More proof that people are responding without even reading my content.
No one is 'blaming teachers'. Thats just another spin designed to fit my views into someone else's box.
Central Falls though is an example of government costs not having any relationship with the ability of the community to pay them. They haven't paid any part their own school costs since 1991. They can't afford government as is.
Government has a cost associated with it, correct?
What is the largest cost? Education. Arizona, according to an article linked in this post, spends 70% of its tax income on education costs, 60% on k-12 and 10% on university costs.
What is the biggest component of education costs? Labor. A recently settled school system budget in Cranston, RI showed 88% of its total was allocated to labor costs.
What is the biggest part of education labor costs? Teachers salaries and benefits. 63% of all Providence school system employees are teachers. 4% are admin. 20% teachers aides. 7% clerical. 6% other. Really teachers and teachers aides are 80% of the employees.
In effect the largest cost associated with government overall is teachers salaries and benefits.
So it naturally falls that as society loses its ability to pay for government due to government policies that encourage jobs to be sent overseas there has to be cuts in government spending somewhere correct? Especially so in a time like this when wages are falling and so many private sector taxpayers are out of work.
Just where should these cuts come from if not from where the money is being spent?
No one has any answers except to disagree with me on a personal level and say its unfair to blame teachers. Of course let me know when life is fair.
In my district, teachers start out at $45,000 and retire around $75,000.
And this is some sort of outrage to you? You are honestly comparing this to New York bankers?
I'm sorry, but maybe your problem is math. Do you know that the difference between $50,000 and $25,000 is a tiny compared to $50,000 and $15 million?
There seems to be a consistently theme here. People are equally outraged over a working class salary that comes from teaching your children, and a billionaire's salary that comes from stealing your life savings.
Have American's lost touch with reality?
Because I just don't know enough about K12 education and what's happening. All I know is if I had a kid I would home school them before sending one to that zoo. I see school administrators acting like executives, giving themselves raising perks, junkets while teachers go on furloughs. I see it required teachers buy class materials like paper, crayons and so on.
I see the biggest insanity in simply learning, with little strange psychologists on "how people learn" totally screw it up with things like horizontal math and arithmetic required when anyone with a brain knows the reason math is in columns is because it is not English and it's much easier to calculate that way.
I see schools changing textbooks and history.
I have no frigging idea except we all just got screwed on health care, individual insurance is a true blue unsafe rip off, and costs are going through the roof.
That and the private sector has screwed a whole generation on retirement. We have no pensions.
Ok, Falls Church is a crime ridden war zone, we get it. But what does that have to do with teachers and everything to do with the local economy and what's going on in the big picture. That's like blaming teachers for what's happening in Detroit, or Flint MI. Detroit and Flint have been decimated by offshore outsourcing, bad trade deals because they were auto towns. So, the point I think all are trying to make is, it's not the teacher's salaries that are the issue here, it's why the median income is $22k? That's the outrage of Falls Church no?
The reason there is this huge orchestrated rage against the Federal Government and 2500 protesters appear in the tidal basin is Rupert Murdoch our new William Randolph Hearst, and his little Rosebud, Sarah.
The Bansters get away with it because they have invested 5 $Billion in contributions in the last 10 years to get their way. Faux News orchestrated the Iraq War artfully and now their target is Congress.
None of your analogies to the private sector work since the private sector was and is being replaced by cheap labor from overseas and as that happens the ability to pay the taxes to maintain the government infrastructure is being diminished. Nothing has been done - NOTHING to protect private sector workers union or not all those jobs are being moved a little slower now because most of the damage has been done.
Now jobs that are paid directly from taxes need to be kept at the same level despite the lack of tax income? The money isn't there but I have a grudge and I am in a bucket of crabs. Thats your answer? Run for office maybe thats an election theme.
70% of the Arizona state budget you cited goes to education costs. Thats a lot of crabs in a bucket too.
I never mentioned the state of RI in my post just Central Falls something you clearly decided to miss.
Thats the average earning of a teacher in, once again for those that missed what I actually wrote, 'in Central Falls' is $73k plus benefits for 180 days a year, 4 and a half hours a day contractually.
