No wonder every boy wanted to be a train driver

In my post "Nationalise the railways?" on 21 December I hinted that railway employees are well paid, in suggesting that most of them would struggle to get such a well paid job elsewhere. I'm not sure that many people realise just how well paid train drivers are, but the Daily Mail was one of several news outlets to pick up on the fact that drivers on Southern Railway, when they are actually bothering to work, earn £49,660 a year basic salary, topped up for many to £52,000 by a London Weighting allowance. Not bad when the median UK salary is about £28k. But hold on minute, that basic is for working a 4 day standard working week. Most of them work 5 days, so actual earnings, given that they get overtime for the 5th day, are about £70,000. That seems a pretty good whack for driving a train.

To put this in context, the median pay of the highest earning group for full -time employees in the ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2016 (managers, directors and senior officials) was £41,500. £70k is higher than the median total annual earnings for chartered engineers, which was £63k in 2013.

Their earnings put train drivers around the 94th percentile in terms of pre-tax pay (£70k was the 95th percentile in 2013-14, £60k was the 93rd percentile). So only 1 in 20 people earn more than them. Incredible.

Oh,  and of course the drivers of course benefit from a generous final salary pension scheme and 6 weeks holiday a year. (Incidentally isn't it about time that all earnings were quoted as the value of the the package including pension and other benefits? This would be very revealing but it would mainly confirm just how good a deal many public sector employees are on).

Driving a train is a responsible job which requires some training and skills but it surely should not rank above the average for jobs in the UK economy. The only reason it does is the historic and continuing bargaining power of a tiny group.

The Southern drivers are striking again in the new year. Their strike overlaps with one by London Underground staff - another group of people with some conspicuously highly paid folk among their ranks. I implied in my post of 13 August (Right Mickey Takers) that the RMT was having a laugh, but they aren't. This has gone beyond a joke; they are taking the p**s.The pusillanimous railway bosses, pre and post privatisation have never stood up to the drivers (or signallers come to that). Remember the Southern dispute is about driver operated doors, not getting rid of drivers. But if the government hasn't got the gumption or bottle to take on these overly powerful vested interests, then I fear we will have to skip the driver operated doors stage and go straight to driverless trains as the only way of making progress and breaking the Luddite's grip. It would be a battle but one worth winning.

Pay data for train drivers in the Daily Mail on 24 December, though they got it from the ASLEF website. General pay data from ONS and The Professional Engineer.