Just to completely destroy my motivation starting back at work it appears when placing my salary into an inflation calculator I am starting the year getting paid 10% less than I was 10 years ago. Same job, increased responsibility, 10 years more experience. No chance of a raise. Not a great start to the year. Anyone else suffering the same?
no idea if i am being paid more or less, but have a 4% increase for 2026. Which as i type, i am happy with... unless someone comes and bursts my bubble!
Battled for raise in 2024 after many years of stagnation, no raise last year & will see what happens this year but don't have my hopes up, to be honest though can't think of what or where else I'd work anyway 😂
My missis works as a classroom assistant in a special needs school. They had no or well below inflation rises for about 10 years once austerity kicked in, and have definitely not had enough to catch up during the odd year when they've received an actual raise since. They even got an allowance for working with special needs kids taken off them during the worst period! I've tried to encourage her to jack it in and find something else, (has enormous skills in looking after Autistic kids especially) but it's too convenient for her.
School is in an academy group now, so no doubt it'll improve hugely as they're not tied to local government finances. 🤣
Not sure mine has been stellar, but I'm on a decent wage so not complaining personally.
I know I have to pay more for food etc.
As for work, yes, slightly more responsibility so just have to suck it up. i.e. not to the point of stress yet but with occasional increased in blood pressure.
From my salary 10 years ago I’m a fair way above inflation, changed jobs but very similar role, in the same industry.
However, the role I was in 10 years ago hadn’t given me a pay rise in the 8 years previously so I’m pretty much tracking inflation over the past 18 years
Only the very well payed are 'suffering' wage inflation. Of course the righty noise channels think everyone is over paid under the 80 percentile.
When compared to the cost of living majority of us are getting fleeced that is the nature of the transfer of wealth we have which just won't budge because of the current system.
Just look at amount of savers v people in debt.
Only the very well payed are 'suffering' wage inflation. Of course the righty noise channels think everyone is over paid under the 80 percentile.
It's more complicated than that, otherwise we'd all be paid minimum wage and no one would do jobs with night shifts, or personal risk etc.
I took a pay cut to take my role I've been in 18 years in HE. I'm definitely a lot worse off than I was 20 years ago as even pay increases haven't caught up to what I was on, never mind general inflation. 2% pay rises we get in HE.
I haven't had an inflation matching, let alone beating pay rise for 15 years....
Always the same, company announces 'fantastic results/performance etc'
then wrings hands, here is a token pay rise, 'uncertain Financial Times, global headwinds yada yada
To get a actual pay rise, you need to change jobs now a days.
Civil servant here, married to a local government employee.
I took a promotion back in 2020, but apart from one year when we signed away some benefits, neither of us have had an inflation busting pay rise since 2010.
My wages have on average tracked inflation over 10 years. Not completely - some years I had to be the squeaky wheel to recoup a previous poor year, but, overall not bad and definitely around +30%.
But as said above - it's about moving jobs or seeking promotion by developing skills outside the job and a network inside and outside the job that has really helped me. This has gained my around +120%.
The former was essentially free, but the latter I'm certainly paying for and being paid for. Longer hours, greater risk, more responsibilities and shorter learning curves.
The only time I've had anything higher than inflation was from a job move or promotion.
It's not always been linear though. Had a couple of occasions where I've dropped pay to move.
Big company was better than smaller ones. At least it was regular and transparent there. Smaller company only gave me a pay rise when I handed in my notice. I foolishly stayed. Last place "forgot" to include me in their pay review.
It's tough to negotiate a decent pay rise if you are continuing to do the same job at the same level.
As a care worker in Scotland I am relatively lucky I get paid national living wage £12.60 there are many careworkers who don't get paid that much. No my wages have not kept up with inflation, not even close
6 years in role and I'm about 6% down in real terms
I've quit one of my two contracting roles. 2 pay increases in 12 years, the last one was last year and was 4%.
Everything else the principal has done (for years) has been to chip away at what I have been charging or able to charge for and - as always with these things - it was a relatively minor thing that pushed me over the edge.
One example was that I was on a day rate, but that's now an hourly rate. But my days are 6 hours long, which pretty much makes a full day when considering admin and prep. Also, they stopped paying for breakfast when working away from home 😁
In real terms in sure I'm really well down on things. Only 10.5 more days work for them though! Whoop.
I've been in my current job for 9 years and despite a huge increase in workload and hassle have never had an above inflation pay rise. Everyone here is extremely fed up but we are kind of trapped. It is one of the only "proper" jobs available around here (most of the local jobs are minimum wage/zero hours/seasonal tourism related) so we have it about as good as it gets locally.
I am a teacher, my wages have not been anywhere near inflation the the last ten years, also I am now just hitting 40% tax band which I wasn't doing on the same pay point 10 years ago even with the extra I got then for management role I no longer do so everyway I appear to lose
After 6 years in role, significant growth in responsibility and having delivered tangible, measurable improvements I'm £12k down on where I should be to have stayed at the same level.
My wages have risen due to career development but the lifestyle I can afford is much worse than it was for older colleagues when they were at the same stage. It mainly comes down to house prices. Some of the houses my older colleagues were able to afford are absolutely mind blowing to me, living in my little shoe box.
