Junior Doctors' Pay Claim Poll

[clockworks]

SiH said:

You'd pay a plumber £75 an hour to come and fix a leak in the middle of the night so why shouldn't someone who is potentially going to save your life be paid at least the same?

You might pay a doctor £75 an hour if he came to your house at 4 hours notice and improved the quality of your life, rather than spending weeks or months waiting for an appointment.
Similarly, a plumber working regular hours for several months doing installations on a new estate won't be earning £75 an hour.

[deckster]

i4got said:

Are you serious. You're choosing a vocational course that will take you into say 30 or more years in the same profession, and you don't consider working conditions in that industry? You don't read the press talking every year about crisis points in the industry? What are people basing their career choices on - Casualty & Holby City?

Not sure how many 15 & 17-year-olds you know. But yes, no, and quite possibly.

Most go on - what am I good at, how much money do I think I can earn (note: not what can I actually earn) and how good will I look when I say "I'm doing medicine".

[deckster]

ukwill said:

deckster said:

When you were 15 and choosing your A-levels, or 17 and choosing which degree you were going to do, how far up your list of priorities were organisational politics and working conditions?

To be clear, that's a rhetorical question. If your answer is anything other than "they weren't" then you're either a freak or simply lying.

Sorry, not taking that seriously.

:shrug:

So how is saying "tough st buttercup, suck it up" working for us, in any case?

[skwdenyer]

JagLover said:

Killboy said:

I did. Its still funny

Paying someone 29k because one day they may make six figures is a little funny. When they finally do, they'll probably find out that they still cant afford an average mortgage.

It is £29K for the first year and it isn't exactly unusual for professionals on training contracts to be earning low 20s for the first couple of years after uni, in fact it is common.

And in a nutshell, that's the problem with our economy, right there. I was earning just shy of £20k a year as a post-grad mechanical engineer in research, not quite 30 years ago. I was teaching students, some of whom went into the City and were making £40-50k per year straight out of university.

In real terms today, my salary then was mid-£30ks - and I didn't think of myself as being terribly well paid I didn't need to go to medical school for that.

How does that compare with Doctors? I can't right now find info from the same year. But this claims to have been current in 2002:

salary info said:

A Junior House Officer (JHO) typically works an average of 72 hours a week, based on a full 40 hour working week and cover for every 4th night and weekend. Such a regular rota results in a regularly repeating four week working cycle of 104, 56, 72 and 56 hours respectively with the longest continuous shift being 56 hours (9am Saturday until 5pm Monday).

Basic starting salary for a House Doctor is £18585 annually for the basic 40 hour week, but each post is then allocated to one of several pay bands depending on the amount of additional on-call duties worked and their intensity. Band supplements (as a proportion of basic salary) are then:

Band 1A– 50%, Band 1B– 40%, Band 1C– 20%
Band 2A– 80%, Band 2B– 52%
Band 3– 100%
Band FA– 25%, Band FB– 5%, Band FC– Pro-rata.

Thus, a House Doctor on a busy 1:5 rota may work an average of 26 additional hours each week, for which they receive an additional £14868 annually before deductions.

Compare that to now. To keep up with inflation, that £18,585 should today be £32,302, whilst the fully-allowanced total (another £14,868) would today be £58,144.

Now we must admit that junior doctors don't seem to work more than 50 hours a week these days on average. Those super-long shifts in the past did include time to sleep - just you were on-call. So is the total workload hugely different over a week? I think it has gone down a bit, yes. Does that mean the pay should go down, too?

If we compare that to 72 hours a week 21 years ago, we could pro-rata the salary down - that would mean about £37k with allowances. But even then, it seems that's quite a long way away from where salaries are right now.

A 2nd year today makes around £34k pre-tax. At that level, they're paying back something like £150 per month on student loans (unlike the 2002 version) - so that's £1800 a year they're out of pocket by for a start.

