“Dog Walker,

I thought it came down to the fact that Universities were paying in less in contributions? Currently employers (the unis) pay 16% of the value of employees' salaries into pensions. This is proposed to be cut to 6.5% of the salaries of pension scheme holders. These cuts are substantial. Employees will pay a bit more in contributions, yes, but they will receive much, much less in retirement than under the current scheme.

The Guardian Professional gives the following examples of the kind of figures that are at stake here:

"A 30-year-old USS member and lecturer, who continues to work to the new retirement age of 65, would lose around £130,000 in expected benefits over the course of their retirement. If that lecturer was a new entrant to the scheme they would lose around £369,000 over the course of their retirement.
If that 30-year-old lecturer was promoted in 10 years' time to a senior lecturer position and worked through to 65 they would lose £150,000, if they were a current USS member, and £461,000 as a new entrant over the course of their retirement. A 25-year-old researcher and current member of USS who left the scheme after 12 years would lose £23,000 in pension benefits. A new entrant to the scheme would lose £53,000."
http://tinyurl.com/3cnynpx


Contrary to popular belief, academics work very long hours that continue throughout the students' holidays - when not supervising doctoral students, lecturing and running seminars, there are books to be written, research to be carried out, not to mention funding applications and the vast amounts of administration. The training required for an academic post is at least as long as that for a medical degree, yet - quite rightly - there is far less financial support for PhD students than medical students. So many PhD students take out loans. In many Arts and Humanities departments there will be just one student per year with government funding for fees and a stipend (of £13,000 pa). Many of the other students will be working part-time or have borrowed large sums to pay fees and support themselves through a PhD. Then, after the PhD, there is a small number of highly sought early-career research positions, available to the very best and brightest who have published during their PhD, taught undergraduates and completed the most well-regarded research. These positions pay about £25,000 and they go to people typically no younger than their late twenties. Clearly nobody becomes an academic for the money. The good pension scheme is seen as, in some way, compensating for the otherwise very grounded salaries that academics receive relative to their level of training. These proposed cuts are going to have a tremendous effect on the way this is seen to those entering the profession.”

“Quite alot of these posts smack of jealousy...

Just because they are academics doesn't mean they don't have the right to challenge decisions they don't feel are fair.

I support their decision, and speaking
as a person that though their striking will be directly affected, I feel I have more grounds to be annoyed with the situateion than half of the commenters here.

Retiring at 65 for some academics isn't a viable option, especially as some research areas benefit from decades of attention by one scholar.

The argument that many academics were born with a golden spoon in their mouths is stupid, and it just shows that people who have no experience of academic life have such a jaded picture. Academics work long hours, spend time working on often difficult subjects, and, at the end of the day, the knowledge and insight they produce become the foundations for policy making decisions, enviromental concerns and form the basis of our cultural and social existence.

Support for striking people should not evade academics - they work hard.”

“Sorry I have no sympathy with these academics.
It is only right that the suffering isn't contained to the lower ranks, it should be felt all the way to the top, maybe then the higher echelon of our nation would think before they grab.

After all, wasn't it the same academics who gave our bankers a grounding in ethics?

Then again perhaps not, ethics were probably scrubbed off the syllabus back in the glorious reign of Adolf Thatcher.”

“One great feature of working for Bristol University is a general acceptance of the "9 day fortnight" whereby instead of working e.g. 9-5 an employee can work 8.30-5.30 and get a extra day off every fortnight. Lovely.

Then they can use that day to do a bit of overtime....

@Norfolk

They may seem be a little worse off (They're not because they live longer so get a pension for longer) but the alternative is not to do these things and then the scheme not being able to meet its liabilities to the same people that are on strike now.”

“I see the idealists are out.

@Norfolk
"and a strong belief that if you worked hard and abided by the rules you could make a good life for yourself, be better off than your parents, and enjoy a rising standard of living."

All fine words but this just goes to show, when politician opens his mouth, you know they are lying. By the looks of it, you believe them.

Looking to the past is to look to see where things have gone wrong, see what has been done right and learn from them. If you can't accept that, then you'll continue to believe that every story has a happy ending.”

“Striking because they have to pay 7.5% of their salaries into a defined benefit scheme and retire at 65? They don't know they're born.”

“Where have all the comments gone?

More moderation by the pathetic thought police in the Black Lubianka on Temple Way.

That's why nobody posts here anymore.

Can't see the point in buying the paper either, in that case.

Bye bye.”

“They are striking because they will be worse off than before with the new scheme.

We are all being asked to work harder but receive less for our efforts.

All except a tiny, but massively wealthy minority - many of whose actions precipitated the current recession.

During mine and my father's generation within the terms of good old-fashioned capitalism, there was clear social mobility and a strong belief that if you worked hard and abided by the rules you could make a good life for yourself, be better off than your parents, and enjoy a rising standard of living.

Now, none of the above rings true.

It is likely that my children will be worse off than I am, despite their ability and work ethic. To me this is completely unacceptable.

The new brand of capitalism, globalised capitalism, has the effect of damping and limiting the prospect of rising standards of living for the masses by imposing harsh and continuous downward pressure on costs and wages. Decisions made by those at the top are no longer made within a moral or philanthropic context as they were when the means of production were owned by people living in the same country. Now these decisions are made by people the other side of the world, who couldn't care less for the wellbeing of the UK workforce.

The beneficiaries of the new capitalism are the oligarchs and speculators who feed off the hard work of the many. They continue to entrench their privileged positions at the expense of the rest of us ¿ the oft mentioned socialisation of losses and privatisation of profit sustains them.

People are fed up of hearing about ¿fiscal adjustment¿ and ¿actuarial maths¿ etc. The bottom line is that the vast majority of us are getting poorer whilst the tiny minority are getting richer. That¿s all that matters.”

“A banker, a scouser and an asylum seeker sit down together for morning tea with a plate of 12 biscuits. The banker takes 11 biscuits and then leans over and whispers to the scouser "That asylum seeker wants your biscuit".”

“@Anon

I started typing a massively long post about why you are wrong, then deleted it as it can be sumed up a lot quicker.

You're an idiot.”