative profit or service then you deserve some reward for that risk and time. Take dividends. 

If you've leveraged a buyout of an existing business using inherited money and have a state backed  income stream where you can increase profits by making staff casual or self employed, then you deserve f**k all. 

There are many points in between but i reckon the UK economy is weighted towards the latter. 

[SlipperyP]

3 hours ago, virginton said:

Where does the money come from to give a £5k per year average salary increase to a train driver? 

From not giving the top end large bonuses, from not giving contracts out to shity suppliers (our friends). You even posted about his on the weather thread.

 

[Left Back]

1 minute ago, Day of the Lords said:

Don't think he said that tbh. 

If employees are expected to eat suppressed wages then surely shareholders can eat reduced dividends?

That's far more reasonable.

I think also people often take the view here that people that own companies are all Tory scum so should get f**k all.  They forget we all own them through our pension funds.

[Billy Jean King]

No - he said folk earning above £35k should enjoy the warm embrace of 0%. 
Those struggling to stuff wads of cash into their wallets after a massive 2% hike are those earning less than £35k. 

Christ misread that. 2% on 35k is poor but a wage freeze yikes. Some Ivory towers in here when a household income of 35k is deemed to be enough to survive 10% inflation and energy costs rising at many times that. No doubt Oaky assumes everyone lives as a couple with both bringing in a wage.

[vikingTON]

32 minutes ago, Aufc said:

Wasn’t referring to ScotRail.

I was though because that's who train drivers in Scotland overwhelmingly work for. So there's no profit and no dividend-earning fatcats to take the rhetorical slack: where does that money come from to turn a £50k wage into a £55k wage across the board? 

5 minutes ago, SlipperyP said:

From not giving the top end large bonuses, from not giving contracts out to shity suppliers (our friends). You even posted about his on the weather thread.

 

Except that the shite suppliers are typically chosen because they're the cheapest option. That's the folly of the private market for you. 

To fix that problem requires higher spending on infrastructure in the railway sector, not lower. Which strikes me as another of the 2570 higher priorities for spending public money than making sure that someone earning nearly twice the median salary does not lose a single penny in 'real terms income'. 

[scottsdad]

Away from the finances, the interesting case of Sam Tarry, a Labour spokesman who joined a picket line. 

Some odd stories going about that he is trying to get sacked. He is getting deselected from his seat and is apparently angling to come across as a martyr for the unions to land a neighbouring seat. 

[vikingTON]

12 minutes ago, Billy Jean King said:

16 minutes ago, scottsdad said:

 

Christ misread that. 2% on 35k is poor but a wage freeze yikes. Some Ivory towers in here when a household income of 35k is deemed to be enough to survive 10% inflation and energy costs rising at many times that. No doubt Oaky assumes everyone lives as a couple with both bringing in a wage.

There are many two adult households that do not earn £35k between them. There are people on UC who don't clear £5k per year. Those are the groups that are going to get absolutely buried by increasing costs unless government support is provided. Support that costs money - except that oh aye we just frittered all that away on far less pressing issues. 

A single adult earning £35k per year is clearly capable of surviving current cost of living increases and so your middle-class special pleading can be filed in the bin where it belongs. 

[Billy Jean King]

There are many two adult households that do not earn £35k between them. There are people on UC who don't clear £5k per year. Those are the groups that are going to get absolutely buried by increasing costs unless government support is provided. Support that costs money - except that oh aye we just frittered all that away on far less pressing issues. 
A single adult earning £35k per year is clearly capable of surviving current cost of living increases and so your middle-class special pleading can be filed in the bin where it belongs. 

Odd response, why mention single adults ?

(because it better suits his argument). Of course a single person earning that should be able to cope but that's quite clearly not what I was referring to

[vikingTON]

Just now, Billy Jean King said:

Odd response, why mention single adults ?

(because it better suits his argument). Of course a single person earning that should be able to cope but that's quite clearly not what I was referring to

You just said that the assumption was that everyone loved as a couple - make your mind up please.

Throw in a second adult earner on the median salary and the total household income is £65k. Comfortably more than enough to deal with cruel horrors of inflation without getting a no questions asked, 10% wage hike. 

[Billy Jean King]

To re-direct the limited pot of money to the people at the bottom of the pay scale, some of whom will be in deep shit in about 10 weeks time.
It's the very definition of the philosophy about those with broader shoulders helping out those less fortunate. People have been banging on about that on this forum for years. It's odd how that philosophy seems to be "ridiculous" now that some of you would be affected by it.
 

We have had "tiered" pay rises tapered to favour those at the bottom in the past where I have worked. They worked fine until after about the 2nd one those at the bottom suddenly were earning the same or more than those a grade or two above them. That had to be addressed by a regrading exercise which then restored the "gap" by pushing those above up again. In any workplace there will be pay grades on a scale but tapered pay deals quickly erodes that structure and you end up regrading thus negating the whole thing.

Fine in theory but doesn't really work in practice.

[Billy Jean King]

If you two are on £35k or more, you enjoy a salary well above the national average and are not the priority right now when large numbers of people are facing disaster in just 10 weeks time.
You can both get sorted out when things calm down a bit and the emergency passes in a year or so.
The pair of you need to get a grip. It's embarrassing to watch.

Median take home in Scotland is £550 per week so 28,600 pa. Take home at 35k salary is actually slightly under that. No idea what figures you are using but a quick Google search confirmed these per Fraser of Allander Institute.

[vikingTON]

5 minutes ago, Billy Jean King said:

11 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

 

Median take home in Scotland is £550 per week so 28,600 pa. Take home at 35k salary is actually slightly under that. No idea what figures you are using but a quick Google search confirmed these per Fraser of Allander Institute.

That median wage is gross not mean, which means that a gross salary of £35k is around one-fifth higher than the median. 

https://www.gov.scot/binaries/content/documents/govscot/publications/statistics/2018/11/summary-of-earnings-statistics-2018/documents/annual-survey-of-hours-and-earnings-2018-slides/annual-survey-of-hours-and-earnings-2018-slides/govscot:document/ASHE-slides-2018.pdf

And confirmed here with 2020 figures:

https://digitalpublications.parliament.scot/ResearchBriefings/Report/2021/2/19/32a8c620-b227-4951-b642-44fe823009d1

 

Edited July 27, 2022 by vikingTON