Slashdot Mirror
Chicago Teachers Rip 'Big Money Interest Groups'
theodp writes "The striking Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) is holding a massive 'Wisconsin-style rally' Saturday as ongoing negotiations try to bring an end to the strike that has put education on hold for 350,000 of the city's schoolchildren. 'The 30,000 teachers, school social workers, clerks, vision and hearing testers, school nurses, teaching assistants, counselors, and other school professionals of the Chicago Teachers Union are standing strong to defend public education from test pushers, privatizers, and a national onslaught of big money interest groups trying to push education back to the days before teachers had unions,' explains the CTU web site. 'Around the country and even the world, our fight is recognized as the front line of resistance to the corporate education agenda.' Some are calling the strike — which has by most accounts centered on salary schedules (CPS salary dataset), teacher performance evaluations, grievance procedures, and which teachers get dibs on new jobs — a push-back to education reform that has possible Presidential election implications. The big winners in the school strike, Bloomberg reports, are the city's largely non-union 100+ charter schools, which remained open throughout the strike. Charter school enrollment swelled to 52,000 students this fall as parents worried by strike rumors sought refuge in schools like those run by the Noble Charter Network, which enjoys the deep-pocket support of many wealthy 'investors.'"
Of course they do. They hate the competition.
and say they want a 30% increase over 2. They are already some of the best paid urban teachers in the whole country. Insane.
http://reason.com/reasontv/2012/09/15/the-deep-logic-of-the-chicago-teachers-s
Don't want to be held accountable, even opposing Obama's merit-based suggestions in favor of tenure, etc.
I'll say what I always said: it's about the children, alright, about using the children.
Hopefully the CTU can take a few steps back towards an education system which isn't brought to you by McCorporation Inc (TM All rights reserved).
Abolish all public service labor unions. They are "ultra" voters who in some areas overwhelm the common voter and take over government.
"U.S. Department of Education: 79% of Chicago 8th Graders Not Proficient in Reading." Teacher evaluations are a must. It is time to get rid of the ineffective teachers that are protected by unions.
Their members will line up into a large mobius strip.
... Because that worked so well in Wisconsin. In Wisconsin, the result of the protests were:
* The teacher's union being flat out broken. The state won.
* A failed recall effort.
* A complete loss of support from many parent for the teachers. Demanding more money when people are struggling is never a hit.
-- $G
We need a good public school system. But I can tell you first hand that public schools aren't always best. I have kids in both public and private schools, and the private school is far better. That's one small local example, I know, but the notion that it's just big money or testing that has adversely impacted public schools is ridiculous. There are some valid points there - there should be no candy machines in lunchrooms and teaching to tests can be a problem. But tenure, a sense of entitlement, an overplayed seniority system, and general lack of accountability for unionized teachers is also a big problem. The main problem as I see it is that there is no incentive in *any* of the public school schemes I've seen to strive for excellence. Mediocrity is the high bar most teachers and schools attempt to reach, and if they even get that far they are doing well. If you do what's minimally necessary, you will get paid, you will advance, you will get summers off, and you will eventually get your nice pension at 55. Do *you* get summers off? Do *you* get to retire at 55? Do *you* get to keep your job if you just sorta, meh, show up and just do what you have to do? No way you will be a teacher at the private school I'm familiar with if you aren't trying to help your students be the best they can be. It's just like that.
Of course public schools generally have a harder job than private schools. They have to deal with *all* the kids - including the dumb ones and the ones who parents have no concern for the quality of their kids education, for whatever reason. Parents who spend lots of money on private school generally don't do it capriciously - they care a *lot* about education and they put their money where their mouth is. So it's not completely fair to just blame lazy/stupid teachers (there are plenty of them for sure). Lazy stupid kids and their parents are equally to blame. Personally, I don't care about them. They should not be my problem or my kids problem. One way or another, public schools need to separate kids by ability and give motivated kids the chance they deserve. I know teachers and administrators who try to do that, but the system makes it very difficult.
I grew up in a northern Wisconsin city where the teachers stuck twice times in four years . It was NEVER about the children, always about pay. Chicago is a big Democratic city, you would think there would be no issue with the citizens WANTING to raise their own property taxes to support the schools. As for charter schools, they represent competition, so of course they are evil.
Conservative, mod down for violating
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Here in Canada they'r one of the biggest. The part about this that really irritates me is that they've been getting annual raises about four times the rate of inflation and threatened to strike during a huge budget shortfall at the first mention of pay freezes. A completely classless move. There are very large numbers of people waiting to get into teaching, yet the pay keeps going up. What ever happened to supply and demand? If there's that big a supply, the rate of pay increase (if any) should be at or below the rate of inflation, I think, especially for a public sector position like teaching.
Unions have a lot of money and political pull too.