That earning level is for a single person not a family of four which in RI includes another earner most likely.
Woody allen once quipped that Armageddon happened when Albert Shanker, head of the NY Teachers Union, got the Bomb. He had no clue about New Jersey. Hundreds of School Districts all of them tiny each a fiefdom with its own purchasing, vehicle fleets, layers of bureaucracy that would make a New York bank blush.
In my district, teachers start out at $45,000 and retire around $75,000. There were death threats to the Gov. Christie when he proposed a 1.5% retirement health copay, now, retirement health benefits are 100 per cent taxpayer paid. The union will let no one get fired, unless they are sexual predators. The rubber room of New York is the rule for the worst incompetents.
On top of this there is the enormous state bureaucracy. And the principals? $125,000 with pay like benefits that make New York banks blush. Don't get me wrong, I am a 4th generation union guy. But nobody around my hood pays less than $8K in property taxes for quarter acre lots with a house with 2400-3200 square feet.
People have been affected by policies that have sent most of the middle class overseas.
The ability to pay the taxes necessary to maintain a high end education system is going overseas with it.
You insert your view of what you want me to be saying by using words like grudge. Its not a grudge its reality.
Education budgets are out of control plain and simple in relation to ability to pay. Spend some time figuring out how to squeeze more of that 10% left over after salaries and benefits for the 4 and a half hour work day they have 180 days a year and you may find a solution. 70% of the Arizona state budget goes to education costs. Thats from one of your sources.
My neighbors fell asleep and then went shopping at Walmart while the middle class was being off shored now what I am supposed to carry a candle and march for my taxes to go up?
Because the Media does not do it's job. Frankly to do a good, solid, sourced and formatted investigative Journalist article, is a lot of work. Even more when one is doing it for free, and for the most part, that's what the blogosphere is.
That said, for those of us who give a rats ass about this country going down the tubes, it's worth the effort.
I agree, the media so often headline buzzes, which is why I write up so many economic indicators and so on. The data does not match at all the headline buzz.
Jim,
I just checked census.gov and found that the median RI income for a family of 4 in 2005 (latest stats available) was 78k+. This ranked 8th in the entire nation! So, your 73k+ teacher isn't even making the median state wage for all occupations. And besides, that 73k salary is for a teacher with many years of experience, accreditations and certifications. The average salary for ALL RI teachers, regardless of seniority, is 56k+.
Full disclosure Jim, my wife is a middle school teacher. She loves the profession and is deflated, but not defeated, by the bureaucratic red tape she deals with daily and the political bashing her profession takes from people like you. She only wants to make a difference in the lives of her students.
Oh btw, she had to take 7 furlough days this year. It looks like a 5-6% pay cut PLUS as many as 10 furlough days will be implemented next year. Additionally, a number of teaching positions will be eliminated and the class sizes will be increased to maximum allowed by state law. To this end, they will be using "averaging" of classes to skirt the legal limits.(ie- Assume state law = 32 max per class. If I put 40 in a regular math class and 20 in an advanced math class. Then the average math class = 30 which is less than state limit).
Oh yeah, one more thing. Her benefits suck more each year and cost her more each year.
A teacher there may as well be a Goldman exec comparatively.
So someone making $73k a year is the same as someone making $73 Million a year?
This reminds me of two things:
1) the poor white factory worker from the South a century ago, who could barely feed his family, spending their free time beating (and sometimes lynching) poor blacks and union organizers whenever they agitate for better pay and working conditions.
Crab mentality, sometimes referred to as crabs in the bucket, describes a way of thinking best described by the phrase "if I can't have it, neither should you." The metaphor refers to a pot of crabs. Singly, the crabs could easily escape from the pot, but instead, they grab at each other in a useless "king of the hill" competition which prevents any from escaping and ensures their collective demise.
There is a difference between working for a living and not working for a living. Too many Americans have forgotten that.
If that was an American factory it would have gone overseas a long time ago.
And this is a good thing to you?
I simply do not understand why anyone should hold a grudge against middle class people making middle class wages.
Its a crisis though when it happens in the public sector.
No, it's just the next stage in the crisis. Wanting the public school teachers to suffer because the manufacturing workers have suffered is peasant mentality. It's backwards thinking.
