Public pay in Britain in the 1990s

Published on 1 November 1998

This Commentary looks at public pay in detail, tracing its trend relative to the private sector over the 1980s and 1990s and showing how the gap in pay between the public and private sectors differs dramatically across occupations, gender and education groups. These findings illustrate how misleading comparisons of public and private sector pay based on aggregate data can be.

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This Commentary looks at public pay in detail, tracing its trend relative to the private sector over the 1980s and 1990s and showing how the gap in pay between the public and private sectors differs dramatically across occupations, gender and education groups. These findings illustrate how misleading comparisons of public and private sector pay based on aggregate data can be.

    Authors

    Richard Disney
    Richard Disney

    Research Associate University of Sussex

    Richard is an IFS Research Associate, a Part-time Professor of Economics at the University of Sussex and a Visiting Professor of Economics at UCL.

    Alissa Goodman
    Alissa Goodman

    Research Fellow University College London

    Alissa is an IFS Research Fellow and a Professor of Economics and Director of the Centre for Longitudinal Studies at the UCL Institute of Education.

    Person graphic

    Amanda Gosling

    Person graphic

    Chris Trinder

    Report details

    DOI
    10.1920/co.ifs.1998.0072
    ISBN
    978-1-873357-83-5
    Publisher
    IFS

    Suggested citation

    Disney, R et al. (1998). Public pay in Britain in the 1990s. London: IFS. Available at: https://ifs.org.uk/publications/public-pay-britain-1990s (accessed: 15 January 2025).

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