Senior teachers in England have in effect had their pay cut by £6,600 since 2010, according to analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies that comes as strike action over pay is likely to close schools.
The independent economics research institute calculated that long-serving and senior teachers – accounting for nearly a third of those working in England – would have earned the equivalent of £50,300 in 2010. But below-inflation wage increases over the past 12 years has meant their pay in 2022 was just £43,700.
Experienced teachers have experienced similar real-terms cuts across the national pay scale, meaning that half of the teaching workforce has had the value of their annual earnings fall by thousands of pounds compared with what they would have earned in 2010, when the Conservative party came into government.
Luke Sibieta, an IFS research fellow, said the erosion in pay for long-serving staff was one reason why teachers were leaving the profession.
