There just never seems to be enough money to fund public education. During the boom years teachers and their unions were constantly complaining that taxpayers were too stingy. That drumbeat was heard throughout the nation. The more money school districts received, the more they asked for.
Imagine if your property taxes set you back $43,000 a year, with 86% of that going to the school system. You justify it if you have two kids in school and it beats paying the freight for private school in the city. But if your kids have flown the coup, why pay?
That’s the dilemma in wealthy New York enclave Bronxville. Despite having wealthy residents and tax money gushing in, the school district there is having to cut back. The district cut their janitors loose last year, outsourcing that work to eliminate pension costs.
The teachers threw a fit when the janitors were sacked, believing that school funding comes magically from heaven. Bronxville’s 150 teachers have been working without a contract since last June, the New York Times reports. The educators believe the two percent salary increase they’ve been offered to be inadequate.
Teachers with a master’s and 30 years on the job make nearly $118,000 in Bronxville and are entitled to retire with an $80,000 a year state pension, or more than two-thirds his or her final salary. Try finding that deal in the private sector. Bronxville teachers don’t have to worry about saving their own money for retirement, or about doubling as investment analysts, combing through the fund choices a 401k plan might offer, hoping to make the right picks to ride the booms and avoid the busts so enough will be there for their golden years.
This is a simple math problem. Paying the 150 teachers that are on the job is one thing, but taxpayers are paying retired teachers at the same time who aren’t teaching anyone. And as the Times piece makes clear, the empty-nester taxpayers that are crying “uncle” and leaving town are selling their homes to young families with kids and lower incomes. They are moving there for the great schools, but their incomes can’t take the tax pain.
“We are in a very different world today, no question about that,” Earl Leiken, mayor of tony Shaker Heights, Ohio told the NYT. “Maybe if you go back to the Great Depression, there was a similar resistance to local tax increases, but not since then.”
Indeed there was, as David Beito writes in his wonderful book Taxpayers in Revolt: Tax Resistance during the Great Depression. Farmers organized and overran tax sales and urban property owners banded together to stage tax strikes. For instance, Chicago city government was helpless as over half of the property taxes due for 1931-32 went unpaid. Those who did pay their taxes were made fun of by their friends and neighbors.
Emboldened teachers vs. squeezed taxpayers. There’s a fight brewing.
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THe irony of this whole situation is lost on so many people, even so-called anarchists, at least ancoms. They are so angry at “union-busting” that they fail to realize that this is a state monopoly on education and teachers.
In some cases it’s not irony, it’s intentional.
I made the mistake of tuning into a local “progressive” radio station a few days ago. Now, I admit that I’m a little ball of rage and bile filled to the brim with hate. I’m a bitter old man in a youthful body, but the level of hate spewed over the last week at the “home schooling Jesus Freaks” and all others who dare question state run education shocked even me.
Much of the anger comes from the fact that the state monopoly on education is in danger. What happens if some Government official calls the teacher’s union bluff? What happens when the parents call their bluff? The State loses.
A few hours on an internet connection can teach more than any over priced state “educator.” Refusing to cough up the taxes that feed their boated salaries will pay for that and many hours with a private tutor as well.
The statists want this mess resolved quickly. The longer it goes on, the more people realize that the previous paragraph is the better option.
The problem is not with the teachers union or unions in general. My parents were both teachers in the UK and both belonged to the NUT – go figure how long ago that must have been!
The problem in the US is the way elections are financed. The unions own the politicians. The system allows this to happen. It is as if they are auctioned off to the highest bidder.
Libertarians believe in property rights. The bought off politicians are the property of the union. As owners they have a right to expect benefits from the politicians. It is a bit like prostitution, except when you buy a politician you get to screw the taxpayers.
However, from a libertarian point of view, there is nothing wrong with buying a politician – every voter has the same opportunity. If you do not like things the way they are you can do like the Tae Party and run your own candidates. The only objection I see from a libertarian perspective is that you are forced to join the union and coerced into paying union dues.
But this is a symptom of democracy. The problem here isn’t the way elections are financed. The problem is democratic elections themselves. The problem, as shown by public choice economics and other people like Mises and Hoppe, is that over time, specialized interests will always win out.