In nominal cash terms, a 2002 junior doctor (yr2, say) would earn basically the same as somebody doing the same job in 2023 (£34k ish in each case).

Against that backdrop, are the demands for a substantial rise entirely unjustified?

[CoolHands]

I cannot believe the Health Secretary Steve Barclay is refusing (via preconditions) to meet with the BMA. Absolute disgrace, and shouldn’t be allowed. I hope they vote for a further 5 days of action after this and ramp it up further.

[i4got]

deckster said:

i4got said:

Are you serious. You're choosing a vocational course that will take you into say 30 or more years in the same profession, and you don't consider working conditions in that industry? You don't read the press talking every year about crisis points in the industry? What are people basing their career choices on - Casualty & Holby City?

Not sure how many 15 & 17-year-olds you know. But yes, no, and quite possibly.

Most go on - what am I good at, how much money do I think I can earn (note: not what can I actually earn) and how good will I look when I say "I'm doing medicine".

If that is really the case then the adults around them have failed them.

[gangzoom]

i4got said:

deckster said:

i4got said:

Are you serious. You're choosing a vocational course that will take you into say 30 or more years in the same profession, and you don't consider working conditions in that industry? You don't read the press talking every year about crisis points in the industry? What are people basing their career choices on - Casualty & Holby City?

Not sure how many 15 & 17-year-olds you know. But yes, no, and quite possibly.

Most go on - what am I good at, how much money do I think I can earn (note: not what can I actually earn) and how good will I look when I say "I'm doing medicine".

If that is really the case then the adults around them have failed them.

Basing the decision on Casualty is probably better than my reason for applying for medicine all those years ago……basically I was told I wasn’t clever enough or good enough to get it. A few decades on and I’m not in the position to be shortlisted for a MD post in an acute trust by my 45th birthday I would be disappointed with myself - I absolutely LOVE my job, am amazed I get paid to do what I do some days.

I would say the adults around me when I was making my decision to apply did a fab job of helping me to make an informed decision….my parents also tried to stop me applying as they said I would be ‘wasting my effort’ as I would never get in .

Edited by gangzoom on Thursday 13th April 19:58

[gangzoom]

CoolHands said:

I cannot believe the Health Secretary Steve Barclay is refusing (via preconditions) to meet with the BMA. Absolute disgrace, and shouldn’t be allowed. I hope they vote for a further 5 days of action after this and ramp it up further.

Nurses are currently voting on a 5% offer, it would make no sense for anyone (BMA or Government) to make any moves until the vote results is out. If nurses accept the 5% offer, the BMA will look very out of touch if they keep on asking for 35%. If the nursing vote is NO on 5%, than the government better make up some more fake money, as everyone - porters, admin staff, physios, dieticians, ambulance staff, essentially everyone, will all be demanding the same level pay rises as junior doctors.

Everyone in the NHS is the same situation of suffering decades long pay erosion, and health care is team effort, not just carried out by one group, so if one group is deemed ‘worthy’ of a 35% pay rise, the same pay rise should be applied to everyone else, and not just one group.

[FiF]

skwdenyer said:

JagLover said:

Killboy said:

I did. Its still funny

Paying someone 29k because one day they may make six figures is a little funny. When they finally do, they'll probably find out that they still cant afford an average mortgage.

It is £29K for the first year and it isn't exactly unusual for professionals on training contracts to be earning low 20s for the first couple of years after uni, in fact it is common.

And in a nutshell, that's the problem with our economy, right there. I was earning just shy of £20k a year as a post-grad mechanical engineer in research, not quite 30 years ago. I was teaching students, some of whom went into the City and were making £40-50k per year straight out of university.

In real terms today, my salary then was mid-£30ks - and I didn't think of myself as being terribly well paid I didn't need to go to medical school for that.

