If public sector workers took 1 week unpaid holiday

So the suggestion could be that public service employees do not get paid for one of their weeks annual leave.
Maybe, it's not my idea.
I don't like the way the government are looking for ways to cut the pay of public an civil servants but don't have the balls to just come out and be honest about what they are doing. Getting your pay cut is a big deal, it should be acknowledged as such. I'm not saying I'm against public sector pay cuts, they are necessary as we cannot afford current pay levels, but it's insulting to those that are taking the hit to pretend it's other than it is.


Im not sure what you mean by this : is it "chuir amach do lámh"
Something like that
 
..actually, I think 2 weeks unpaid leave,staggered over the year could be doable...

daithi
 
I did hear a shorter working week was discussed at the last talks.

We got a circular this week announcing a memoratium until end 2010. Further instructions are to follow and I fully expect that managers will be asked to consider short weeks/term time etc. I'd say managers will then have to explain in detail why its not possible in their section.
 
I agreed with alot of what you say,there would have to some sort timetable done, as for schools just do not pay them for 1 week of their all to long holiday's ,look of course there would be huge thinking, but our government really need to start realizing that they are the employer,Boss,Gaffer etc, these workers which by the way my wife is and has been for over 11 years need to be treated in the same vain as other employee's are in other companies.I don't know of any other employer in the Country that seem to have to ask permission for every single thing they seem to want to do to improve their company.As mention in an earlier post the 5 days do not have to be taken all at once.
 
Average industrial wage figures are meaningless in a country like Ireland where a small percentage of workforce are in industrial employment. Ireland is a services economy, so the average services sector wage would be more relevent.
 
Re: If public sector workers took 1 week holiday



I would like to know this as well? It sounds as if the figure quoted is being skewed by the salaries of people at the very, very top. There is no way the majority of public servants are on >49K.
 
Agree to a point but from my own family situation, my wife is in Aminstration in Public sector no fancy certificate's behind her or anything and is on 42K for a 36 hour week with 28 days holiday,Not bad is it
(maybe they should be made give back one weeks holiday) I would love to know what the average holidays are per year leaving out teachers of course) v Private sector
 

Surely the fairer way would be to take an average of the employees wages?
I dont understand your logic of your mean , it is too simplistic , is there a reason why wouldnt use an average of the employees?
 
Surely the fairer way would be to take an average of the employees wages?
I dont understand your logic of your mean , it is too simplistic , is there a reason why wouldnt use an average of the employees?

He is using an average. Mean median and mode are all averages calculations. He is correct in saying that the median is better for working out average incomes because the mean is sensitive to outliers in the distribution i.e. the average will be skewed upwards by people earning high salaries.
 
Re: If public sector workers took 1 week holiday


ost public sector workers have had recent pay cuts which Brian Cowen likes to call a pension levy when in fact its no more than a pay cut.

its the likes of ministers and the taoiseach himself that needs to take pay cuts as they can well afford to.
 
Re: If public sector workers took 1 week holiday


Actually - I was wrong with my figure of 49k average wage in public sector.
It is in fact 50k.
€966 euros per week to be exact.
Just heard it this very second on six one news from george lee also.

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In fact - here are the figures from teh cso.
They only go as far as 2007 for some reason though.
BAck in 2007 the average was 921 per week.

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As for your comment that there are different kind of averages this is not true.
The median is not another type of average.
The median and average are 2 distinctly different things.

As for your reasoning that an average can be skewed by a particular high figure being prsent this is correct.
However - there are now 373000 workers in the public sector.
WIth that many workers such skewing does not exist.
So the average is indeed very relevant in this scenario.
 

You are mistaken about the median being referred to as the average in common parlance.
It is not the average - and therefore anyone who uses it instead of the word average is plain wrong and should not be copied.
They are 2 different measurements. The technical definition is not in anyway largely irrelevant as you suggest.

As for the skewing the smaller the sample of data the more likely skewing can arise.
373000 is not a small sample of data - and consequently skewing is non-existant.
 
No, but when you're dealing with that number of people and with a wide,wide range of professions and job titles, quoting an 'average' salary does not make much sense.
 
No, but when you're dealing with that number of people and with a wide,wide range of professions and job titles, quoting an 'average' salary does not make much sense.
What part of the public sector do you work and do really not consider people who work in this sector to be very lucky in general with the security of their jobs.
 
What part of the public sector do you work and do really not consider people who work in this sector to be very lucky in general with the security of their jobs.

No because during the boom years no one wanted the public sector jobs they found it hard to fill positions, now times are bad and the people how went into the public sector are seen as money grabbers how should feel guilty for going into the service when no one else wanted to.

Well tough $hit, no guilt here. I decided to go in and have job security but rubbish pay. You can't have everything in life.
 


Totally inacurate drivel Ron. I tried to get a Public service job in 2003 during the peak of the boom. There were a couple of hundred of us in Croke Park doing those exams and only a handful of jobs.

There are only so many Public service positions available. Quit playing the bleeding "I chose job security" card. The TRUTH is a majority of people in the private sector didnt have a choice but to work in the private sector and a majority of them didnt make millions in the boom years.

I wont write down the salary I was on after 5 years in the private sector, with a business degree, stockbroking diploma and Financial qualifications. Lets just say it was comfortably below the industry average (back then and today) and I know many many people who were stuck with the same paltry salary with similar or better qualifications. I wasnt getting the cushdie (cushdie from where i was looking up from!) benchmarking figures that the poor unfortunate public service workers were getting!

Your constant Private sector bashing is no better then people who call public sector workers as "all lazy". Hypocrite to the core my friend.
 
Ron, I know you work in the private sector (self employed) as well as your public sector job so you have no agenda here. The facts are that 10 years ago the public sector, on average, job for job, was better paid than the private sector and over those 10 years the gap has increased, not decreased.
 
Myles na GCopaleen reckoned that everyone should stay in bed for one week out of every four. It would be a great saving on fuel, elctricity, food etc
 
What part of the public sector do you work and do really not consider people who work in this sector to be very lucky in general with the security of their jobs.


What kind of off the point remark is that? I was talking about the impossibility of working out an average salary for an area as wide and varied as the public sector. I did not, at any stage, say that people in the public sector were not lucky to have job security. That does not mean, however, that the people at the very bottom, on low salaries, should be asked to take a week's unpaid holiday because if you add everyone's salary together and work out the average it comes to a reasonable wage.
That would be like adding up the salaries of everyone who works in a hospital, from the top consultant down to the person who mops the canteen floor, saying the average works out at blah and therefore all hospital workers are on great salaries and should take a pay cut. Its a lazy and inaccurate way of doing the figures.
 


So you didn't get a job in the public sector because other people, who competed fairly and squarely with you for the jobs, were deemed better. and therefore got a better paid job than you What's so wrong about that? I applied for some jobs in the private sector, they were given to stronger candidtates and I settled for a less well paid job in the public sector. That's life.