Even a strict republican form of government isn’t immune from this, as shown by the history of the United State. It might have taken a few generations, but the strict limited government republicanism of the US government of the colonial times is gone. Elections have become more democratic, and therefore more prone to the problems that public choicer’s, Mises, and Hoppe point out.
Actually, from a libertarian point of view, there is alot wrong with “buying” a politician if you intend to use that politician to initiate force against others. You have a right to “buy” politicians to keep them from initiating force or to vote to reduce the level of governmental aggression. However, you do NOT have a “right” to “buy” a politician to loot the “taxpayers” for your benefit or to vote for more government. When you donate money to a politician or vote for a politician, your action is only compatible with libertarian principles if you can make a good case that your action is intended to reduce governmental aggression. Obviously, I have a big problem with the anti-voting argument that voting imposes your beliefs upon others and therefore voting is wrong (because I have a right to impose my belief that initiation of force is always wrong on everybody who desires to initiate force, while those who believe in initiating force have NO right to act on their beliefs because their beliefs are criminal).
I see no problem with libertarians becoming teachers or with paying union dues (provided that they are coerced into paying them as a condition of employment and do not do so voluntarily). They just don’t have a “right” to demand ever higher salaries (and thus tax increases). Retired teachers certainly don’t have any “right” to live parasitically off the hapless “taxpayers” even if they have a “contract” with the government (contracts are only valid to the extent that they do not initiate force upon 3rd parties; these government union contracts are morally on the same level as a murder contract and worthy of as much respect).
At what stage does a politician not initiate force?
Erase Public Education And Start Over!!!
Just like everything else in a socialist State, there are numerous alternatives that are far superior, just waiting for the opportunity to be tried.
The ignorance of the ‘educators’ and the ignorance of those who ignorantly depend on these ‘educators’ speaks volumes about the depths of degradation in these, the Dark Ages of economics.
Is the tragedy of the coming destruction of the fantasy world of socialism by the pendulum of economic equilibrium what will make these people human, that is, alert investigators of truth – which is their birthright?
This is where I’m against the market. Teachers provide such a valuable service, then you have athletes and celebrities making so much money and being made for the rest of their lives.
On the same note, it just came out that just FOUR HUNDRED people have more wealth than half of all Americans combines. There’s no way anyone can think this is moral.
Lisa, I adamantly disagree with your comparison of teachers vs. athletes. Athletes perform a valuable service called entertainment. It is funded by private people CHOOSING to buy private tickets. If the athlete isn’t doing a good job or I just don’t like the sport I can CHOOSE not to buy the ticket. If a teacher or school system is not doing a good job I may have the option to put my child in private school or home-school them, but I will STILL have to pay for something I don’t want or I’m not even using. If you think athletes make too much money and their retirements are too lucrative, don’t go to the football games. If you don’t like the teacher/school system – too bad.
Most professional athletic organizations would go bankrupt without the heavy subsidies provided to them by state and local governments. Do you know how many professional teams financed and built their own statiums? None. Stadium operations, preferred tax structure, special services provided by taxpayers on game day, all of these things are major expenses that nearly every professional team of every sport doesn’t have to deal with.
Additionally, the training of replacement athelets is also ridiculously subsidized. Just about every high school football program is publicly funded. Most of the college athletic system is publicly funded. High school and college sports provides the prospective athlete, thus the professional level, free, or close to it (few pro athletes paid their way through college), access to facilities, equipment, training professionals, coaches, nutritionists, room, and board (the last two in the case of college athletes and many “disadvantaged” high school athletes).
Much of professional sporting would collapse if this level of training was funded exclusively by the athletic organization itself. Pro teams would have to set up entire youth sporting leagues in nearly every city in the nation because youth sport leagues are heavily subsidized by taxpayers. They could find a way to either make it support itself, but that would cost thousands per player to operate as there is little demand for tickets to a football game with 12 year old players. Pro leagues would have to train and whittle down this group up until college age. Then they’d have to actively fund college teams because a self-supporting college team is a rare sight, and almost non-existent outside football and basketball. Even those two high dollar college sports show few teams capable of supporting themselves without taxpayer support, either in direct subsidies or sweetheart tuition loans that include activity fees to fund the programs.
