"Median earnings were 52% higher in the public jobs", said Davy. "or the equivalent occupation, education level or experience, the smallest gap is 25% and the largest is 76%. The gap between public and private pay cannot be justified by saying that public sector employees are moreexperienced, better educated or do different jobs. For example, how can we explain the fact that security personnel in the public sector get paid 46% more than their private sector peers?"
The Unions love babbling about the bulls***t poor low-paid entry jobs in the public sector. Table above shows that younger age cohorts and lower experience cohorts are earning vastly greater wages in the public sector than in the private sector.
Workers with 20-29 years of experience achieve a wage that is 36% higher in the public service
than in the private service. What does this mean? It means that the actual gap for those with greater tenure is even wider than that because workers in the private sector in this category of experience have to save 25-30% of their disposable income in pensions, while their counterparts in the public sector are enjoying lavish retirement plans benefits.
Davy note: "In February, the first attempt was made to rectify the imbalance. But the public pension levy only matched the wage cuts in the private sector, so the gap has probably
not closed. The public pay bill of €20bn in 2009 amounts to more than one-third of voted public expenditure. Further pay cuts of at least 10% are justified by these data." Oh, dear - can't we actually have some ambition? These figures show that public pay bill should be cut by ca40-45% through an equal measure of reduced wages (-25-30%) and reduced numbers employed (-20%). This will still produce a public sector employment premium, but it will at the very least force them to work more productively.
Davy concluded the note with the following statement: "Hourly earnings are 48% on average higher in the public sector. But average annual earnings are 32% higher because public employees work fewer hours. But it is not the case that bonuses are much higher in the private sector. In 2002, bonuses (and benefit-in-kind) in the private sector amounted to €1565 (or 5% of average annual earnings) versus only €149 in the public service. Five years on in 2007, bonuses in the public service had almost caught up at €1,807 versus €2,211."
Another interesting fact is the distribution of various grades in private and public sector. Notice the relative proportions of managerial and admin staff vs professional staff. This is not a sign of the public sector depth of expertise (high ratio of professionals), but of inflation in terminology. When an elementary school teacher or a basic nurse are considered professional grade employees, academics should be called demi-gods...
What all of us are forgetting is that as taxpayers - we employ them, not the other way around. It is time to start issuing pink slips. And by the way - if you hear once again anyone talking about 'not creating a conflict between the two sectors' - guess what: by granting themselves these gratuitous increases in wages, they - the public sector - have taken hard earned money from all of us, rich and poor. It was an involuntary transaction that enriched them alone. The state has presided over this system of wealth transfer under the guise of Social Partnership. We have every right to demand our money back. It is conflict time!