How does that compare with Doctors? I can't right now find info from the same year. But this claims to have been current in 2002:

salary info said:

A Junior House Officer (JHO) typically works an average of 72 hours a week, based on a full 40 hour working week and cover for every 4th night and weekend. Such a regular rota results in a regularly repeating four week working cycle of 104, 56, 72 and 56 hours respectively with the longest continuous shift being 56 hours (9am Saturday until 5pm Monday).

Basic starting salary for a House Doctor is £18585 annually for the basic 40 hour week, but each post is then allocated to one of several pay bands depending on the amount of additional on-call duties worked and their intensity. Band supplements (as a proportion of basic salary) are then:

Band 1A– 50%, Band 1B– 40%, Band 1C– 20%
Band 2A– 80%, Band 2B– 52%
Band 3– 100%
Band FA– 25%, Band FB– 5%, Band FC– Pro-rata.

Thus, a House Doctor on a busy 1:5 rota may work an average of 26 additional hours each week, for which they receive an additional £14868 annually before deductions.

Compare that to now. To keep up with inflation, that £18,585 should today be £32,302, whilst the fully-allowanced total (another £14,868) would today be £58,144.

Now we must admit that junior doctors don't seem to work more than 50 hours a week these days on average. Those super-long shifts in the past did include time to sleep - just you were on-call. So is the total workload hugely different over a week? I think it has gone down a bit, yes. Does that mean the pay should go down, too?

If we compare that to 72 hours a week 21 years ago, we could pro-rata the salary down - that would mean about £37k with allowances. But even then, it seems that's quite a long way away from where salaries are right now.

A 2nd year today makes around £34k pre-tax. At that level, they're paying back something like £150 per month on student loans (unlike the 2002 version) - so that's £1800 a year they're out of pocket by for a start.

In nominal cash terms, a 2002 junior doctor (yr2, say) would earn basically the same as somebody doing the same job in 2023 (£34k ish in each case).

Against that backdrop, are the demands for a substantial rise entirely unjustified?

I'll believe that killboy read those articles but only because he claims to have done because clearly didn't understand what was being said as evidenced by the resulting vacuous comments.

It's always been the case that fresh out of uni trainees and getting their real world professional training the pay is not great compared to a few years down the line. Straight out of uni my hourly rate as a graduate trainee was less than I'd been earning in the holidays as either a coach painter, or relief manager in a retail shop. That way of the world doesn't apply here, why, because doctors?

Is it right that e.g. city bankers earn vastly more than doctors who are not yet at consultant level but now specialising, I'd say absolutely not. Some metal traders for example are not much more than bookies' runners but even relatively new juniors can outstrip the pay of a consultant. That's ignoring the pension issue by the way, but still doesn't seem right to me.

Is anybody saying that junior doctors deserve nothing and should simply stick their aspirations for an increase where the sun doesn't shine, because I've not seen it. Is anybody saying that train and tube drivers are worth more, again I've not seen it.

As mentioned before the core pay has been eroded by about 10-12%, but the disingenuous attempt to hoodwink members, public and govt that to restore this they need 35% is actually doing harm to their case. In reality if they wanted to play games with the figures in the hope that people wouldn't pick them up on it they could turn things on its head and produce similarly inaccurate numbers which say "look our pay has been eroded by x%, but look we're only asking for y% (where y<<x) aren't we being reasonable?"

But no, typical, because doctors, God complex.

Edited by FiF on Thursday 13th April 20:07

[Carl_Manchester]

CoolHands said:

I cannot believe the Health Secretary Steve Barclay is refusing (via preconditions) to meet with the BMA. Absolute disgrace, and shouldn’t be allowed. I hope they vote for a further 5 days of action after this and ramp it up further.

Hunt has said that rises should not be above the rate of inflation.

I am not sure if the government sees the doctor problem for what it is. If inflation goes back down to 2% next year, does that mean no rises for junior doctors above 2% ? I am not sure that's going to fix the problem with junior doctors which, I feel, is different situation to other public sector workers.

The public does value doctors in this country but I am not sure of the BMA and the other hard-left groups are the right people to be leading the narrative with the Government, its hardening public opinions on both sides of the political spectrum.

