Inflation and the Teachers

I haven’t seen this explanation anywhere else so perhaps it’s worth looking at. With heavy increases in government spending when he was Chancellor Gordon Brown obviously caused some inflation. What he did to circumvent it was to fiddle the index.

Inflation is measured as a rise in the price of a basket of goods and services and obviously you can have different things in the basket. When Brown was getting worried he changed the index, from RPI (retail price index) which included mortgage payments, council tax and other things, to CPI (consumer price index) which didn’t. Suddenly inflation was lower! Brilliant economics by the Iron Chancellor!

No, trickery. This is where the teachers come in. Their salaries were reviewed 'independently' according to the CPI and they were given 2.5% but their costs go up with the RPI which is 4%. One teacher interviewed on Sky said her student loan was being repaid in accordance with RPI but her salary had gone up with the lower CPI. All in the same paycheck!

My gut reaction to a teacher’s strike is to condemn it: our children are suffering enough with the appalling education system without being cheated from their schooling by bolshie teachers.

But actually the teachers have a point. To make it they should withdraw from the political levy for the Labour Party and vote for anyone else, Conservative, Liberal, UKIP whatever. They have been shafted to make Brown look good, just as the 10p tax payers have. That's how to make the point.