The years of discontent, 2022/23

[Bairnardo]

Graft is subjective, time is not.
Literally everyone feels they are worth more than they are paid. That doesn't, however, change the pay you get for the time you are contracted to work is very good, which reflects your skills. It's the reason why you get paid more per contracted hour than someone, for example, working in a supermarket.
I honestly couldn't give a shit how much unpaid time you get off tbh.

What you think reflects very good pay, and what you think skills are worth is also subjective tbf.

You can compare pay to the average of course, but I might then counter that actually, vast swathes of the population are getting underpaid for what they do.

None of it really matters in the end. Market forces will dictate pay. No one gets paid well out of employer generosity.

I just dont understand the need for some sort of adjustment to be made to teacher pay to reflect time. They get paid to teach, they do so when schools are on. Getting term time is just something people look at when considering going into the sector, alongside the money.

[Billy Jean King]

The higher rate of tax in Scotland starts at £43,663
A fully qualified teacher in Scotland earns £42,336 after 5 years, and it's already been established that teachers are contracted to work 235 of the 261 (90%) "working days" each year, 40 days of which are paid holiday.
Extrapolating their salary to 100% of the working days (otherwise you aren't comparing like for like) would take them comfortably into the higher tax rate bracket.
Thank you for confirming teachers in Scotland are indeed "very well paid"

The absolute definition of a straw man. Teachers are salaried, they are not on an hourly rate and hence at the current top of scale of £42,336 do not fall into the top rate tax bracket in Scotland. What a bizarre twisting of the facts.

By the same token no one can seriously be arguing that a teacher at the top of their scale on the above salary isn't "well paid" in relative Scottish terms, It just doesn't need a blatant misrepresentation of their pay to try and prove that point.

[Todd_is_God]

11 minutes ago, Bairnardo said:

What you think reflects very good pay, and what you think skills are worth is also subjective tbf.

You can compare pay to the average of course, but I might then counter that actually, vast swathes of the population are getting underpaid for what they do.

None of it really matters in the end. Market forces will dictate pay. No one gets paid well out of employer generosity.

I just dont understand the need for some sort of adjustment to be made to teacher pay to reflect time. They get paid to teach, they do so when schools are on. Getting term time is just something people look at when considering going into the sector, alongside the money.

 

Because if you don't normalise salaries to 261 working days per year, it's impossible to fairly compare them.

It's not an attack on anyone or any job, but its a basic necessity when discussing pay.

14 minutes ago, Bairnardo said:

What you think reflects very good pay, and what you think skills are worth is also subjective tbf.

True, however it was a direct reply to another poster who had already set the parameters.

[Todd_is_God]

15 minutes ago, hk blues said:

To be honest, you have not really helped the argument by bringing in the hours stuff, rather given those with an alternative view ammunition.

What do you mean, sorry?

[Todd_is_God]

1 minute ago, Billy Jean King said:

The absolute definition of a straw man. Teachers are salaried, they are not on an hourly rate and hence at the current top of scale of £42,336 do not fall into the top rate tax bracket in Scotland. What a bizarre twisting of the facts.

Not that I'm suggesting teachers are, but Part-Time workers can also be salaried.

That they are "salaried" changes nothing.

[hk blues]

4 minutes ago, Todd_is_God said:

What do you mean, sorry?

Suggestion was that use the high-rate tax band to determine well paid.

Teachers' salaries are at 97% of that number. That's close enough for most (reasonable) folk to accept it's there.

So there is no need to bring in the highly debatable argument around hours.  You've just given doubters room to dispute - exactly as has happened.

[101]

18 hours ago, Bairnardo said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-63791844

This doesn't seem like a particularly good use of the state broadcaster.... Unless the state broadcaster has an agenda of course. Or we can shortly expect a balanced article from the POV of other trade unionists not involved in the dispute.

I could understand that story if it was anywhere other than London, probably the best connected and most densely populated part of the country, how many punters will be within walking distance or a bus journey of his pubs, I suspect several times that of, even, other cities.

[Todd_is_God]

15 minutes ago, hk blues said:

Suggestion was that use the high-rate tax band to determine well paid.

Teachers' salaries are at 97% of that number. That's close enough for most (reasonable) folk to accept it's there.

So there is no need to bring in the highly debatable argument around hours.  You've just given doubters room to dispute - exactly as has happened.

Ok I understand you now.

However, based on the critera suggested, the point remains:

Anyone earning 97% of the higher tax threshold for being contracted to work 90% of the year is every bit as "very well paid" as someone earning 21.5% of it for being contracted to work 20% of the year.

Just looking at the gross pay amount misses the detail.

Edited November 30, 2022 by Todd_is_God

[hk blues]

14 minutes ago, Todd_is_God said:

Ok I understand you now.

However, based on the critera suggested, the point remains:

Anyone earning 97% of the higher tax threshold for being contracted to work 90% of the year is every bit as "very well paid" as someone earning 21.5% of it for being contracted to work 20% of the year.