Instead of trying to tear down the working slob next to you simply because he has had the luck of not being screwed as much and as often, is self-defeating and a waste of time. You should instead be thinking about how to bring you and your neighbor up, not tear another working man down.
Wouldn't it be a better use of energy to go after the people responsible for the factory closing and the theft of your pension?
BTW, a used Volvo is not an expensive car by any means.
Books? Building upkeep? Close to 90% goes to labor costs.
If that was an American factory it would have gone overseas a long time ago.
The same thing is happening to people working at small manufacturers making a lot less money (they can't afford used Volvos) - the factory closes - the people are laid off and you never hear about it again.
Its a crisis though when it happens in the public sector.
after all when the media are such fools, we will never know the truth.
Today all over the news is the headline that GM paid back their loan. I am sure the talking heads (who I don't watch) will parrot the headlines. My 87 year old mother will take it at face value and others will take it at face value. The power structure relies on the media hoodwinking the public.
The problem is that the government gave another $50B to GM. Paying off $4.7B and the headlines are sent all over the States. But the government is still into them for $50B. GM laid off 63,000 Union employees. Did losing that employee liability, that human capital allow the $4.7B pay-back?
In todays world paying 10 percent on a loan is worth headline of GM Pays Off Loan.
It is a rigged game where government and large corporations are working hand in hand. There is a name for that but it escapes me at this moment.
Through taxes and they have some control over those through the voting process.
Lets see how that Arizona referendum goes over for a 'temporary' tax to raise their tax base there. Temporary, ha, what a joke.
Also these 'jobs for life' now represent some of the best paying local jobs around.
I hate to bring up Central Falls, RI again but in a community with an average household income of about $22k the average teachers pay is $73k plus solid gold benefits.
$15,000 a year per student costs is almost as much money as these people have for a whole year.
No one from Goldman Sachs lives in Central Falls to direct 'rage' at and those people would be hard pressed to pay for a ride to NYC to protest them.
A teacher there may as well be a Goldman exec comparatively.
Maybe it is because a government job was portrayed as a dead end, bureaucratic deal, the private sector was supposed to be the place to obtain financial security and a good retirement. So now everyone is screwed, they seem almost enraged that some government jobs are way more secure in wages/retirement than they are.
I feel a little jealous. I was truly sold a bill of goods in College in terms of the "big money" skills. Many are.
But why they do not realize they should be taking that rage out on the private sector is beyond me. Why are they not screaming mad at executive pay for example. I mean that's their retirement dollars going into someone else's pocket.
Why are they not marching on Wall Street at the growing prevalence of companies even refusing to do matching funds in 401ks or have absurdly long vesting structures where they happen to fire people right before vesting happens?
It is misdirected rage. Our site title, Populist, maybe we should look to help redirect that rage and outrage at the real guilty parties. It sure isn't some smuck teacher being forced to provide basic class material out of their own ~$40k paycheck and teach 40 kids per class who revolve in an out per class period.
I was just thinking about that this morning.
Why is it that when people hear that teachers have pensions they think, "I don't have a pension. Why should they get pensions?" When instead they should ask, "Why don't I have a pension?"
It's backwards thinking. They want to bring fellow working people down to their level, instead of wanting to bring themselves up. But at the same time they claim helplessness about Wall Street destroying their ability to get a pension in the first place.
Maybe I shouldn't say "backwards" thinking. Maybe I should say "peasant" thinking.
Our new royalty, the corporate elite, are beyond our grasp, but the working class guy living next door isn't. How dare he get a little bit ahead of us just because he has a bachelors degree! Who does he think he is?
I think it's good we're an econ, non-partisan site and allow anonymous moderated comments. Clearly there is some sort of propaganda out there trying to blame the unions for all of our economic woes and it's massive. I've seen this crap pop up around and I know I've heard it on FAUX news, but where is it really coming from? How can people blame other people who are pretty much in the same boat as themselves financially? How can they do that and not see the disparity these days between "executive" pay and regular pay?
More proof that people are responding without even reading my content.
No one is 'blaming teachers'. Thats just another spin designed to fit my views into someone else's box.