You also have, an NHS system which seems resistant in too many trusts, to be willing implement reforms that would enhance efficiency either and this doctors strike has become conflated with the wider NHS narrative because, whomever does stay will be worked to the bone as the system is breaking.

Perhaps a better route would be to strike their student fees, assuming they remain in the country for 10 years post. That way, Hunt ducks the pay-rise issue and we prevent medical students from graduating with enormous debt and then sodding off to Aus.

[gangzoom]

Carl_Manchester said:

If inflation goes back down to 2% next year, does that mean no rises for junior doctors above 2% ? I am not sure that's going to fix the problem with junior doctors which, I feel, is different situation to other public sector workers.

Do you think nurses deserve the level of pay increase as doctors?

[Dixy]

The government does not as they awarded Nurses and all other NHS employees a covid increase of nearly 5% but not the junior doctors. Because they have their own contract, Who was it that imposed that contract. Jeremy Hunt.

[Carl_Manchester]

gangzoom said:

Do you think nurses deserve the level of pay increase as doctors?

No.

I think that people who excel and go through what doctors go through should be rewarded fairly.

I think nurses compensation is fair.

[Glosphil]

fat80b said:

irc said:

I don't think £59k 5 years after graduating is bad. In fact it is far higher than average. The best performing university in the country as measured by average salary after 5 years is Oxford. £47k.

This is the way to look at it imho - a Doctor does extremely well over a full career even more so when you consider that we pay for their training.

Arguing over the starting pay level is highly misleading but the junior BMA mouthpieces seem to be hell bent on picking a fight.


That said, I think we saw all of this coming when the pensioners were given their 10.5% increase to set the bar. It was always going to end badly when the non-working got a far bigger payrise than the working folk.....

Then give the doctors the same pay rise as I received on my state pension - £1,100/annum.

Just looking at percentages always favours those already on high salaries. 10% on mimimum wage doesn't cover the extra cost of having to pay a large proportion of your salary to cover basic living expenses such as mortgage/rent, food, power, etc. 10% on an already high salary gives more spending power for non-essentisls & luxuries.

[gangzoom]

Carl_Manchester said:

No.

I think that people who excel and go through what doctors go through should be rewarded fairly.

I think nurses compensation is fair.

So nursing is for people who don't excel....I wonder if you would voice those views to any nurse in person, especially if you a patient.

I work with all different grades of people every day, and as I've said it's a team effort, from our CEO right down to the ward housekeeper. Everyone's pay in the NHS has been degraded, the government needs to recognise that for everyone.

Edited by gangzoom on Thursday 13th April 22:57

[Murph7355]

gangzoom said:

....
Everyone in the NHS is the same situation of suffering decades long pay erosion....

It's not just the NHS. Plenty of people are in the same boat. Which is why demands of 35% are being met with the response they are.

gangzoom said:

So nursing is for people who don't excel....I wonder if you would voice those views to any nurse in person, especially if you a patient....

I suspect he'd end up as a patient if he did with my sister (or needing non-existent NHS dental care)

[JagLover]

skwdenyer said:

Compare that to now. To keep up with inflation, that £18,585 should today be £32,302, whilst the fully-allowanced total (another £14,868) would today be £58,144.

Now we must admit that junior doctors don't seem to work more than 50 hours a week these days on average. Those super-long shifts in the past did include time to sleep - just you were on-call. So is the total workload hugely different over a week? I think it has gone down a bit, yes. Does that mean the pay should go down, too?

If we compare that to 72 hours a week 21 years ago, we could pro-rata the salary down - that would mean about £37k with allowances. But even then, it seems that's quite a long way away from where salaries are right now.

A 2nd year today makes around £34k pre-tax. At that level, they're paying back something like £150 per month on student loans (unlike the 2002 version) - so that's £1800 a year they're out of pocket by for a start.

