How does Helen Clark survive....

[Usarka]

Helen is good at being PM. She's just got the wrong long term strategy. I wouldnt do her job for $375k.

Sorry, crashe, but people who use the word 'luck' when it comes to personal income and wealth make my blood boil.

Lucky?

Pig's fucking arse.

Hard work and brain cells is what gets the cash.

But youre so lucky earning that money, having gone to uni, worked 60 hour weeks for the last 15 years and sacrificed a lot of your personal life! Most of us dont get the chance.

[Wolf]

John Key is worth around about $40 million dollars. Do you seriously think he needs the PM's salary??.

Or that he'll say "Oh, no, I already am worth 40 mil, don't bother paying me the PM's wage, I'll get by on my own."

All the PMs have been independantly wealthy and they've still accepted the PM's salary and then upped it at the first opportunity.

[Usarka]

Cos should you vote in John Keys ooops 'donkey' in as PM..... then he too will be getting that money as his salary........ will you all moan and groan then. I guess not.....

why cos he has children, he has straight teeth....... but remember the man thinks that he is in the labour party..... he even stated that in a speech.
He will most likely send us to war..... get rid of nuke free within NZ..... Remember he thinks along the same lines as Rob Muldoon...... and just look what Muldoon did to our country.
.

John key is rich (which is why a lot of kiwis dont like him, how dare he be). He doesnt need this job for the money. so why is he doing it?

helen clarke = worked in academia and politics all her life, PM is just part of her career progression

john key = whether you agree with his policies or not he wants to be PM to make a difference to the country

[Mully]

Ok what about the CEO's of huge companies that earn way more than what Helen Clark gets..... and they work way less hours than her......

Blah Blah, pissmoan, snip.

Helen will be on a high tax bracket and a lot of her wages will be also put into a super account upon her retirement.

OK, two points.

A) Private Enterprise, verses public purse. CEOs and GMs I have met who are paid a lot are professionals who have been slogging it out (in the real world) for upwards of 20 years. Unlike Helen who has never held a real job. If she turned up to, say, Telecom, tomorrow looking for a $375K job, they would laugh her out of the building.

B) Helen's super fund is also subsidised - to the tune of $2.50 for every dollar of contributions she makes.

[rainman]

They can't get enough cops, nurses, doctors or teachers and we have 3rd world hospital waiting lists. How many resources could be bought using the horrendous inflated salary the PM gets?

As a public service to the hard of thinking, I'll work this out for you. Let's see, how about..... um..... about 10. At the cost of not having a PM. Yeah, that'd work well.

Why does everyone see a $375K per annum salary as some sort of enormous mind-numbing wealth?

It's less than most senior partners in large law firms take home every year, certainly less than one can make running a residential construction company, and about an average wage for the CEO of a mid-level NZ company with, say, less than $50m annual turnover.

Viewed in context with the enormity of the potential fuckups and potential successes that can be generated by a Prime Minister, $375K per annum is almost paltry.

Good question. A few jobs (and years) ago the CEO of the co I worked for was earning a base of AU$515k plus options allowances and assorted other gobs of money, and he was a useless tit too, who seemed to go out of his way to destroy the company.

Says who? And these CEOs are (usually) skilled in the art of business for the good of their shareholders. Your precious Heilen is only skilled in the art of staying where she is

As is the nature of all politicians of all political persuasions. What do you really expect pols to do? And how many CEOs do you know who hang about a few years, collect the big cash, do an at best indifferent job of running their companies, then float off to another cushy gig?

You'd think she'd be able to afford to get her teeth fixed

Praps she don't wanna? Maybe she's quite happy with her looks and teeth, or sees them as irrelevant.

OK, two points.

A) Private Enterprise, verses public purse. CEOs and GMs I have met who are paid a lot are professionals who have been slogging it out (in the real world) for upwards of 20 years. Unlike Helen who has never held a real job.

I say bollocks. I could count the number of highly paid, talented, professional and capable CEOs that I have met on one hand, after I'd chopped most of the fingers off. On the other hand, I can give you a long list of useless bastards who have stuffed up one thing after the next and still either been given a pile of cash to piss off or given a pile of cash and gone to find another nest to crap in.

Government is a) hard to do right (why so many stuff it up), and b) there's a relatively limited number of job openings for PMs. Like one.

[Shadows]

She is on duty 24/7, including putting in her appearance at seemly "trivial" social functions. She probably doesn't get a chance to spend any of it. She has made the sacrifice of not having children to do the things she does for her country (a woman who has missed the bus on that one will probably not share how they feel)

How often do we see her playing golf, regulary engaging in various hobbies of her own, going on extravagent holidays etc (if she IS overseas shes usually on duty)

Shesh to that salary I say...well she has put the time and effort into working up the political ladder...its a shame shes not appreciated by the public while being at the top...

If we dislike her that much...who the hell votes for her?! must be someone around here.....

Gee I guess that some of you lot aren't thinking.....

Cos should you vote in John Keys ooops 'donkey' in as PM..... then he too will be getting that money as his salary........ will you all moan and groan then. I guess not.....

why cos he has children, he has straight teeth....... but remember the man thinks that he is in the labour party..... he even stated that in a speech.
He will most likely send us to war..... get rid of nuke free within NZ..... Remember he thinks along the same lines as Rob Muldoon...... and just look what Muldoon did to our country.


As Katwyn stated she is earning every damn cent working 24/7 365 days a year. Helen Clark choose NOT to have children as have many other women in NZ.

Damn I wish Kate Sheppard was never born.

[McJim]

It's not that much - I knew dudes that earned 5 times that in London and they weren't considered particularly high flyers...just good at their jobs.

[Sanx]

why cos he has children, he has straight teeth....... but remember the man thinks that he is in the labour party..... he even stated that in a speech.

