Dale farm apply to English Heritage for listing

[Flyfisher]

How do you become a banker then?

Well, a fishing friend of mine became an FX trader by joining Barclay bank after leaving school, though he's currently with Kreditbank in the City. He's up at about 5am in the morning so he can be at his desk well before 7am and is rarely home before 9pm. He doesn't get multi-million pound bonuses, though it would be fair to say he's not exactly struggling to make ends meet. He didn't go to Eton and he didn't go to University, so a pretty average chap really - he just decided to chase the money.

Another friend (who sadly died a couple of years ago) was a chemical engineer and worked for Glaxo and their various acquisitions and mergers until he was made redundant. So he then started consulting (often for Glaxo!) at a daily rate well in excess of £6-700 per day. Such fees are not particularly unusual for a professionally qualified person these days.

 

[Gareth Hughes]

a daily rate well in excess of £6-700 per day. Such fees are not particularly unusual for a professionally qualified person these days.

Um.....

 

[LadyArowana]

a daily rate well in excess of £6-700 per day. Such fees are not particularly unusual for a professionally qualified person these days.

Um.....

..... and some don't even have to work a whole day.

 

[Pford75]

Re: Dale farm apply to English Heritage for listing

by Gareth Hughes » Mon 3rd Oct, 2011 11:28 pm



Flyfisher wrote:a daily rate well in excess of £6-700 per day. Such fees are not particularly unusual for a professionally qualified person these days.

Um.....

In my recent recollection, I have encountered many people generating this sort of daily rate (and this is in Norfolk!) My surveyor, my accountant, my solicitor, my structural engineer, my financial advisor, the leader of my local council and myself. So it's certainly not restricted to bankers.

Like the friend FF mentions, I didn't go to private school, my father left school at 13 and my mother looked after the home. I funded myself through university with debt, double-glazing sales and stints at McDonalds and missed out on the nights on the booze. I spent my early career working 12 hour day/night shifts and then taking a distance learning MBA in my own time and at my own expense. I regularly work away from my wife and children for weeks at a time (often in less than glamorous locations). However, I now reap the rewards and I don't feel in the slightest bit guilty for the salary I earn. I pay my taxes and redistribute my wealth to the local craftsmen of Norfolk (whilst maintaining a lovely period property).

I certainly agree that teachers do an important job, but the hours are quite attractive and there are rather long holidays :wink: I'm not sure I would place librarians at the same level of criticality or stress as teachers and nurses :shock:

 

[robgil]

I was quite surprised as well.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/4605476.stm

 

[philpjuk100]

How come people doing other high stress jobs dont get 6-7 hundred quid a day? Nurses do long hours and get paid very little ,teachers get an average wage and I would say they have loads of stress to deal with. Chefs and even librarians all report high stress levels. I dont see too many librarians giving them selves massive bonuses every year while the rest of the economy goes down the tubes.
How do you become a banker then?

6-7 hundred a day? my (damaged by ENRON) pension is that for a MONTH! and I do not qualify for any benefits and still have to pay tax on this!

 

[JoceAndChris]

How come people doing other high stress jobs dont get 6-7 hundred quid a day? Nurses do long hours and get paid very little ,teachers get an average wage and I would say they have loads of stress to deal with. Chefs and even librarians all report high stress levels. I dont see too many librarians giving them selves massive bonuses every year while the rest of the economy goes down the tubes.
How do you become a banker then?

I'm sorry if I sound a bit harsh but you make your bed and you lie on it. If you go off to be a teacher, a nurse, or whatever, you aren't chasing a high salary - you do it from some (probably misguided) notion that the job will make you fulfilled and happy. If you go for anything that involves the Arts then poverty or just rubbing along is the likely outcome as there are too many people wanting not enough jobs.

I came out of private schooling, Oxford university and drama school and mucked about naughtily for too long chasing a theatrical career. I now wish I headed straight to the city as I'd be on £150,000 a year. But at the age of 21, I thought chasing money was a pretty soulless thing to do. How short-sighted!

Chris on the other hand had a less rarefied education and began with making and selling T-shirts on the beach in Crete. He came back to the UK after several years of hard partying and sat down at the computer and learned a bit of programming. He says anyone can do this if they want to. All you need to do is go on the Microsoft website for 6 months and learn the programming for fun stuff. Then do some exams, then get a modest job for around 25,000 p/a in pretty much any town in Britain.Then you'll need to move to within a commuter distance of the City and break into the contract market, and then push your way into the financial sector, and then into investment banking to be on £700 per day. You'll need pretty bullish levels of confidence and to present yourself convincingly which involves significant amounts spent on looking the part. A large chunk of the day is likely to be spent commuting, and there is ongoing reading and learning of code, in your own time, as the technology changes constantly. The work seems mainly to be sorting out huge knotty messes left by others, setting up new systems which then get changed again or abandoned altogether, so it isn't very satisfying, or easy. People are constantly shouting at you and telling you to get done in two days what takes two weeks. If you aren't any good at it you're quickly driven out. And the contracts don't last long, a year if you're lucky, so the job-hunting and aggressive interviews are never far away, with the knowledge that it's such a small world someone you know of will be in the team you want to join, and they might have no good opinion of you, or vice versa.

Chris gets back at 8-ish so exhausted from a 13 hour day he can't even speak. If he doesn't work he doesn't get paid, and holidays are pretty frowned on during the period of the contract.

On the other hand there's a real spirit of camaraderie and silliness, and teasing and joking amongst his colleagues, so although he complains bitterly and daily about how hard it all is I know he has fun as well. And he frequently says he'd be happy to clean toilets for £700 a day.

