[veronica]

I have been chatting to a few Uk customers who are not forum members in the ski shop lately and there seems to be a reoccuring theme in what they are saying. The ones I have in mind are mostly chippies and sparks. they have all said that they are disappointed in the wages/cost of things here and feel misled. They all knew logically that the wages were going to be lower, but all of them had gained the impression that as NZ was short of skilled workers they would be a valued commodity here,they have found the truth to be very different. As a general rule they are getting $18- $20 an hour, and these are all experience qualified workers. they all know that there bosses are charging anything between $40 to $60 an hour for their time on the job. Unfortunately this means that many of them have to work Saturdays as overtime to make ends meet and they are feeling the pinch. They have all said that they expected their money to go a lot further from the blurb they got from the NZ govt. that showed cost of living etc and feel that they were misled by the figures put out.
They feel a bit 'cheated' and have no spare cash to do the many things that NZ offers. while I know going tramping, taking the kids out on the bikes etc. is free its nice to be able to spend a bit sometimes on leisure activities without feeling you will have to go without something else.

My own feeling on the wages issue here is that is well overdue for a massive shake up. In Australia a labourer can be earning $30 an hour, here they are pleased to get $15. While I am not either in favour or against unions I do believe in a fair days money for a fair days work and it seems to me that isn't happening. I wouldn't mind betting we are due for a lot of industrial action and turbulance in the next few years, and its long overdue.....its no wonder so many NZers are living and working overseas once they qualify. NZIS needs to get those books rewritten to give a more up to date/realistic listing of prices and cost of living here.

Its such a beautiful place to live (in spite of the southerlies) but that won't be enough to get people to stay here and have such a drastic standard of living drop. Bit of a dismal post really so sorry about that, but having several people independently make the same comments I felt that it ought to be said on here for people to think on.

[Bubbles]

A good honest post Veronica, thankyou.

Yes, I too believe NZ needs to seriously review their skilled wage structure for the reasons that have been stated, but it's not going to put us off making a damn good go of it. We're going in with " Eye's Wide Open "

The wife and I have discussed this topic on quite a few occasions now and both realise that as a toolmaker I would fall into the $22 / $25 an hr bracket :eek and my good lady knows that she would and will, be working aswell as me to subsidise what would be, to be honest, a pretty crappy wage for such a skill. We know it's going to be very hard for the first 2 yrs or so, until we have got established and well and truly found our feet. Hopefully with the funds we are taking with us our intention is to be mortgage free :clap , which is a very big burden off anybodies shoulders and hopefully have some spare cash to fall back on if / when required. This should be able to provide us with a reasonable quality of life with the house and surroundings we have worked very hard for and so much want for ourselves and our children.
We know its not all going to be a bed of roses , but life's a gamble and we are pretty sure we've done our homework.

Who was it that said " You only get one life but if you work it right one is enough " ;) ;)

John

[Tara Sage]

Well Said Veronica :clap :clap

For all those who don't know me my hubby is a carpenter and is on a lot lower wage than what we had thought he would get.

We know that his boss charges out at least double what he earns.

It isn't as easy as people think it is going to be, we are in the fortunate position that by moving we have cleared all the credit card and loan debts that we had in the UK and what we have we have paid for (except the house still got a mortgage unfortunately)

Don't get me wrong, we don't regret moving for a minute - NZ is just right for us we are very much outdoor people and nothing is nicer than a nice long walk with our son and the dog at the weekend.

We have a few plans up our sleeve that will make things easier financially in the future.

I just wouldn't want people to be disillusioned that fiancially you will be better off unless you can come totally mortgage free I don't think you will be.

However the quality of life is so much better if you can stop yourself from getting back into the work rut that you were in in the UK.

Sorry if I am waffling :?

[jo b]

Veronica,

nicely put. I too think there needs to be a shake up. NZ will continue to loose good skilled workers and in the long term it will cost businesses dearly. Not only because of the time they have with vacancies on thier hands but the hidden costs of recruitment and also not being able to fulfil regular customers work. The will certainly be a pattern of a conveyor belt of workers if they don't open thier eyes to this quickly.

I agree the governement needs to stop making NZ look to good to be true in all the blurb and manage peoples expectations of the country properly.

I am just thankful of this forum as I know I am going into emigrating with my eyes open.