In nominal cash terms, a 2002 junior doctor (yr2, say) would earn basically the same as somebody doing the same job in 2023 (£34k ish in each case).

Against that backdrop, are the demands for a substantial rise entirely unjustified?

The £29K is before allowances, once allowances for working unsociable hours are factored in it is £38,000, £46,000, and £55,000 respectively for the first three years.

And yes some graduates who go to work for a magic circle law firm or investment bank may well be earning more their first few years, but the vast majority of graduates don't. Also the more highly paid a new graduate job the higher the chances it will be one where 50+ hour working weeks are the norm.

[pghstochaj]

FiF said:

I'll believe that killboy read those articles but only because he claims to have done because clearly didn't understand what was being said as evidenced by the resulting vacuous comments.

It's always been the case that fresh out of uni trainees and getting their real world professional training the pay is not great compared to a few years down the line. Straight out of uni my hourly rate as a graduate trainee was less than I'd been earning in the holidays as either a coach painter, or relief manager in a retail shop. That way of the world doesn't apply here, why, because doctors?

Is it right that e.g. city bankers earn vastly more than doctors who are not yet at consultant level but now specialising, I'd say absolutely not. Some metal traders for example are not much more than bookies' runners but even relatively new juniors can outstrip the pay of a consultant. That's ignoring the pension issue by the way, but still doesn't seem right to me.

Is anybody saying that junior doctors deserve nothing and should simply stick their aspirations for an increase where the sun doesn't shine, because I've not seen it. Is anybody saying that train and tube drivers are worth more, again I've not seen it.

As mentioned before the core pay has been eroded by about 10-12%, but the disingenuous attempt to hoodwink members, public and govt that to restore this they need 35% is actually doing harm to their case. In reality if they wanted to play games with the figures in the hope that people wouldn't pick them up on it they could turn things on its head and produce similarly inaccurate numbers which say "look our pay has been eroded by x%, but look we're only asking for y% (where y<<x) aren't we being reasonable?"

But no, typical, because doctors, God complex.

Edited by FiF on Thursday 13th April 20:07

Just wait until the consultants decide what to do given the suggestion that it’s ok once you make it as a consultant. The pay erosion for consultants has been just as bad. My wife has been a consultant for six years and her pay is £99,425.

In 2008 pay would have been £82,590. Just allowing for inflation that would be £125k today.

The failure is with the BMA allowing this erosion to happen slowly.

To compare to MPs, in 2008 an MP got £60,675 which would today be £91,578. They actually get £86,584.

[FiF]

Another article pointing out the truth about how much junior doctors really earn.

Also touching on the issue of training numbers it reminds us that "Yet the BMA should take responsibility for its role in the UK’s dwindling healthcare workforce. It voted back in 2008 to cap the number of places for medical students in Britain, arguing that an increase of staff risked ‘devaluing the profession’, and, ironically, would make these doctors ‘prey to “unscrupulous profiteers”.’ Fifteen years on, the lack of doctors is being used as leverage to request an off-the-charts pay hike."

So they voted to prevent an increase in training numbers because it would make them a bit less special. Because "doctors" it seems.

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/what-junior-do...

[FNG]

pghstochaj said:

Just wait until the consultants decide what to do given the suggestion that it’s ok once you make it as a consultant. The pay erosion for consultants has been just as bad. My wife has been a consultant for six years and her pay is £99,425.

In 2008 pay would have been £82,590. Just allowing for inflation that would be £125k today.

The failure is with the BMA allowing this erosion to happen slowly.

To compare to MPs, in 2008 an MP got £60,675 which would today be £91,578. They actually get £86,584.

I'm private sector. Just ran my salary through an inflation calculator.

In 2008 I was earning 45k, which is apparently 76.5k in today's money.

I'm on 56.5k now. And I was very VERY lucky to get a 12% payrise last year, as it was the second year of a pay deal that had been linked to RPI.

It's happened to all of us. The 2008 GFC fked us all over.