I just can't put in to words just how much I hate the public sector!
The average teacher is paid about 33k a year, obviously that means some are paid less, some are paid more. Take into account the amount of holidays they get, a nice public sector pension and that works out as a nice little job. You don't have to be that clever, don't have to put too much effort in (all teaching material is provided for you), the only thing you do have to do (which is no different to any other apprenticeship) is to take a lower salary for a while whilst you first learn the job. The great thing about being a teacher as well is that because you're dealing with kids all day you tend to wander away from what is real life. More than 90% of the teachers I've spoken to as part of bringing up my daughter and as being Friends with them when they were at school appear to live in a dream world that has seen them go from school, to university and then back to school (normally in the guise of one of their old teachers).
Because of this la la land approach they're now going to go on strike because of below inflation pay rises. If they could just open their eyes a little bit they'd see that below inflation pay rises for the public sector has been the norm for a few years. This is because the down turn in the economy that we are now seeing was expected. The private sector, the thing that actually generates the income that all these public sector workers (including you teachers) are being paid out off is struggling. When things were good teachers got great pay rises (in real terms 10% above inflation). Things are now bad. Any pay rise above 2% is seen as good in companies where all costs are spiralling, company owners can't afford bigger pay rises because they can't just dip into the public purse. If the Government are forced to dish out more money to 33k a year teachers then somebody else has to pay for it, us suckers in the private sector with our non secure jobs, private pensions that we have to pay for and less than 2% pay rises. Great, we all get landed with giving more of our money to the government so that they can pay themselves more money.
Sort of begs the question why don't we all just say fuck it and sign up for a cushy number with the government? After the bastard of a week I've had it's crossed my mind more than once.
