In Ireland all discussion on public sector pay, wage coordination and labour cost competitiveness ignores the role of collective bargaining in a democratic society. Over 80 percent of employees in the Eurozone are covered by collective wage agreements. The type of wage coordination is generally described as multi-employer bargaining. This means that wages are set [...]

Who has the right to comment on the Croke Park Public Service Agreement?
Labour leader Eamon Gilmore says that political parties should not ‘interfere’ in what is a matter for public sector workers. They should be left in peace, he says, to consider the strengths and weaknesses of the agreement and make their decision accordingly.
I don’t [...]

It is hard to know where to begin a rant on this dreadful deal. I won’t and instead want to point to four external and macro consequences. Four consequences of the deal for all workers, including private sector workers, and for the public at large, especially the poorest part of it.
(The details of the deal [...]

In a previous post we saw that public sector labour costs are below-average by EU-15 standards. The argument that Irish public sector workers are ‘over-paid’ in relation to their European counterparts holds no water whatsoever. However, that doesn’t answer the charge that, regardless of comparative costs, we just have to cut public sector wages because [...]

With industrial action in the public sector ramping up a couple of notches, it is worth revisiting a couple of issues in relation to pay. A critical issue is the fiscal benefit or otherwise that accrues to the Exchequer from cutting public sector wages - I will examine this in the next post. Here, let’s [...]

Everyone knows the Irish Examiner is a Fine Gael newspaper and everyone equally knows that even if Fianna Fail is being obnoxious about public sector workers, Fine Gael would be even worse.  The incessant cry from FG over the past two years has been for the savaging of the sector.  ‘More! More!’ they scream like a mob [...]

There are strong structural differences in employment between the public and private sector - a fact that is recognised by some, and ignored by others.
The structural differences relate to the types of occupation, education standards, and length of service - all of which affect wage levels. The length of service of those in the public [...]

Ronan Lyon has written an instructive post on the ‘Thorny Issue of Teachers’ Pay’. So useful, in fact, that it was highlighted on Irish.economy.ie and in the Sunday Business Post. And boy has it stirred comments on both websites. Cutting to the quick, Ronan concludes that Irish primary school teachers are paid too much - [...]