And I'm sure you've never mixed up a preposition, either ...

He will most likely send us to war..... get rid of nuke free within NZ..... Remember he thinks along the same lines as Rob Muldoon...... and just look what Muldoon did to our country.

Oh what utter tripe. "He will most likely send us to war." Where the hell are you getting that from, other than the rather large booklet entitled "How Great Labour Are, and other fairy stories"?
As for the nuclear-free issue, unless Key's continually lying through his teeth about such matters, he has stated that he will not change the nuclear free status of New Zealand. Some evidence here. He also declared it rather publicly on Cambell Live during an interview. No doubt the response will be "But he can say what he likes now - what he does in power will be the important thing", or some other trite phrase indicating he'll perform an abrupt U-turn the day after the election. Well, that's a possibility. But, unlike a certain party that's in power, Key doesn't have a track record of U-turns.
Labour, on the other hand, promise lots of things before elections, and then promptly reverse them at the next convenient opportunity. This is not hyperbole - it's documented fact. For proof, go read Hansard on the day of the 2005 budget and then for the day of the 2006 budget.
As for the Muldoon comment ... he was before my time. But last I heard, some of the great economic fuck-ups were carried by a Labour government; the names David Lange and Roger Douglas spring to mind. 76,000 manufacturing jobs lost in five years, plus such other policies designed to help the 'working man' including introduction of GST, removing farming subsidies, removing controls on foreign exchange, abolishing or removing import tariffs and incorporating state owned enterprises. Oh, and they also drafted possibly the biggest fuck-up of all, the Treaty of Waitangi Amendment Act 1985.

As Katwyn stated she is earning every damn cent working 24/7 365 days a year. Helen Clark choose NOT to have children as have many other women in NZ.

Wow - what a woman. Works while she sleeps. Or doesn't she sleep at all? And yes, Helen Clark can choose not to have kids. It is her inalienable right. But she never chooses to exercise another of her inalienable rights, that of silence, when it comes to telling other how they should raise their children. Isn't it kind of her, the gracious dear leader, to share her complete lack of experience.

[Mully]

As a public service to the hard of thinking, I'll work this out for you. Let's see, how about..... um..... about 10. At the cost of not having a PM. Yeah, that'd work well.

Plus the $2.50 of contributions for every dollar we top up her super.
Plus the unlimited international travel FOR LIFE for her and her wife Peter
Plus the 2 free cars (my understanding is they get one at home and one in Wellington??), replaced every, what 3 years??
Plus the expenses to pay for "grooming" and the like (most people have to take that out of their salary)

Even if we ignore Helen's salary in particular, the article I linked to shows backbenchers get $126,200 plus benefits. I bet most people couldn't pick a lot of the backbenchers out of a Police line up.

I don't want to turn this into another political (Labour v National) thread (I can't stand for III to ruin another perfectly servicable thread) my point was simply the amount politicians in general get paid compared to the "average" wage in NZ.

This in particular annoyed me:
"MPs' allowances have also been given a 2 per cent boost in line with inflation; they now get $14,280 to entertain, pay for memberships, sponsors, fees and koha; cover the costs of raffle tickets, donations and flowers; and pay for passport photos, briefcases and meals."

[MisterD]

Or that he'll say "Oh, no, I already am worth 40 mil, don't bother paying me the PM's wage, I'll get by on my own."

All the PMs have been independantly wealthy and they've still accepted the PM's salary and then upped it at the first opportunity.

Well he already gets $200-and-odd grand for being leader of the opposition, same as a cabinet minister and he already donates that salary to charity every year...

[James Deuce]

As for the Muldoon comment ... he was before my time. But last I heard, some of the great economic fuck-ups were carried by a Labour government; the names David Lange and Roger Douglas spring to mind. 76,000 manufacturing jobs lost in five years, plus such other policies designed to help the 'working man' including introduction of GST, removing farming subsidies, removing controls on foreign exchange, abolishing or removing import tariffs and incorporating state owned enterprises.

Be careful arguing the Muldoon vs Lange economic debate. When Lange came to power in '84 there was about 6 weeks worth of cash reserve left in the NZ economy. Interest payments on overseas debt were made with Diplomatic Credit Cards. The Economic reforms undertaken by Labour in the '80s weren't done for fun, and if National had won that election, they would have been in the same boat. At the time Muldoon wouldn't have handled it as well as Lange/Douglas because his MO was borrow 'til you drop. No one was lending to NZ in '84. Manufacturing had been sustained on protective tariffs and subsidy, and primary produce had been protected to the extent that when they had to account for their own production and finance a lot of them (mostly sheep farmers) just sold up. NZ businesses weren't required to compete, just to exist to maintain positive economic indicators.

[KATWYN]

Damn I wish Kate Sheppard was never born.

How have you managed to survive in the real world with that attitude

[James Deuce]

He's alright and probably knows more about Kate Shepard than your average 19 year kiwi chick.

[KATWYN]

Wow - what a woman. Works while she sleeps. Or doesn't she sleep at all?

I spose you would say the same thing about our Ambos, Dr's & fire people when they are hauled outa bed in the middle of the night to be on duty ....being on alert and needing to jump into action at any time comes under the catagory of working 24/7 IMHO

[rainman]

Even if we ignore Helen's salary in particular, the article I linked to shows backbenchers get $126,200 plus benefits. I bet most people couldn't pick a lot of the backbenchers out of a Police line up.

Agreed without question on the backbenchers. We could do with less than half of them and still run the place quite fine. In fact it'd probably be better!

Didn't we have a referendum a few years back on whether to reduce the size of parliament, and the results were a yes, but ignored? Wonder if National would actually reduce the number? I'd seriously think about voting for them then.