Before you purchased the ticket for game night, you’ve already paid 80% of the cost of what it takes to put that game on. The ticket just goes to immediate salaries, transportation costs to get the players to games, and profit.
This is not true internationally – take Football (aka Soccer) as an example. Or NASCAR here? Or tennis? Or Golf? Most of the revenue comes from advertising.
cool, what an eye-opener! I don’t doubt that what you say is true, but did those stats come from a specific book, do you collect and collate these kind of facts, or what? Again, what you say rings true, but is such a change than the “feeling” one gets from osmosis that I’ld like to have some sources before I gleefully start spreading stuff that so many would find so counterintuitive. Thanks again!
Lisa, keep in mind your link is actually a quote from Michael Moore. Michael Moore is a propagandist and anybody has to take anything he says with a grain of salt. The man hates economic freedom and subscribes to the notion that it’s bad that somebody is rich. Which is ironic, since economic freedom enabled him to become a very rich man himself.
But let’s say Michael Moore’s quote is correct. I still don’t see a problem. Provided that that money was received through non-coercive means and voluntary trade, I can think of no reason to object. If you are referring to someone like the dark lord Dick Cheney whose entire fortune is based on government corruption and largesse, then yes that’s an major problem (but that is coercive government force, not voluntary market force.) But why have a problem with a Peter Schiff? Or a Henry Kravis? A Steve Jobs? An Oprah Winfrey?
Lisa, the question that is most important here is: why are you so interested in somebody else’s money, provided they got it through voluntary means? Maybe I’m mischaracterizing you, but I believe your issue here is more envy than anything else. If you disagree, please tell my why I’m wrong.
In regards to public school teachers providing valuable service, I’d also disagree. I consider my time in the public school system a complete waste. Practically all of my current knowledge and skills I learned either through parents, family, friends, or co-workers. To me, school was (and is) a warehouse for kids. I could’ve been out doing something valuable at a young age, but instead I was stuck in a kid warehouse wasting time studying for standardized tests with information that was useless in the real world. I’ve learned more in a year at one of the many jobs I’ve had than I ever learned in all my time in public school. This situation is just another instance of tax feeder vs tax payer. At some point, especially when times are hard, the tax feeders have to understand that the tax payers only desire to go so far.
“In regards to public school teachers providing valuable service, I’d also disagree. ”
This was not always the case -before Jimmy Carter, even the schools in California were excellent.
I know that correlation is not causation, but the decline seems to coincide with the establishment of the Federal Department of Education.
So Lisa, you advocate wage controls on Labor? And because you made an arbitrary judgement about teacher’s “utility”.
Lisa, being a teacher is not hard. I am going to flat out say that. You get 3 months off, plus many holidays, but you are paid for a full years work. You follow lesson plans, and you are not held responsible for the graduation rate of the students.
But, none of that matters. What you speak of is dangerous. Who would decide “how much a teacher deserves”. Undoubtedly, since its taxpayer money going towards their salaries and pensions, it would be the State. So, you advocate for the State to have the ability to arbitrarily set wages and benefits based on “who deserves it”?
Lisa, you come across as someone who doesn’t understand basic economics. Athletes and celebrities make their money based on DEMAND by consumers. The supply of elite athletes is low, thus people will pay a lot to see them. The supply of teachers is very high, and would be much higher if the Unions didn’t restrict the amount of teachers that could be employed via collectively bargaining for higher salaries, meaning higher costs for the State.
Basically Lisa, who is to say Teacher’s should make more money because their job is more “valuable”? And how in the world would one come up with an accurate salary via such an arbitrary means. Why do teachers need to live like Kings? If they do such rewarding work, shouldn’t they be happy with seeing their kids grow up and succeed? Teacher’s salaries in most areas are above average and their pensions more than take care of them for the rest of their life.
I think there are some obvious points I should make about this article and the state of education.
1. Most teachers do not make $120,000 dollars a year. This is an extremely rich district where I am sure the average home prices in the district is around a million dollars.