 

[Pford75]

And I think the example you've given Joce is replicated across many people around the country. It is a popular myth amongst those on the left that anyone who earns more than £100k must be a 'toff' who went to public school or comes from some sort of privileged background. It's painful for them to accept that actually there are plenty of people who got where they are through single-mindedness and hard work. As FF says, the politics of envy.

The problem being, that if you accept that some people succeed from humble beginnings without any special 'advantage'...then why is it that others do not? The key point is personal choice....I don't see my career as better or worse than others - it's just down to personal choice on the lifestyle and trade-offs we all want to make.

Anyway - back to Dale Farm...seems the courts approved the removal of most of the caravans http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-15153060 but the injunction is still in place. Seems the travellers are also applying for a judicial review

 

[Moo]

Chris gets back at 8-ish so exhausted from a 13 hour day he can't even speak.

That's why my friend's son (also a City chap) lives in Notting Hill.

And while we're on the topic, here's a definition of a successful man/woman/person*:
Someone who spends his/her/their days doing something that he/she/they really enjoy(s). And someone pays him/her/them for doing it**.

On that reckoning, our son is very successful indeed.

*Being PC doesn't do much for one's prose, does it?

** Note that the definition doesn't specify how much.

 

[Flyfisher]

Since we're having one of our frequent off-topic rambles, here's a favourite little story of mine.

A rich businessman was holidaying on a small tropical island. A small, one-man fishing boat drew up on the sandy beach. Inside the boat were several large tasty-looking fish.
"That's quite a fine catch," noted the businessman. "How long did it take you to pull those in?"
"Only a little while," said the fisherman.
"So why don't you stay out fishing longer and catch more fish?" said the rich man.
"This is enough to take care of the needs of my family," replied the fisherman.
"But what do you do with all the rest of your time?" asked the businessman.
The fisherman said, "I sleep late, I fish a little, I spend time with my wife and play with my children. Then I rest in the afternoon. In the evening, I visit the rest of my family or stroll into the village where I have a drink with my friends. I have a full and busy life."
The rich man scoffed. "I have a business degree from one of the best universities in the world. I can help you. If you spent more time fishing, you could buy a bigger boat with the profits you make. With the profits from the bigger boat you could buy several more boats until eventually you would own a whole fleet of fishing boats. Then instead of selling the fish to a middleman you could sell the fish directly to the processor and increase your profit margin. Eventually, you could open up your own canning factory and become a wealthy business owner. Of course, you would have to leave this tropical paradise by the sea and move to the city and maybe even later to another country to manage your growing business."
"How long would all of that take?" the fisherman wanted to know.
"Oh, at least 15 years, maybe 25" replied the businessman.
"But what then?" asked the humble fisherman.
The businessman laughed and said, "That's the best part. When the time is right, you can sell your company and become a multi-millionnaire. You'd be rich beyond your dreams."
"Millions!" exclaimed the fisherman. "Then what?"
"Then you could retire to a tropical paradise by the sea," said the businessman, "where you could sleep late, you could fish a little, spend time with your wife, play with your kids, then rest in the afternoon. In the evening, you could stroll into the village and have a drink with your friends. You see how wonderful things could be!"

 

[Flyfisher]

..... and some don't even have to work a whole day.

That's a nice photo Milady, though I'd always imagined you as being fair-haired.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Chris gets back at 8-ish so exhausted from a 13 hour day he can't even speak.

That's why my friend's son (also a City chap) lives in Notting Hill.

Fab if that works for him! Most London commutes make a mess of 45mins-1 hour, Chris' is 1.30 door to door but at least he gets a seat and a nap.

We had 11 great years in London through our 20s and early 30s, and could go back to our 1 bed flat in Highgate which we rent out, if we wanted to. It would be unthinkable though - we love this house so much and that makes up for everything!

 

[LadyArowana]

:lol: but eeeeeeeew, not for all the tea in China!

 

[Penners]

No, because all cars, even Ferraris, have a major weak point.

It's the big fleshy bit sitting behind the steering wheel.

During my engineering training, I was always taught that the most unreliable component in any motor vehicle is the nut that holds the wheel.

 

[Penners]

..... and some don't even have to work a whole day.

That's a nice photo Milady, though I'd always imagined you as being fair-haired.

I've been studying that picture very closely, and I reckon that the choice of electric socket is very unsympathetic to the decor of the room as a whole.

Tsk! Some people, eh...? :roll:

 

[skier-hughes]

The family I refered to above on the transformation of travellers pitches to mobile home park...
http://www.expressandstar.com/news/2011/10/05/married-gipsy-said-she-was-single-in-63k-con/

 

[biffvernon]

Here's a rather different case to Dale Farm, though there are parallels:

http://www.thisisdevon.co.uk/Injunction-end-month/story-12812676-detail/story.html

This is where the Planning system is not so clever.

 

[robgil]

They like to keep you in the boxes they provide you with Biff. Living outside that box presents them with a problem.
What if everyone wanted to live this way?

 

[biffvernon]

What if everyone wanted to live this way? - A strawman argument. Everyone does not want to live this way, in fact very few people want to live this way. The planning laws may have been fit for purpose in the 1950s but the 21st century is a different place.

http://www.petitiononline.co.uk/pet...o-evict-the-masons-from-muxbeare-orchard/3054

 

[robgil]

I think more and more people deep down are seeing that there is something wrong,only a few acknowledge these feelings and act on them.