Central Falls though is an example of government costs not having any relationship with the ability of the community to pay them. They haven't paid any part their own school costs since 1991. They can't afford government as is.
Government has a cost associated with it, correct?
What is the largest cost? Education. Arizona, according to an article linked in this post, spends 70% of its tax income on education costs, 60% on k-12 and 10% on university costs.
What is the biggest component of education costs? Labor. A recently settled school system budget in Cranston, RI showed 88% of its total was allocated to labor costs.
What is the biggest part of education labor costs? Teachers salaries and benefits. 63% of all Providence school system employees are teachers. 4% are admin. 20% teachers aides. 7% clerical. 6% other. Really teachers and teachers aides are 80% of the employees.
In effect the largest cost associated with government overall is teachers salaries and benefits.
So it naturally falls that as society loses its ability to pay for government due to government policies that encourage jobs to be sent overseas there has to be cuts in government spending somewhere correct? Especially so in a time like this when wages are falling and so many private sector taxpayers are out of work.
Just where should these cuts come from if not from where the money is being spent?
No one has any answers except to disagree with me on a personal level and say its unfair to blame teachers. Of course let me know when life is fair.
And this is some sort of outrage to you? You are honestly comparing this to New York bankers?
I'm sorry, but maybe your problem is math. Do you know that the difference between $50,000 and $25,000 is a tiny compared to $50,000 and $15 million?
There seems to be a consistently theme here. People are equally outraged over a working class salary that comes from teaching your children, and a billionaire's salary that comes from stealing your life savings.
Have American's lost touch with reality?
Because I just don't know enough about K12 education and what's happening. All I know is if I had a kid I would home school them before sending one to that zoo. I see school administrators acting like executives, giving themselves raising perks, junkets while teachers go on furloughs. I see it required teachers buy class materials like paper, crayons and so on.
I see the biggest insanity in simply learning, with little strange psychologists on "how people learn" totally screw it up with things like horizontal math and arithmetic required when anyone with a brain knows the reason math is in columns is because it is not English and it's much easier to calculate that way.
I see schools changing textbooks and history.
I have no frigging idea except we all just got screwed on health care, individual insurance is a true blue unsafe rip off, and costs are going through the roof.
That and the private sector has screwed a whole generation on retirement. We have no pensions.
Ok, Falls Church is a crime ridden war zone, we get it. But what does that have to do with teachers and everything to do with the local economy and what's going on in the big picture. That's like blaming teachers for what's happening in Detroit, or Flint MI. Detroit and Flint have been decimated by offshore outsourcing, bad trade deals because they were auto towns. So, the point I think all are trying to make is, it's not the teacher's salaries that are the issue here, it's why the median income is $22k? That's the outrage of Falls Church no?
The reason there is this huge orchestrated rage against the Federal Government and 2500 protesters appear in the tidal basin is Rupert Murdoch our new William Randolph Hearst, and his little Rosebud, Sarah.
The Bansters get away with it because they have invested 5 $Billion in contributions in the last 10 years to get their way. Faux News orchestrated the Iraq War artfully and now their target is Congress.
None of your analogies to the private sector work since the private sector was and is being replaced by cheap labor from overseas and as that happens the ability to pay the taxes to maintain the government infrastructure is being diminished. Nothing has been done - NOTHING to protect private sector workers union or not all those jobs are being moved a little slower now because most of the damage has been done.
Now jobs that are paid directly from taxes need to be kept at the same level despite the lack of tax income? The money isn't there but I have a grudge and I am in a bucket of crabs. Thats your answer? Run for office maybe thats an election theme.
70% of the Arizona state budget you cited goes to education costs. Thats a lot of crabs in a bucket too.
I never mentioned the state of RI in my post just Central Falls something you clearly decided to miss.
Thats the average earning of a teacher in, once again for those that missed what I actually wrote, 'in Central Falls' is $73k plus benefits for 180 days a year, 4 and a half hours a day contractually.
That earning level is for a single person not a family of four which in RI includes another earner most likely.
Central_Falls,_Rhode_Island The median income for a household in the city was $22,628, and the median income for a family was $26,844.
Also from Wikipedia.