2. The average American teacher are paid below average compared to their education level. The average wage for teachers in America is $43,493 (See Link). http://www.payscale.com/research/US/All_K-12_Teachers/Salary
Everybody just needs to calm down about Education in America. The Educational system is doing just fine right now. Teachers are currently paid a decent salary, which they should. Private sector employees will always get paid more which they currently are. In rich, wealthy school districts children are getting a great education, in average wealthy school districts children are getting average educations, and in poor school districts children are getting a poor education. That is how it has always been and it will continue that way. The only difference now is that people are angry about the unemployment rate and state of the economy and Americans want to blame someone. One of the popular choices these days are teachers.
It’s not a matter of what teacher’s get paid, so much as a problem of what it costs per pupil. I agree that most salaries are decent and appropriate. However, that’s mostly because not every teacher takes advantage of the system the way that they could.
However, I must disagree strongly with your assertion that the current educational system is “doing fine”. Check out http://www.johntaylorgatto.com. If you have time to read his Underground History of Education, it’s available for free online. I can attest to the intellectual and behavioral effects he ascribes to state-run education since, like he did, I teach at an inner city school.
I do agree that teachers get unfairly blamed, but that does not mean that there aren’t huge problems with the educational system worth criticizing. (I’m quite blown away by your “always been, always will be” argument since there is nothing I have seen or read which even remotely suggests that to be true.)
Lisa:
The total wealth of the Forbes 400 is about $1.4 trillion. This would not even pay off last years budget deficit. Once this money is pissed away, it does not self regenerate. The amount quoted would not make anybody well off if the Federal Government redistributed it. We had $1.5 trillion in two stimulus packages. Did this make you rich?
Last month, the budget deficit was $223 billion – this would take out, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Larry Ellison, the Koch brothers, and the Waltons.
“This is where I’m against the market.”
Opposed to the market, ‘against the market’, is like saying that you are opposed to free and open communication between people about their needs and desires to solve problems through voluntary social cooperation. Instead you prefer constrained communication, processed through disinterested individuals who are burdened by arbitrary and nonsensical rules, coercively imposed on everyone regardless of need. The market requires taking responsibility rather than passing it off mindlessly, which may be the real issue.
Lisa,–would you mind explaining WHY that particular distribution isn’t “moral?”
Because the teaching of young minds is more beneficial to the world than men playing with a ball.
Lisa:
You quote Michael Moore. Michael Moore went to Catholic School. Worldwide, the Catholic Church has provided free education for centuries – when was the last time you saw a nun or Catholic priest driving a new Mercedes. Providing a good education is not equivalent to spending a lot of money. In fact, you will see State by State, a negative correlation between the amount of money spent and scholastic achievement – there is another reason why the 49 ers are associated with California.
It seems most of the money spent in education is money flushed down the toilet – is this a case for low flush toilets?
That’s your own value judgment. The market is great because we can all put our money where our value judgments are without this being at the expense of those who disagree.
Who determines what is beneficial to the world? Is it you, Lisa? Each person makes that determination for himself or herself. And, should not imposed wishes upon others who happen to think differently through the State or Union mandates.
If the state was engaged in “teaching young minds”, you’d be a bit less erroneous here.
…which is why the teaching of young minds must come from the free market and not from some pretense of authority that coerces attendance within that pretend authority’s indoctrination centers. Perhaps if less parents could count on being able to rob me (no kids) by proxy as a way to pretend that they’re securing for their children a “free” education, less parents would waste part of their income on sporting events.
Go ahead and question socialized education, but don’t question teachers. There would still be a need for us in any economic system.
Wow! If teacher bashing becomes a new professional sport, this would be a recruiters dream. First of all, teachers are subject to the market. A district offers a salary and benefits they feel will attract the best teachers. They are free to offer less but once the deal is made they should abide by it. Blaming unions is as ridiculous as blaming Exxon for high gas prices. The unions are there to serve their members as Exxon is there to serve their shareholders. The problem is some people feel teachers should work for next to nothing.
