The stand-off between Tasmania's public sector workers and the state government is continuing with no end-point in sight.
Union leaders argued industrial action would only escalate until their needs were met, while the government said offering any more than a 9.5 per cent wage increase over three years would bloat the budget.
But what would the repercussions be for everyday Tasmanians?
Premier Jeremy Rockliff said the government was open to negotiating with union leaders, but the bottom line is that it simply cannot afford anything higher than the offer currently on the table.
"I want to ensure the public service are rewarded for the work that they do and continue to do and have done, to ensure that we take account of cost of living pressures ... but also ensure that our budget can sustain the increases as well," he said.
"It's no good having pay rises that break the budget, which forces future governments to reduce services. That didn't work between 2010 and 2014 and that's not what I want."
But economist at the University of Tasmania Paul Blacklow dismissed the Premier's claim.
"The state government's revenue has been increasing thanks to inflation kicking off, [and] GST revenues are really picking up," Dr Blacklow said.
"We also had the property boom, so stamp duty revenues are quite up."
Dr Blacklow said the government's budget revenue is predicted to increase by 8 per cent next financial year, followed by 5 per cent the year after.
Thanks to windfall gains, he also said taxpayers are not likely to foot the bill for wage rises, nor should they see a reduction in services.
"There's no need to increase taxes or reduce services because the increase in revenues from GST and stamp duty are flowing in."
So what should Tasmanians be worried about?
"I think everyday Tasmanians will notice it more if the teachers and nurses and ambulance drivers leave because they're not getting paid enough," said Dr Blacklow.
"That's my worry. By not getting a decent pay rise or one that matches inflation, the Tasmanian wages of nurses and teachers and ambulance drivers are really falling behind.
"It's already really hard to attract workers to Tasmania … so this is just going to make it worse.
"The state government needs to realise that if they don't give a decent pay rise, they're effectively lowering the public sectors incomes by about 5 per cent, which means typically people are going to cut back their spending [and] slow our economy down."
It is a sentiment echoed by workforce demographer Lisa Denny, who said the government should be considering how much it will cost the state if public sector workers seek employment interstate.
"There's a lot of discussion about the affordability of this pay rise, but what is the cost of not providing these services?" she asked.
"And what's the long-term cost of deteriorating health conditions of people not being able to achieve the educational outcomes they deserve?
"What I really feel we need to be doing is looking at a longer-term vision for health care, education and public sector workers."
Part of that vision, according to Dr Denny, is looking at ways to entice workers to stay in the state long-term, which she said would become crucial in the near future.
"The reality is, the number of jobs that we're going to need in these sectors and the number of people we're going to need in these sectors are going to be growing quite significantly over the next five to 10 years," she said.
"We really need to be [thinking of] what jobs we are going to be needing into the future … what are we going to pay them and what conditions are we going to be able to offer them to attract them and to retain them there?"
So what kind of trade-off is required? And what would Tasmanians rather lose?
"We have to make a decision of whether or not we pay our workers appropriately and provide them the conditions that they need and be able to attract and retain them and reduce the costs involved in continually attracting and re-training and the turn-over costs," said Dr Denny.
"Maybe we have to change our expectations as a population as to what services we expect our government to deliver if we don't expect to pay for them ourselves."
Treasurer Michael Ferguson said every 1 per cent wage increase would cost the state budget $400 million over the four-year forward estimates.
