First it was the teachers in a top end Brisbane school, who complained about a modest pay increase, the worst in twenty years mind you, but still in the order of 3.45% I believe.

Now it's the armed forces complaining about a 4.5% pay increase over four years.

Are these people stupid. Can they not see where we are headed. Can they not spot the signs of the train wreck headed our way!

With something in the order of ten thousand coal miners jobs lost in QLD alone in the past 18 months,or so, combined with the unreported contractor businesses and jobs that have also no doubt gone with them, and the looming chaos that's ahead with the withdrawal of our car industries, I just can't believe these people are not happy just to have a well paid job.

Times have changed, whereby you can't just quit one job and start another. Those days are gone again.

Talk about all take no give

Unfortunately if you are in a secure job, paid by the government etc all you can see is:
low interest rates, cheap overseas holidays, cheap goods from overseas etc etc
so the reality is these people can't see past their own circumstances which currently are the best they have ever seen, despite increases in utility costs.
When half the country is unemployed and the government has to start retrenching because they have no incoming tax revenue from the unemployed only then will these people get on the same page as the rest of private enterprise Australia.

Indeed Rehctub, I just can't understand why all those greedy workers don't just say
" Ok, no more pay rises. I will stay as I am for the good of the country."

Yeah right.

Ar Suze, you're so predictable in your response.

Perhaps you should revisit the situation in a few years and see where things sit hey.

At no time did I say no more pay rises but, if you remove your bias you will actually see that to just have a secure jobs in the next few years will be a god send.

Don't believe me, just keep dreaming of your world that only ever goes up, never down.

You may also try to broaden your horizons for a while and consider the 10,000 miners who don't have a job anymore, let alone a pay rise. Perhaps you could stop worrying about our faulse world for a while and spare a thought for them, many of which either have no job, or a far less secure and paying job.

It always amazes me how people who have their jobs provided think. They are happy to take the pay rise when workers are short, but to think they may have to give a little back when things slow. Unthinkable!

Give and take should be just that, not take and take again.

Rehctub, are you suggesting the rest of the workforce should forego any pay rises unless everyone else is employed?
That is a bit naive isn't it?

I am getting a pay rise soon, and I damn well earned it!

"When half the country is unemployed and the government has to start retrenching because they have no incoming tax revenue from the unemployed only then will these people get on the same page as the rest of private enterprise."

There's been quite a bit of retrenchment in the public service already. In the rural area where I live, the various land and water departments, national parks, CMAs, etc. have been destaffed over the last couple of years. Whole offices have closed down. Then people whinge that the departments don't do enough back-burns, or manage the ferals in the parks. The same applies to the health system. You want an ambulance under half an hour? Happy to lie in the ambulance until there's a free bed?

Can't have it both ways!