The Treasury is searching for a Director for Financial Services to take on an “exciting and challenging leadership role” within the heart of the British economy, for a £100k salary.
According to the job posting, the successful candidate would be tasked with “advising the Chancellor and Economic Secretary on financial services policy, taking account of the Treasury’s fiscal and economic objectives”.
Tim Leunig, chief economist at Nesta, said that the salary is “a way of saying ‘don’t apply if you have ever had a senior position in finance’”.
And Paul Johnson, former director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), described this level of pay as a “false economy”, which showed that for this job “knowing about financial services is not an essential criterion”.
Johnson noted: “I was at this level in HMT 18 years ago and was paid that amount in cash terms.
“Getting good experienced people into these roles matters to us all.”
Salary level well below industry standards
From a sweep of City job postings for financial services roles in the same salary bracket, City AM has identified vacancies for a senior developer for a financial technology firm, an operations manager for a loan company and a senior project manager in investment management.
Each of these roles would be considered mid-senior, but far from senior management or executive level.
While there have been indications of a wobble in financial services pay in 2025, average pay for the entire sector sits at £102,300 as of August. That figure is higher than the salary for this “leadership” role.
This is the latest Civil Service job to questionably align seniority with pay, leading to questions around the experience levels of the candidate who gets the job.
Back in July, the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) offered £79,440 for a Head of Ventures within the government’s new “sovereign AI unit”, which was slammed as “laughable”.
On the bright side, the successful candidate would be eligible for a day off on the King’s birthday.