As of next month I get £5 a week less, thanks Tony you c***

i would say the first £5 should be spent on a dictionary

How is that a ‘pay rise’ then? £5 though, how will you survive.

Is Tony your boss?

Pay rise almost exactly canceled out my student loan deductions 🙁

Tony = grinning idiot who played at running the country for a few years

And that is Tonys ( who is tony??) fault how?

Getting paid what you are worth now? 😉

Are you paying off your student loan yet, or just some of the interest? My sister pays something every month, but 9% of what she earns over the threshold isn’t as much as the interest.

She’s only working with teenagers to help prevent pregnancies and STIs, so she’s not really entitled to earn a living, is ishe?

And that is Tonys ( who is tony??) fault how?

Remember the guy who ran the country for a while? I think he’s bringing peace to the Middle East now.

You mean the middle east that is currently knocking shit out of each other? Glad to see he’s doing a stand-up job there as well then.

Heh! With his record of success, maybe he’ll start trying to teach people how to be as good at being good as him!

She’s only working with teenagers to help prevent pregnancies and STIs, so she’s not really entitled to earn a living, is ishe?

what was her degree? why did she do it if she knew her final career wouldnt pay off her student loans?

So why is the fact you are paying your student loan off his fault? Please enlighten us

because every other generation has been entitled to free higher education with grants to cover living costs.

Now this generations stuck paying off its student loans, and payign for everyone els’ pensions!

what was her degree? why did she do it if she knew her final career wouldnt pay off her student loans?

She did a psychology degree, and then a Masters in Health Psychology.

Should degrees only be done for personal financial gain?

and payign for everyone els’ pensions!

Eh?

No sympathy from me im afraid, if i want to do any training to further my career I will have to pay for it. Why should Uni be any different?

I didnt fancy paying off a student loan so I left school and did an open university degree. I had to pay for that as well, but as I was working full time I didnt have to borrow any money to pay for it.

Eh?

I think they are refering to the fact that the NI contributions of today’s workers are being used to pay the current pensions, though that has always been the case.

When my parents went to Uni it was only a very small % went. Went I went it was a bigger % but still very much a minority. Now a lot of folk g – how is it to be financed? Tax on everyone or what?

No sympathy from me im afraid, if i want to do any training to further my career I will have to pay for it.

My employers pays for my training, as it benefits them for me to be better trained.

As the country benefits from having graduates, should the country not pay?

When my parents went to Uni it was only a very small % went. Went I went it was a bigger % but still very much a minority. Now a lot of folk g – how is it to be financed? Tax on everyone or what?

Should a lot of folk be going?

I dont think with them laying people off here at the moment the training budget is going to be too big at the moment. If i want to protect myself from that and do some training then i would pay for it. Or if I wanted to train to move to another career, again I would have to pay for the training.

I have had this argument many times and in short my position is that if you want something then you pay for it, if you dont think its worth what it costs then dont buy it.

Opting to go to uni, finishing the course, receiving the benefits of it, and then moaning about paying for it in the monthly peanuts installments isnt a tenable position

I have had this argument many times and in short my position is that if you want something then you pay for it, if you dont think its worth what it costs then dont buy it.

Do you feel the same about the NHS? The welfare state? Primary schools?

At the moment I have a job, medical insurance, and no children so yes that would suit me.

At the moment I have a job, medical insurance, and no children so yes that would suit me.

Your medical insurance doesn’t cover you for emergency treatment…

That was a bit tongue in cheek, the NHS and welfare state are a safety net ensuring everyone has the basics, and primary schools provide a necessary basic education, what I am saying is that if at the age of 18 you want undertake further education then this is not a safety net for you, it is not a basic need. Although it may benefit the country as a whole the main beneficiary is you and so you should bear the cost, in exactly the same way you would if at 18 you decided you wanted to train to do anything else that wasnt covered at uni.

Student loan debt is really very reasonably priced finance indeed!

Its just a shame the Govt’ pushed the whole “do a degree and earn more” thing some years ago, meaning more degree’s would be vocational as opposed to ‘noddy’ degree’s (i’m not saying further education is a bad thing, it just seems that the people I knew/know who have degree’s are not working in the industry they trained in or their degree has no relevance to the work they are doing)

Perhaps if the govt’ opted to reduce the price of Degree’s for Dr’s, Scientists, Lawyers and other such trade related, then pushed the price on the noddy ones?

jt

what degree did you get spoony?

There’s no such thing as a ‘noddy’ degree, just ‘noddy’ graduates.

I bet it was something useless like media studies or whatever, and I bet he got a 2-2 – the drinkers degree

i rest my case

Chemical Engineering and Chemistry MEng, not exactly something the OU dishes out :p

Am I not justified in being miffed at working hard for a £1500 p.a. payrise, then getting £1750 taken off me in extra tax?

Has any body published anything to show if the country has benefited from all these extra graduates? Or even individuals – has average income increased for people in their 20s?

As with anything else in life, it’s th*tcher’s fault. She introduced the ‘pay for postgraduate education’ marlarkey, it’s just trickled down from there.

mudshark, yep, theres a study showing how much the media industry has grown due to the number of media studies grads! It’s nowhere near as useless as its made out to be apparently 🙂

it’s th*tcher’s fault

I was a student for the last year of no loan and the 1st year with a loan. As I understand it the plan back then was to always have a grant with a loan topping it up but that changed when Tony came along. Then fees were introduced. ‘Anything you can do I can do better…..’

just finished four years of study, which i had to pay for up front, from my earnings which also pay my rent & food – still at least i dont have any incredibly low interest loans to repay at my leisure

tony is a ****

thank f*** the media has grown eh 🙂

yep, this website probably has a media grad involved somewhere!

theyr like Rats, your never more than 3ft from a media studies grad

My dissertation was on whether extra graduates were worthwhile – loads of research going back over it – even the NUS were warning there weren’t enough graduate jobs for the number of graduates back in the 90s.

would that not depend on your definition of “graduate jobs”

my dad did his job without a degree for years (did an OU diploma a few years ago to get somethign on paper). But a new starter would be expected to have a degree simply because there is now one available (most likely in leisure and tourisom/business studies etc) that wasnt there 25 years ago.

rewind a few months, before it all went tits up

loads of grads pouring out of uni’s, unemployment was respectably low, so they must have been finding work somewhere?