There are five counties located in Rhode Island, one of which are in the top 100 richest counties in the country.
Rank National Rank County
Per Capita Inc Median House-hold Inc Median Family Income
1 94 Newport County $26,779 $50,448 $60,610
2 102 Bristol County $26,503 $50,737 $63,114
3 124 Wash. County $25,530 $53,103 $66,112
4 197 Kent County $23,833 $47,617 $57,471
5 722 Prov County $19,255 $36,950 $46,694
Woody allen once quipped that Armageddon happened when Albert Shanker, head of the NY Teachers Union, got the Bomb. He had no clue about New Jersey. Hundreds of School Districts all of them tiny each a fiefdom with its own purchasing, vehicle fleets, layers of bureaucracy that would make a New York bank blush.
In my district, teachers start out at $45,000 and retire around $75,000. There were death threats to the Gov. Christie when he proposed a 1.5% retirement health copay, now, retirement health benefits are 100 per cent taxpayer paid. The union will let no one get fired, unless they are sexual predators. The rubber room of New York is the rule for the worst incompetents.
On top of this there is the enormous state bureaucracy. And the principals? $125,000 with pay like benefits that make New York banks blush. Don't get me wrong, I am a 4th generation union guy. But nobody around my hood pays less than $8K in property taxes for quarter acre lots with a house with 2400-3200 square feet.
People have been affected by policies that have sent most of the middle class overseas.
The ability to pay the taxes necessary to maintain a high end education system is going overseas with it.
You insert your view of what you want me to be saying by using words like grudge. Its not a grudge its reality.
Education budgets are out of control plain and simple in relation to ability to pay. Spend some time figuring out how to squeeze more of that 10% left over after salaries and benefits for the 4 and a half hour work day they have 180 days a year and you may find a solution. 70% of the Arizona state budget goes to education costs. Thats from one of your sources.
My neighbors fell asleep and then went shopping at Walmart while the middle class was being off shored now what I am supposed to carry a candle and march for my taxes to go up?
Thats not a grudge that is a bottom line.
Because the Media does not do it's job. Frankly to do a good, solid, sourced and formatted investigative Journalist article, is a lot of work. Even more when one is doing it for free, and for the most part, that's what the blogosphere is.
That said, for those of us who give a rats ass about this country going down the tubes, it's worth the effort.
I agree, the media so often headline buzzes, which is why I write up so many economic indicators and so on. The data does not match at all the headline buzz.
Jim,
I just checked census.gov and found that the median RI income for a family of 4 in 2005 (latest stats available) was 78k+. This ranked 8th in the entire nation! So, your 73k+ teacher isn't even making the median state wage for all occupations. And besides, that 73k salary is for a teacher with many years of experience, accreditations and certifications. The average salary for ALL RI teachers, regardless of seniority, is 56k+.
Full disclosure Jim, my wife is a middle school teacher. She loves the profession and is deflated, but not defeated, by the bureaucratic red tape she deals with daily and the political bashing her profession takes from people like you. She only wants to make a difference in the lives of her students.
Oh btw, she had to take 7 furlough days this year. It looks like a 5-6% pay cut PLUS as many as 10 furlough days will be implemented next year. Additionally, a number of teaching positions will be eliminated and the class sizes will be increased to maximum allowed by state law. To this end, they will be using "averaging" of classes to skirt the legal limits.(ie- Assume state law = 32 max per class. If I put 40 in a regular math class and 20 in an advanced math class. Then the average math class = 30 which is less than state limit).
Oh yeah, one more thing. Her benefits suck more each year and cost her more each year.
So someone making $73k a year is the same as someone making $73 Million a year?
This reminds me of two things:
1) the poor white factory worker from the South a century ago, who could barely feed his family, spending their free time beating (and sometimes lynching) poor blacks and union organizers whenever they agitate for better pay and working conditions.
2) the crab bucket mentality:
There is a difference between working for a living and not working for a living. Too many Americans have forgotten that.
And this is a good thing to you?
I simply do not understand why anyone should hold a grudge against middle class people making middle class wages.
No, it's just the next stage in the crisis. Wanting the public school teachers to suffer because the manufacturing workers have suffered is peasant mentality. It's backwards thinking.