Jo

[Bubbles]

However the quality of life is so much better if you can stop yourself from getting back into the work rut that you were in in the UK.

Sorry if I am waffling :?

Hi Tara, exactly my sentiments.
We know and fully expect we will be making some changes to the way we look at life and finding out what really is important to us.

John

[Carol]

I took a massive wage drop as a teacher when I came here.... which has fortunately (only with the insistence of NZEI teachers union) gradually been reinstated.
That said - even 9 years on - my salary has been left behind in comparison with my UK colleagues.


One of them - a head of Science department in a High School - has been out here and loves it.
Would come tomorrow....but cant afford to.


He would be in HUGE demand here.
Amazing eh?

[foolsgold99]

some interesting background

http://www.national.org.nz/don_brash_article.aspx?ArticleID=3899

sooner we get rid of butch helen, and get a goverment that's more in touch, and will offer tax cuts that ammount to more than 67c in 3 years the better

[veronica]

It seems to me that the only way to make any money as a craftsman is to be self employed.
I can't say that I share Danpolls view of the trades here. we have had a variety of trades men through and only had one who was slow, (and both Pete and I are convinced he was slow in the educational sense) but he was very thorough. All the rest have been on a par with UK blokes for speed etc. but I suppose if you are only getting $18 an hour theres not a lot of incentive to go fast. make the job last twice as long to get the money in.

[debnjohn]

I'd like to ask what information sites other folks use for internet research, when trying to work out cost-of-living in NZ ?

And do you think the cost-of-living calulator on the parent site HERE (http://www.emigratenz.org/cost-of-living-in-new-zealand.HTML) is reasonably accurate?

Cheers,
John.

[debnjohn]

Double post :oops:

[Gran]

The National party destroyed the union structure, and established, individual employment contracts so that everybody was on their own with their pay negotiations, if the employer did not like you personally, that was tough biccies. That was when NZ drifted behind in the pay stakes. Hopefully we will gradually catch up because altho the employers love it they have bitten off their nose to spite their face, it has become more difficult to encourage good immigrants to come here. Another thing the National party did was destroy the aprentice system, although it has been reinstated now it will be a while before we get oncoming skilled people from it.

[ErwinT]

some interesting background

http://www.national.org.nz/don_brash_article.aspx?ArticleID=3899



A Dutch guy who is going to work in NZ on a work visa forwarded this to his employer and this was his employer's reply:

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There will be a general election in the next couple of months. Don Brash is the leader of the main opposition party. It is the job of opposition parties to point out the complete failure of government parties. When his party was in power in the 1990s the economy was a flop.

For the record, NZ has the lowest unemployment in the OECD (3%), it has experienced sustained and record economic growth for the last 6 years and net immigration has been positive over that period and the population continues to grow. There have been large investments made in education, health and infrastructure after many years of right-wing neglect. The business situation is confident and vibrant. For some reason Mr. Brash ignores this.

You are not unique as an "intelligent" European seeking to bring your skills to NZ. At CeBIT a couple of months ago our stand was approached by a lot of excellent people looking to come to this country. The tax burden in NZ is much lower than Australia and we are a much less regulated society than Australia (or Europe for that matter). For example, the top tax rate in Australia is 45% as opposed to 39% here.

The Australian economy is larger and supported by some pretty major mineral wealth but I have a friend who actually did migrate to Adelaide to run a hospital and he had to negotiate a much higher salary than they wanted to pay just to have the same living standard as NZ. He is looking to return at the end of his contract.

New Zealanders do travel a lot and do spend time working overseas. Obviously the opportunities with our population and size of economy makes that inevitable. There is also an education system here that gives them the opportunity to make themselves useful anywhere in the world. My sister and her family spent 6 months here a year ago and thought the
schools were way better than they had in Canada.

It seems rather healthy to me that many people seek to live and work overseas. Many also return to NZ, particularly when they want to start families.

Obviously YMMV. Not everything is as it should be, but then again nobody can agree on what the "should be" situation is. For example, you may be surprised that NZs reputation for "cleanness and greenness" is largely a factor of low population rather than good husbandry. Not all NZers are nice people and elections bring out the worst in everyone, it seems.

--------------------------------------------

The truth obviously lies in the middle, but I found it to be a very reasonable reply.