2% pay rises we get in HE
I work at a HEI. We recently balloted on strike action over this year's 1% offer. Since 2015 I've been promoted, manage a team, moved up a full grade on the salary scale and halfway up through the next grade and...
...now earn exactly the same, after inflation, as i did then.
MrsDoris, in the private sector, also doesn't keep up with inflation but usually gets more like 2%
Just to completely destroy my motivation starting back at work it appears when placing my salary into an inflation calculator I am starting the year getting paid 10% less than I was 10 years ago. Same job, increased responsibility, 10 years more experience. No chance of a raise. Not a great start to the year. Anyone else suffering the same?
don’t think about fiscal drag on top of inflation, it’ll make it seem even worse. happy new year
only way to get real wage rises ime has been to change job and change company.
Wage inflation has been low since the 2008 financial crisis. I earn more, but partly due to promotions. Adjusted for inflation I'm on nothing like what my managers were on 25 years ago when I started.
Globalisation has also hurt my profession, offshoring jobs to India has meant people have less career mobility in the UK and can't readily move for more money.
These are some figures I put in the UK government thread about 12 months ago, I would expect it to be a bit worse again now.
Since 2000 wages have grown about 66%.
Inflation has run much higher than that, the cost of goods and services have risen about 125% in that period
Since 2000 uk share prices have more than doubled, again probably around 125% more than 2000.
Since 2000 the average UK house price has risen from 75,000 to 240,000, more than 200%
I don't think the official inflation figures tell half the story.
Those figures would probably be quite similar for most of western Europe, by the way, this isn't just a UK problem, it is the whole western (probably most of the world) economy is being run for the few and not the many.
People who bought house and started investing in pensions 20+ years ago are rather insulated from the misery of those who were unable to and the following generations will have to suffer.
This asset inflation and suppressed wage growth is generational debt far more damaging than the government debt that the rich tell us we should be in a panic about.
I thought this was well know. If not, it should be. Pay is, in real terms, less now than it was 10 years ago. It doesnt help that tax bands havent increased much in those years too. Blame incompetent Governments, Covid, Ukraine and a multitude of other things that have hit the economy.
Blame incompetent Governments, Covid, Ukraine and a multitude of other things that have hit the economy.
or put the blame where it really lies, by far the biggest driver of inflation has been greed by the wealthy, the governments aren't so much incompetent, they just serve the richest in society instead of the majority of the electorate.
IT industry has been like that a long time, you don't get a meaningful raise unless you resign and get a new job.
I'm not sure how the maths works for the company, I quit my last job as I was a senior analyst doing the job of an operations manager, project manager and a change and release manager, depending of which way the wind was blowing at the time.
They'd literally have to pay a new hire double what my salary was or more, to replace me..
Oh well, not my problem any more, not my circus, not my monkeys, etc.
Civil servant
Institute for Government (IfG) (2024): Found real-terms median salary falls from 2010, ranging from 11% (junior) to 22% (senior).
It certainly feels like a substantial whack and in that time I've had 4 or 5 years of pay freezes, and ente rest largely average at a bit below inflation . All except 2022/23 even inflation hit 11% and hasn't yet been controlled properly imv.... and i got pay rises that must set me back another 6 to 8%
I feel skint, and I know why!
Factor in tnt fiscal drag induced tax increas, 2.5% increase in vat, and probably some other stuff that happened in that time period..... we are suffering a n affordability crisis.
I am in IT working for a "service provider" in the public sector, I just looked at my pay slip from when I first got this job and calculated I am about 20% down on where I would be if I had inflation matching pay rises, and that's the official inflation figures which I don't trust one bit.
I agree with that msp, I'm sure my personal inflation doesn't match headline figures!
I've no idea...how would I check?
Everything is costing more and I've not been paid more so I'm definitely feeling poorer.
And it should be said, I calculated my pay comparison above (from 2018) on my gross salary, not including the raises in NI contributions (or rather the German equivalent for me) which has also been a roughly 1.5% increased loss to my take home.
Fiscal drag is definitely a significant factor for me and many others. If you earned £40k in 2014, your take home would have been £30k, but even assuming you made the ~30% inflation in the last 10y, putting you at £52k your take home would be £40k, so in real terms, your take home (minus inflation) is £28k.
This doesn’t even take into account that finance rates such as mortgage and debt interest are almost double what they were in 2014 or the fact that many people now eat out less which skews the inflation figures.
If housing were included into inflation figures, that 10% decline in real income would look like a drop in the ocean.
Governments need to be more upfront about taxation and income and the tax system needs to be simpler. Every year, governments should be forced to show at each tax threshold what their policies are doing to people’s REAL income which should include housing and services.
Further, they should be required to publish (and broadcast) the cumulative effect of their policies to the nation for each year that they’re in power.
Let’s see how fast things change once they can’t hide behind the complexity and simply showing annual figures. No government in the last 15y would ever be re-elected after their first term if this were mandated.
Is now a bad time to remind everyone that the bosses of FTSE 100 companies will have made more money in 2026 before midday today than the average worker will all year…
Neo-liberal capitalism sucks, unless you’re a CEO…
I agree that taxation should be simpler, and that would make it more transparent.
I've been with the same employer for the last 12 years, I've had 3 "promotions" from Dev Lead up to Principal Engineer - I'm slightly above inflation (strictly looking at gross salary) over that period.
I should move, but I won't in this climate...