[FYI - (1)My GENday is Sept. 19th. When is YOURS?;(2) Before Election Day, get ahold of a copy from the library of "Obama's America" or see the film "2016" that is based on it. see trailer at http://www.2016themovie.com/media/ You only THINK you know our President.]
URGENT PRAYER REQUEST: American Embassies Attacked!
•LET'S BE SURE TO CONTINUE PRAYING FOR THE SAFETY OF ALL OUR EMBASSIES WORLDWIDE
•For the families and colleagues of Ambassador Stevens and the others who were killed by the attacks in Benghazi.
•About the U.S. relationship between Libya, Algeria, Egypt, Yemen, Iraq, Afghanistan and other Islamic controlled nations.
•God's wisdom as to whether to suspend foreign aid to countries that threaten Americans and American interests.
Chicago Teachers Union Strike:•For a rapid end to the strike, and those who are negotiating it.
•For the more than 350,000 children who will not be in school, and for their families who must find alternate ways of providing for them.
•For public safety in Chicago and environs as bands of unsupervised children take to the streets.
Churches Open Doors to Kids During Chicago Strike - CBNNews.com, September 11, 2012,http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2012/September/Churches-Open-Doors-to-Kids-During-Chicago-Strike/
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[NOTE: I offer the following explanation of the Chicago teachers UNION strike to supplement the article I posted on Tuesday (#318)on what is wrong with education in America today. Please note the additional related article posted afterwards.- Stan]
"25,000 Chicago Teachers Walk Off the Job"- Amy Payne, September 10
[Beginning Tuesday]morning, about 350,000 students in Chicago Public Schools [have been] without teachers. While the 25,000-plus unionized teachers take to the picket lines in a strike over benefits and teacher evaluations, working parents are scrambling to figure out what to do.
“We know a strike is really going to be painful. People will be hurt on both sides,” Jay Rehak, a union delegate and high school English teacher, told the Chicago Tribune [1]. “But in the end, it’s like saying, ‘I’ll be bloodied and you’ll be bloodied, but at least you’ll know not to bully me again.’” [italics mine; what does it say when this kind of violent wording is used?]
Among other demands, the Chicago Teachers Union had asked for a 30 percent [!; Question: Who in ANY economy, let alone today's economy, asks for that kind of raise? Most are just grateful to have a job.] a pay increase—despite the facts that just 15 percent of fourth graders are proficient in reading and just 56 percent of students graduate in the district. The school board ended up offering a 16 percent pay increase over four years, but as last night’s midnight deadline for strike negotiations neared, the union rejected the offer.
The average teacher in Chicago Public Schools—a district facing a $700 million deficit—makes $71,000 per year [2] before benefits are included. Reuters reports that “Chicago Public Schools has projected a $3 billion budget deficit over the next three years and faces a crushing burden [3] of pensions promised to retiring teachers.”
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, formerly President Obama’s White House chief of staff, is getting an advanced class in union power [4]. He came into office last year and asked the teachers to accept a 2 percent pay raise instead of 4 percent to try to address the $700 million budget shortfall, and the union refused. He did reach a deal to lengthen one of the country’s shortest school days. As the Tribune describes: “In exchange for the longer school day—an additional half-hour in high schools and 75 minutes in elementary schools—CPS agreed to rehire nearly 500 teachers in non-core subjects from a pool of teachers who had been laid off. That kept the hours in the work week the same for full-time teachers.”
The most reliable [5] data show that teachers in general work no more than private professionals in a typical workweek, even when off-site work on evenings and weekends is included. Yet the CPS school day is among the shortest for teachers in the nation.
Heritage’s Jason Richwine and the American Enterprise Institute’s Andrew Biggs did an extensive study of teacher compensation [6] and followed up [7] with additional discussion of controversial issues. When it comes to teacher pay, Richwine sums up [8]:"Because the average public-school teacher already receives above-market compensation, policymakers should avoid across-the-board pay raises. Instead, they should focus on rewarding high-quality teachers with targetedsalary increases."
Of course, teacher compensation is much more than just wages. Part of Chicago Public Schools’ financial problems is the guaranteed pensions for retired teachers. Richwine explains [8] that these defined-benefit plans, which cost [9] several times more than the typical retirement plan in the private sector, are a bad deal for taxpayers: "Since benefits accruing to today’s workers need not be paid now, states can promise generous benefits without feeling the full fiscal impact for years or even decades. Benefits to workers are guaranteed, meaning taxpayers are ultimately responsible for any shortfalls in their states’ pension systems—and there are many shortfalls.
