Thank goodness for austerity

Use this board for general non-cycling-related chat, or to introduce yourself to the forum.
User avatar
Mick F
Spambuster
Posts: 56359
Joined: 7 Jan 2007, 11:24am
Location: Tamar Valley, Cornwall

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by Mick F »

Something I've been thinking about ...............

The only people who can live in their own homes are people of an age. Younger people cannot even hope to save up the deposit.

Therefore, if the younger people get older, the older people must also be getting older. The older people in their own homes will die before the younger people.

Eventually, there won't be older people around who can buy the houses, so therefore the houses will be empty and therefore the houses will be cheap and the younger people can buy them.
Mick F. Cornwall
Flinders
Posts: 3023
Joined: 10 Mar 2009, 6:47pm

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by Flinders »

The way it used to work when we had higher inflation is that you bought a house, mortgaging to the utmost of your income. Incomes and house prices both went up. So it became easier to pay off the mortgage over the term of it, in spite of higher interest rates, because you wages were going up. At then end of it, you had a house and no rent to pay.

People were sold the idea that inflation was bad bad bad, and not knowing much about economics, most of them fell for it. So now they are mortgaged to the utmost and stay that way, as wages are not going up. People who save are getting terrible interest rates. House prices are still going up far faster than inflation, and even faster than wages. People who rent are being dealt an even rawer deal.

The only people that win are those who inherit property and/or rent it out (to people who can't afford to buy at all- a far higher percentage of those now than ever in my lifetime, and who in many cases are paying far more in rent than they would for a mortgage, and paying it forever, and their rent will carry on going up for ever, and they will be paying it when retired when if they'd bought they'd be paying nothing by then, but they can't get a mortgage because of the new rules).
TonyR
Posts: 5390
Joined: 31 Aug 2008, 12:51pm

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by TonyR »

Mick F wrote:The only people who can live in their own homes are people of an age. Younger people cannot even hope to save up the deposit.


So who are all these first time buyers then?
TonyR
Posts: 5390
Joined: 31 Aug 2008, 12:51pm

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by TonyR »

Cunobelin wrote:... and the public sector

Having seen a real 11% reduction in my wage compared to the cost of living, we are now to see 4 years of further less than inflation pay rises increasing the deficit even further.

Depending on the sources I will have seen up to an 18% reduction in what I should be earning if my pay had simply kept up with inflation.


I don't know your personal circumstances but its not a true reflection of public sector pay. Public sector pay is made up of two parts - an annual increase in line with inflation but now capped at 1% (which is currently more than inflation) PLUS a 3% increase from an automatic annual grade point progression for most. That makes over the past few years an annual pay increase of 4-5% and it will still be a 4% p.a. rise with the 1% cap. That's well above inflation. Most of the public sector has had much bigger increases than most of the private sector for years now.
PH
Posts: 13106
Joined: 21 Jan 2007, 12:31am
Location: Derby
Contact:

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by PH »

Cunobelin wrote:... and the public sector

Having seen a real 11% reduction in my wage compared to the cost of living, we are now to see 4 years of further less than inflation pay rises increasing the deficit even further.

Depending on the sources I will have seen up to an 18% reduction in what I should be earning if my pay had simply kept up with inflation.


And the private sector - I've had a 4% increase over the last 7 years, plus hours cut from 40 to 35 and overtime opportunities go from an average of 20 hours a month to zero. Still I'm a lot luckier than the 20% who no longer have a job. I'm not going to look at how far behind my earnings have fallen, I doubt it'd be much less than 50%.
Last edited by PH on 12 Jul 2015, 7:36pm, edited 1 time in total.
PH
Posts: 13106
Joined: 21 Jan 2007, 12:31am
Location: Derby
Contact:

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by PH »

Buy to renters, I hate them, IMO nothing short of usery, making money out of people just because you can, adding nothing to it. I've nothing against landlords, some are good some less so, I've had a few of each. But being a landlord used to be a business, not just someone having the ability to get the mortgage, getting an agent to do all the business and expecting the tenant to pay the mortgage. When did that happen? Oh yeah, about the same time as all the social housing was sold off and the Building Societies disbanded. It used to be the case that it was much cheaper to rent than buy, in the early 80s by at least a third. It was feasible to rent, save for a deposit and have a life, for many people that's no longer the case.
User avatar
jan19
Posts: 1606
Joined: 3 Jan 2008, 9:26pm
Location: Orpington, Kent

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by jan19 »

I'd be interested to see Tony R's figures for the public sector getting 3% automatic incremental rise per annum. Because I've just looked at my pay grade and the annual increments are not 3% they're 0.3%. Just a bit different!