The commented above that talked about how easy teaching is made me laugh out loud. Obviously this is someone who has only viewed teaching from the outside. I’m sure most jobs look easy when you only view the perks. Teachers spend their own money on supplies and put in many hours outside the school day grading papers, tutoring students, and yes, writing lesson plans (curriculum is not lesson plans).
With all this said, I love teaching because I love students. I do believe I provide a valuable and life changing service. Maybe many of the other commenters had poor teachers and this is the reason for the animosity. But to say you learned nothing is a ridiculous and hyperbolic statement by what appears to be intelligent people. Maybe they were taught to write and think by their friends.
This is an example of supremely selfish democracy in action. Owe they nothing to the community which has given them so much? Have they no pride in their city?
As for the teachers, this is an example designed to feed prejudice as part of the current round of fights. Yes, there are districts were teachers make this much. But such salaries are rather far from normal. Note that all the examples are for retired or late career teachers. This is dishonest. What are the starting salaries or median salaries?
The author implies that 6 the low six figures for 30 years experience and masters degree is somehow unreasonable. Would an MBA candidate settle for less with 30 years on the job?
The author also implies that high retiree benefits are unreasonable. This is clearly a high rent neighborhood. Shall we throw them all out of their homes upon retirement and say “Thanks for your service educating our kids. Enjoy your retirement in an apartment in Jersey.” Cold thanks.
No community gives anything to anyone, and no person owes allegiance to any pretense of “communal obligation.”
“Pride” in a geographical location is synonymous with impending warfare.
If you saw the way teacher salaries balloon because of stipends, graduate or in-service credits (that we have to take anyway), and all sorts of things like that, I think you’d be less concerned about median or entry-level wages.
MBAs create their own wealth and have to continue to maintain it. Teachers just have to get tenure and enough seniority to hang around. Many do no more than they absolutely have to because the union will protect them. The “rubber room” in NYC does exist and is the reason for the bill S.3501 (which I had my state senator support).
As I mentioned in another post, we teachers fund our own retirement. There is some misinformation going around on that, but the reason why it’s an issue is because when I retire, the state guarantees me a certain payment. If the fund isn’t big enough, my fellow taxpayers get the bill for the shortfall. In NY, many current retirees are living high off the hog (with free healthcare for life and an advantageous payment formula). Future retirees will get less, so the impact might be mitigated somewhat as those earlier tiers start dying off.
I’m a teacher in NY…home to the strongest teaching unions in the country, so I see this issue from the belly of the beast.
Like most important matters, the problem is one of philosophy, which I can reduce to one question: If teaching is a profession, why does it involve a union at all?
To my knowledge, there are no doctor unions, no lawyer unions, no CPA unions, etc. Professionals are not labor, and yet the teacher unions wish to get the benefits of being in both camps. It would be considered schizophrenia if it weren’t so obvious that the union leadership has found a way to manage the paradox.
Regarding how vital our service is, a good teacher is worth their weight in gold and should have no difficulty surviving in a free market educational system if they just apply some of their own brainpower to the ‘problem’. I’m planning on proving that when the economy finally makes “the big correction” and the state-run education system fails.
As far as pensions go, we fund our own. The legal plunder happens when the system can’t make the guaranteed payments because of the economy. That’s when taxpayers make up the difference. I’m not in favor of this, I’m just reporting it.
The doctor union is the AMA.
The lawyer union would be the state bar associations.
The doctor and lawyer groups are just much more clever with their manipulations of government law to restrict competition and control wages then teachers are. With teachers it’s not really necessary to take the round about method because (I suspect) the general public are trained since early childhood by teachers to hold teachers in a special reverence.
Yeah you hinted at in your following statements, but… yeah we don’t live in a free market economy. Unions are probably actually necessary and probably a good thing to have in many cases in a free market economy.
The AMA and ABA aren’t unions, though, because they aren’t legal bargaining units. I’m certain that they have political influence beyond simple lobbying, but nothing contractual in a collective sense like teacher unions do. For example, a doctor or lawyer can negotiate individually if they so choose. Teachers (in NY and many other states) are prohibited by law from engaging in any direct contractual discussion with their employer, even if they have chosen to not be part of the union. (It’s called the Taylor Law here in NY.)