The Chicago strike, highlighting the urgent need for education reform, comes at a time when lack of confidence in public schools [10] is at an all-time high—and support for school choice [11] is also at an all-time high. Is it any wonder?
[bold and italics emphasis mine]
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Article printed from The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation: http://blog.heritage.org; URL to article: http://blog.heritage.org/2012/09/10/morning-bell-25000-chicago-teachers-walk-off-the-job/
URLs in this post:
[1] Chicago Tribune: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chi-chicago-public-schools-chicago-teachers-union-contract-talks-strike,0,2062807.story?page=1
[2] $71,000 per year: http://blog.heritage.org/2012/06/12/chicago-teachers-union-demands-30-percent-pay-raise/
[3] crushing burden: http://in.reuters.com/article/2012/09/10/usa-chicago-schools-idINL1E8K93JC20120910
[4] union power: http://reason.com/reasontv/2012/09/05/the-machine-the-truth-behind-teachers-un
[5] reliable: http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2008/03/art4full.pdf
[6] extensive study of teacher compensation: http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2011/10/assessing-the-compensation-of-public-school-teachers
[7] followed up: http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2012/01/critical-issues-in-assessing-teacher-compensation
[8] sums up: http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2012/04/a-better-way-to-pay-five-rules-for-reforming
[9] cost: http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2012/05/the-real-cost-of-public-pensions
[10] lack of confidence in public schools: http://blog.heritage.org/2012/06/21/lack-of-confidence-in-public-schools-at-an-all-time-high/
[11] support for school choice: http://blog.heritage.org/2012/08/22/back-to-school-support-for-school-choice-reaches-all-time-high/
[12] links: http://www.chicagonow.com/wee-windy-city/2012/09/oh-wow-this-is-really-happening-what-to-do-with-your-kids-during-the-cps-teachers-strike/
Copyright © 2011 The Heritage Foundation. All rights reserved.
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Chicago Teachers’ Strike: Unthinkable and Intolerableby James Sherk,September 10; http://blog.heritage.org/2012/09/10/chicago-teachers-strike-unthinkable-and-intolerable/
“Unthinkable and intolerable.” So President Franklin Delano Roosevelt considered strikes by government employees. Karen Lewis, the president of the Chicago Teachers’ Union (CTU), has a different view. She called a strike to block Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s (D) education reforms.
Chicago Public Schools have a 40 percent dropout rate. Emanuel considers that unacceptable. He has proposed evaluating teachers on how their students learn. With Chicago’s finances tight, he proposed giving teachers a raise of “only” 8 percent.
Chicago Public School already teachers enjoy the highest average pay of any district in the nation—$76,000 a year, plus benefits. (The CTU argues it is only $71,000 after taking out contributions for their pensions and health care.) The union wanted a 30 percent raise but has indicated it could settle for the 16 percent the city is now offering (raising average annual pay to $88,000).
But the union adamantly opposes the mayor’s education reforms. They want the teacher evaluations watered down. They also want the school district to rehire teachers who lose their jobs in layoffs or school closings—no matter how ineffective they are. Emanuel refused, so the union shut down Chicago’s schools.
The union has a great deal of leverage in its strike. It can prevent more than 350,000 children from receiving an education. It has forced parents to find other ways of caring for their kids while they work. Many children will wander the streets—police are beefing up patrols to forestall trouble.
The union prefers having children pay this price to letting the district fire bad teachers. This is not exactly surprising. Unions serve their members’ interests first. No union would sacrifice its members’ job security to spare parents from a strike.
This is why collective bargaining does not belong in government—and why more states should emulate Governor Scott Walker’s (R–WI) reforms. No competitors exist to pick up the government’s slack. Unlike in the private sector, a government strike shuts down vital services entirely. The government exists to serve the common good, but unions exist to serve themselves. They should not have the power to shut down the government to get their way.
FDR agreed: "Since their own services have to do with the functioning of the Government, a strike of public employees manifests nothing less than an intent on their part to prevent or obstruct the operations of Government until their demands are satisfied. Such action, looking toward the paralysis of Government by those who have sworn to support it, is unthinkable and intolerable."
[bold and italics emphasis mine]
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