Just looking at the gross pay amount misses the detail.

I understand the point, but it just seems to weaken rather than strengthen the argument by opening the door a crack for debate.  By the definition given, teachers are well paid, or at least 97% well paid.  I'm not sure there is any mileage in pushing that to very well paid by adding in the contentious hours element.

[Todd_is_God]

4 minutes ago, hk blues said:

I understand the point, but it just seems to weaken rather than strengthen the argument by opening the door a crack for debate.  By the definition given, teachers are well paid, or at least 97% well paid.  I'm not sure there is any mileage in pushing that to very well paid by adding in the contentious hours element.

I understand where you are coming from, but tbh if the bar is set for measuring something, someone saying "i know this is only 97% of the way there, but it's close enough" is easily dismissed as not achieving said bar.

[hk blues]

1 minute ago, Todd_is_God said:

I understand where you are coming from, but tbh if the bar is set for measuring something, someone saying "i know this is only 97% of the way there, but it's close enough" is easily dismissed as not achieving said bar.

I'd discount the views of folk who don't accept 97% is close enough FOR THIS SITUATION.

It wouldn't be if we are talking about landing planes  or brain surgery, I agree, but we aren't.  

[Todd_is_God]

5 minutes ago, hk blues said:

I'd discount the views of folk who don't accept 97% is close enough FOR THIS SITUATION.

You're ignoring the reason the poster picked a value ever so slightly higher than a teacher's salary in the first place.

[hk blues]

Just now, Todd_is_God said:

You're ignoring the reason the poster picked a value ever so slightly higher than a teacher's salary in the first place.

I'm not because I didn't buy into it in the 1st place so it falls at the 1st hurdle.  Anything from that point onwards is nothing more than half-arsed discussion for me.

Regardless, if they did come back with that I'd discount their opinion as I said.  And rightly so. 

[Todd_is_God]

2 minutes ago, hk blues said:

I'm not because I didn't buy into it in the 1st place so it falls at the 1st hurdle.  Anything from that point onwards is nothing more than half-arsed discussion for me.

Regardless, if they did come back with that I'd discount their opinion as I said.  And rightly so. 

But I was replying directly to them.

You'll note they haven't responded, despite reading it.

[Gaz]

It's possible to believe that:

a) Teachers are reasonably well paid for the hours they are contracted to work;

and

b) The wages of teachers have been impacted by rising costs / inflation and thus they are deserving of a payrise that they are willing to fight for.

It's not one or the other.

[Gaz]

(That's without getting into the whole other issue about the sheer volume of expected, unpaid overtime that teachers are expected to do - which often falls disproportionately onto younger / newer teachers who perhaps lack the confidence and experience to say "no")

[coprolite]

Ok. Now we’ve established the threshold for “very well paid” I’d like to take a few minutes to establish what salary counts as “extremely well paid” and “ridiculously well paid”.

This shit is important.

[Carl Cort's Hamstring]

2 hours ago, hk blues said:

I wonder why you chose to use the higher rate tax bracket as your yardstick?  We could just use the average wage and see where that leaves us?    I guess we are just confirming what I said in my initial post - what does "well paid" actually mean?

I am not disputing that you role is experiencing a "more for less" dynamic but, to be honest, this is nothing new for many of us.  I'm not saying you should give a f*** about that and not instead focus on your own issues but by the same token there may not be all that much sympathy out there.  At least no more than for any other group in the current climate.

 

It's as good a way as any as defining "very well paid." If we want to use average salaries as a reference that will quickly get bogged down in semantics. When does 'above average ' become 'very well paid'? Top 40%, 30%, 25% etc?

I'm not particularly looking for sympathy and at no point have I argued teachers are poorly paid. But the degradation in funding and conditions does have an impact on the students. There are 6 children in my class of 30 who previously would have received extra funding and resources from the local authority because if their additional needs. Now only 2 of them get it because the assessment process takes so much longer due to cuts. That has a huge impact on both my workload and the education that those children receive.

Similarly, the job of a subject leader in primary schools in England has completely changed in the last 2 years. Primary subject leaders are now treated much more like secondary heads of department by Ofsted while, generally, not being paid at all for the extra responsibility (typically, schools only tend to pay the Maths and English leaders and many don't even do that). The role has gone from one that can be done well alongside being a full-time class teacher to one that is impossible to do within contracted hours.  That's not really an acceptable situation.

 

[Carl Cort's Hamstring]

45 minutes ago, Todd_is_God said:

But I was replying directly to them.

You'll note they haven't responded, despite reading it.

 

I'm a teacher and it's a weekday morning!

[Todd_is_God]

5 minutes ago, Carl Cort's Hamstring said:

I'm a teacher and it's a weekday morning!

Yet you still found time to view the thread.

Edited November 30, 2022 by Todd_is_God