Instead of trying to tear down the working slob next to you simply because he has had the luck of not being screwed as much and as often, is self-defeating and a waste of time. You should instead be thinking about how to bring you and your neighbor up, not tear another working man down.
Wouldn't it be a better use of energy to go after the people responsible for the factory closing and the theft of your pension?
BTW, a used Volvo is not an expensive car by any means.
Where does the education budget actually go?
Books? Building upkeep? Close to 90% goes to labor costs.
If that was an American factory it would have gone overseas a long time ago.
The same thing is happening to people working at small manufacturers making a lot less money (they can't afford used Volvos) - the factory closes - the people are laid off and you never hear about it again.
Its a crisis though when it happens in the public sector.
after all when the media are such fools, we will never know the truth.
Today all over the news is the headline that GM paid back their loan. I am sure the talking heads (who I don't watch) will parrot the headlines. My 87 year old mother will take it at face value and others will take it at face value. The power structure relies on the media hoodwinking the public.
The problem is that the government gave another $50B to GM. Paying off $4.7B and the headlines are sent all over the States. But the government is still into them for $50B. GM laid off 63,000 Union employees. Did losing that employee liability, that human capital allow the $4.7B pay-back?
In todays world paying 10 percent on a loan is worth headline of GM Pays Off Loan.
It is a rigged game where government and large corporations are working hand in hand. There is a name for that but it escapes me at this moment.
Through taxes and they have some control over those through the voting process.
Lets see how that Arizona referendum goes over for a 'temporary' tax to raise their tax base there. Temporary, ha, what a joke.
Also these 'jobs for life' now represent some of the best paying local jobs around.
I hate to bring up Central Falls, RI again but in a community with an average household income of about $22k the average teachers pay is $73k plus solid gold benefits.
$15,000 a year per student costs is almost as much money as these people have for a whole year.
No one from Goldman Sachs lives in Central Falls to direct 'rage' at and those people would be hard pressed to pay for a ride to NYC to protest them.
A teacher there may as well be a Goldman exec comparatively.
Maybe it is because a government job was portrayed as a dead end, bureaucratic deal, the private sector was supposed to be the place to obtain financial security and a good retirement. So now everyone is screwed, they seem almost enraged that some government jobs are way more secure in wages/retirement than they are.
I feel a little jealous. I was truly sold a bill of goods in College in terms of the "big money" skills. Many are.
But why they do not realize they should be taking that rage out on the private sector is beyond me. Why are they not screaming mad at executive pay for example. I mean that's their retirement dollars going into someone else's pocket.
Why are they not marching on Wall Street at the growing prevalence of companies even refusing to do matching funds in 401ks or have absurdly long vesting structures where they happen to fire people right before vesting happens?
It is misdirected rage. Our site title, Populist, maybe we should look to help redirect that rage and outrage at the real guilty parties. It sure isn't some smuck teacher being forced to provide basic class material out of their own ~$40k paycheck and teach 40 kids per class who revolve in an out per class period.
I was just thinking about that this morning.
Why is it that when people hear that teachers have pensions they think, "I don't have a pension. Why should they get pensions?" When instead they should ask, "Why don't I have a pension?"
It's backwards thinking. They want to bring fellow working people down to their level, instead of wanting to bring themselves up. But at the same time they claim helplessness about Wall Street destroying their ability to get a pension in the first place.
Maybe I shouldn't say "backwards" thinking. Maybe I should say "peasant" thinking.
Our new royalty, the corporate elite, are beyond our grasp, but the working class guy living next door isn't. How dare he get a little bit ahead of us just because he has a bachelors degree! Who does he think he is?
So, the tightening up (but not enough) derivatives moves to the Senate Floor. That's an improvement, at least.
I think it's good we're an econ, non-partisan site and allow anonymous moderated comments. Clearly there is some sort of propaganda out there trying to blame the unions for all of our economic woes and it's massive. I've seen this crap pop up around and I know I've heard it on FAUX news, but where is it really coming from? How can people blame other people who are pretty much in the same boat as themselves financially? How can they do that and not see the disparity these days between "executive" pay and regular pay?
Pages