Not that I get it anyway. I got to the top of my grade 7 years ago - it only has 3 incremental points. Any of my colleagues in post for more than 3 years - and thats most of them - don't get increments.

Jan
TonyR
Posts: 5390
Joined: 31 Aug 2008, 12:51pm

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by TonyR »

jan19 wrote:I'd be interested to see Tony R's figures for the public sector getting 3% automatic incremental rise per annum. Because I've just looked at my pay grade and the annual increments are not 3% they're 0.3%. Just a bit different!

Not that I get it anyway. I got to the top of my grade 7 years ago - it only has 3 incremental points. Any of my colleagues in post for more than 3 years - and thats most of them - don't get increments.

Jan


If what you say is correct, your grade has three points on it with the top and bottom points separated by 1%. So if the bottom of the grade is £20,000 the top is £20,200?

For an example of the average 3% increment see http://www.rcn.org.uk/support/pay_and_c ... es_2014-15

Admittedly the 2013 Budget announced the intention to stop automatic annual increments in favour of performance related pay and I don't know how far that intention has so far translated into practice.
Flinders
Posts: 3023
Joined: 10 Mar 2009, 6:47pm

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by Flinders »

MPs see to it that they don't get things like performance related pay, or pay according to hours worked, hours actually spent in the HOC, or jobs done. They just want other 'little' people to have that sort of 'incentive' while they treat being an MP as a part-time job with the longest holidays in the British economy, far larger the than average wage for a full time job, plus opportunities for 'consultancies' and freebies from companies and individuals (many of which would be called 'bribes' in any other line of work, including the public sector).
Flinders
Posts: 3023
Joined: 10 Mar 2009, 6:47pm

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by Flinders »

TonyR wrote:
Cunobelin wrote:... and the public sector

Having seen a real 11% reduction in my wage compared to the cost of living, we are now to see 4 years of further less than inflation pay rises increasing the deficit even further.

Depending on the sources I will have seen up to an 18% reduction in what I should be earning if my pay had simply kept up with inflation.


I don't know your personal circumstances but its not a true reflection of public sector pay. Public sector pay is made up of two parts - an annual increase in line with inflation but now capped at 1% (which is currently more than inflation) PLUS a 3% increase from an automatic annual grade point progression for most. That makes over the past few years an annual pay increase of 4-5% and it will still be a 4% p.a. rise with the 1% cap. That's well above inflation. Most of the public sector has had much bigger increases than most of the private sector for years now.


Inflation is far higher than that for most people. Current figures include a lot of things poor people don't buy because they can't afford them to start with, and it's those things for the most part that have got cheaper. OTOH essentials like housing etc. have gone up far more than 1%, and British people have to spend a higher proportion of their income on housing that just about any country in Europe, and that proportion is growing.
beardy
Posts: 3382
Joined: 23 Feb 2010, 4:10pm

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by beardy »

Flinders wrote:MPs see to it that they don't get things like performance related pay, or pay according to hours worked, hours actually spent in the HOC, or jobs done. They just want other 'little' people to have that sort of 'incentive' while they treat being an MP as a part-time job with the longest holidays in the British economy, far larger the than average wage for a full time job, plus opportunities for 'consultancies' and freebies from companies and individuals (many of which would be called 'bribes' in any other line of work, including the public sector).


I dont see many/any MPs acting like that. They all seem to put a lot of hours into their job, to my mind many of them (those I disagree with) put far too much effort into pursuing their political goals.