It could easily be argued that unions have improved working conditions for teachers, but they sure haven’t improved student learning. I used to think they were a necessary evil, but the more I get to know about them, the less I’m convinced of the necessity and the more I see the evil. (I probably picked this up from my father who was also a teacher…who had to go on strike when I was in 9th grade.)
They control the markets through different methods, but their aims are the same as unions and have a similar effect. In my eyes that makes them ‘close enough’.
The problems with unions come from their special legal status and protections. Get rid of that and then you get rid of most of the negative effects. Then unions will compete with other unions and unorganized labor on a open market.
Believe it or not Unions/Guilds can offer businesses positive benefits. They carry out training and certification of their members. Also they pay for travelling expenses and will supply employment opportunities for it’s members and employees for employers. They can provide benefits for employees that small businesses cannot afford to provide on their own. Health insurance, vacation, and all sorts of other stuff.
For example when I was young I worked in a movie theater. The projectionists were unionized. When something happened to the projectionist, who needed to be absent for extended periods for whatever reason, the union then supplied trained and experienced operators by the next day. For a small and independent theater it could take weeks to find another projectionist that was experienced enough to repair the obsolete and worn out projectors that they used.
The only way unions could exist in a free and open market is that they provide enough benefits to employers to warrant their existence. I don’t know if they could exist in a truly open market, but if they did it would be because they are good for the market.
The negative aspects of unions we have now revolve around special privileges and protections that they receive from the state. In this way they not only terrorize the employers, but also the employees.
I would agree that they are analogous, but until I see doctors losing jobs due to seniority (or not losing their license due to tenure), or all making the same amount of money, I think we’re going to disagree on it.
I would also agree that the special privileges and protections are a big problem, but I haven’t seen a successful union that wasn’t philosophically monopolistic and politically entrenched. Also, I have heard it explained very well that the real power of the union is violence, by which was meant that when a union goes on strike, it illegally intimidates, bars, or even injures (less common these days) those whom the employer seeks to use in their place. I’ve seen this happen with teachers so it’s hard for me to get around the idea that they could ever be a positive thing. (They don’t even support their own members if it doesn’t benefit their agenda.)
Teacher pensions in IL and many other states are overly generous and unaffordable. They are an economic disaster and unfair to the taxpayers in private industry who don’t receive even close to the same benefits. They were in exchange for campaign contributions and votes from union members. Pension contributions come from the education budget which means overly generous pensions mean less money to hire more teachers which would result in lower class sizes. In IL, the Teachers Retirement System (TRS) pension fund was set up so the State of IL, “on behalf” of the school district, is the major contributor to the pension fund. The State of IL = Taxpayer. The teachers contribute 9.4% and the district contributes .58%. The State of IL (Taxpayer) “on behalf” contribution percentage varies because added to it is an actuarial calculation so the plan will eventually be 75% funded by 2045 or something of the sort. The plan has issued bonds as a source of funding. The State sometimes shorts or skips payments. It’s crazy. It’s insane. Even more perverse, the Illinois Education Association (IEA) teacher union would lobby the state legislature to allocate more money towards current teacher salaries, and less to TRS. Why? They knew larger salaries result in larger pensions. They knew a “pension protection clause” was added to the Illinois State Constitution at the 1970 constitutional convention, guaranteeing the pensions would be paid. They assumed that Illinois would just increase sales taxes to pay for the pensions. Guess what. That happened. But it’s not enough. Illinois just increased personal and business income taxes, and that money, I believe all of it, went to make the pension payment for this year. In the meantime, the State has cut back aid to local school districts, resulting in larger class sizes and laid off teachers. The State is months behind in paying the bills (invoices) from its vendors, in some cases up to a year behind. In Illinois many local school district unions negotiate in their collective bargaining agreement, that the School Board (taxpayer) will pay some or all of the supposedly “Teacher Contribution” of 9.4% to the TRS pension fund. In fact, 39% of teachers don’t contribute a penny to their pension fund, relying on taxpayers to foot almost the entire bill (school districts contribute just over 1/2 of 1%). http://mchenrycountyblog.com/2011/05/16/39-of-illinois-teachers-pay-nothing-for-pensions/
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