My own MPs have normally been very industrious.
TonyR
Posts: 5390
Joined: 31 Aug 2008, 12:51pm

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by TonyR »

Flinders wrote:MPs see to it that they don't get things like performance related pay, or pay according to hours worked, hours actually spent in the HOC, or jobs done. They just want other 'little' people to have that sort of 'incentive' while they treat being an MP as a part-time job with the longest holidays in the British economy, far larger the than average wage for a full time job, plus opportunities for 'consultancies' and freebies from companies and individuals (many of which would be called 'bribes' in any other line of work, including the public sector).



That's not my experience of MPs. Hours actually spent in the HoC is not a good measure. There is all the Parliamentary work, a lot of which is work in committees etc that goes unseen as well as the more public work in debates etc. But when that is all done there are all the constituents and constituency matters to deal with. And at the end of it despite doing an excellent job you can get kicked out at a few hours notice because of national trends. Not a job I'd go for.
User avatar
Mick F
Spambuster
Posts: 56359
Joined: 7 Jan 2007, 11:24am
Location: Tamar Valley, Cornwall

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by Mick F »

TonyR wrote:
Mick F wrote:The only people who can live in their own homes are people of an age. Younger people cannot even hope to save up the deposit.


So who are all these first time buyers then?
A dying breed.

TBH, I was generalising, but in order to be a FTB, you need a new-build with discount and a promise of a mortgage.
Again, generalising.

There's a new scheme going up locally and a friend of ours and his wife are buying one. They haven't even laid the first brick yet, but they are still buying one. It was all organised months ago even before the site was cleared and fenced off.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@50.51500 ... 312!8i6656
Mick F. Cornwall
User avatar
Lance Dopestrong
Posts: 1306
Joined: 18 Sep 2014, 1:52pm
Location: Duddington, in the belly button of England

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by Lance Dopestrong »

Alas, I'm a prudent chap who went without nights out, foreign holidays and brand new cars so I could pay off my mortgage in a little under 8 years. Thus with no mortgage, and no need for any loans the low interest rates are of no utility to me.
MIAS L5.1 instructor - advanded road and off road skills, FAST aid and casualty care, defensive tactics, SAR skills, nav, group riding, maintenance, ride and group leader qual'd.
Cytec 2 - exponent of hammer applied brute force.
Psamathe
Posts: 17650
Joined: 10 Jan 2014, 8:56pm

Re: Thank goodness for austerity

Post by Psamathe »

TonyR wrote:
Flinders wrote:MPs see to it that they don't get things like performance related pay, or pay according to hours worked, hours actually spent in the HOC, or jobs done. They just want other 'little' people to have that sort of 'incentive' while they treat being an MP as a part-time job with the longest holidays in the British economy, far larger the than average wage for a full time job, plus opportunities for 'consultancies' and freebies from companies and individuals (many of which would be called 'bribes' in any other line of work, including the public sector).



That's not my experience of MPs. Hours actually spent in the HoC is not a good measure. There is all the Parliamentary work, a lot of which is work in committees etc that goes unseen as well as the more public work in debates etc. But when that is all done there are all the constituents and constituency matters to deal with. And at the end of it despite doing an excellent job you can get kicked out at a few hours notice because of national trends. Not a job I'd go for.

Mine is a complete waste of public money. Does not reply to letters, etc. (110% safe seat, 110% support from his local party - he has a job for life whatever he does)

Which probably shows there is a wide variability in their performance. So what is wrong is that there is no monitoring, no management, no requirement for MPs to even turn-up for work. Some clearly do and work hard (good on them) but for such a high paid high status job you would expect it to be done on a more than voluntary basis (when clearly some decide not to do their job and still get full pay,, full pension, etc.). All they'd have to do is to pro-rata the existing pay (maybe after their mega pay rise !!) according to hours worked (to that expected). So assume a 37 hour week, reasonable to expect an MP to work at least 37 hours so if they work only 18.5 hours they only get 50% of their pay/pension/etc. Most people would get sacked if they only worked half their contracted hours but MPs do seem to live in a parallel universe.

Ian
Post Reply