In many ways they have more political pull per dollar. Because the Unions in the US need just as much reform as the business system does.
Why am I paying out of my paycheck to something that will use for political campaigning for a party I may or may not believe in.
That money should be used to pay for a small staff of legal experts, and for operations. The rest of the money should be held to pay for strikers pay during a strike.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Public sector unions should be outlawed.
Private sector unions must be voluntary.
All problems solved.
I'm with them on the complaint about test pushers. But privatization? Why should they care? Can't the union accept private school teachers as members and negotiate with private employers just like it negotiates with the City of Chicago? Other unions agitate for their members who're employed by private entities.
I'm also curious what would stop the city from hiring scabs. Parents would no doubt be unhappy with the decrease in teacher quality (since everybody would be brand new) but at least their kids would be going to school. If nothing else, giving the credible appearance of being willing to hire scabs might give the city more leverage over the union.
getting annual raises about four times the rate of inflation
Check your numbers. If the real inflation rate was as low as their request, then gasoline would be about $1.50, a day at the hospital would be about $750, a loaf of bread would still be 50 cents, higher ed tuition would still be about $1000/semester....
There are very large numbers of people waiting to get into teaching
For kindergarten teachers in my sorta-rich suburb, yeah the competition for teaching jobs is incredibly intense. For ghetto areas like big cities, where you need to wear a bullet proof vest, often there's racial hiring quotas, there are serious issues getting enough staffing. Its very much like the demand for police officers in different locales... oddly enough the nice places have 10 applicants per position, and the bad places have 10 positions per good applicant...
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Ten posts in, and I already see the guy chomping on the high-salary-bit modded at +5. Before that becomes the focus of these posts, let me add something to reflect on.
There is not only a very strong negative correlation between the percent of a school's low-socioeconomic-status students (measured by a school's free-and-reduced lunch rate) and test scores*, but there has proven to be causation as well. Now, urban Chicago has some of the highest poverty rates in the state of Illinois. Creating a system where half of a teacher's evaluation (and, ergo, the chance they keep their job) is based solely on test scores is simply setting up teachers to fail. Teachers know this; when they (or anyone else, for that matter) are put into a position where their evaluation likely will be poor, due to circumstances far beyond their control, resulting in dismissal from their job, it will negatively affect their performance in the classroom. Then, with high teacher turnaround, the quality of new hires will just suffer precipitously.
This evaluation system was never meant or designed to improve teacher performance. It was designed to set schools up to fail. And Chicago Area Teachers have every right to stand up and stop it. Anyone who tries to complain about salaries is merely throwing a red herring into the discussion.
* source: The Star Tribune. It appears that, sadly, they removed the free-and-reduced lunch data from this year's test results. In previous years, I ran simple correlation calculations between a district's free-and-reduced lunch percentage, and the percentage of students who were proficient on the tests. The correlation coefficient was -.87 for math and -.92 for reading.
I am really struggling to figure out how this posting/article fits with Slashdot at all.
First of all, WTF does this have to do with tech? This is one of the most inappropriate stories for a News for Nerds site.
But, since we're all nerds, we do our homework, right?
Anyone who wants to engage in an informed discussion about this issue should, at the very least, read the fact finder's report:
http://www.ctunet.com/blog/text/FactFinderCOMPLETE.pdf
Yes, it's 80 pages long and still requires a fair amount of context.
I am so sick and tired of idiots blathering on about (a) lazy selfish goddammed overpaid teachers or (b) without unions we'd all be working 752 days a week in sweatshops.
I'm in a union, been down this road before, it sucked ass. I still have a love/hate relationship with unions. But unlike binary data, things in the real world are rarely black and white.
A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous, got me?
Why should public sector be any different from private sector?
What is more democratic than voting for something to change?
So many of your current entitlements (by which I mean safe working conditions, 8 hour days as opposed to 14 hour days, paid vacation) was won by unions. You should take a history lesson my friend!
There are very large numbers of people waiting to get into teaching, yet the pay keeps going up. What ever happened to supply and demand?
Well, the better question is why does the Ontario government keep subsidizing the training of enormous numbers of teachers in taxpayer-supported universities, when there is an enormous existing surplus of teachers.
Perhaps 1 in 10 teachers graduating today from an Ontario university will be able to get a full-time teaching job after graduating.
"Public sector unions should be outlawed."
Why? This is (or supposed to be) a free country, you should be able to join any organisation you want.
"Private sector unions must be voluntary.:"
All union membership should be voluntary, and no employee, publis or private should be penalized for belonging to any union, politcal group or religious group.
Freedom of assembly and all that.
Can you cite this? I'm interested in finding where you got your numbers from. In the US, food and fuel is specifically exempted from determining the amount of inflation. Perhaps it is the same in Canada.
I am an employee of the federal government. Not only do I think I shouldn't be able to be in a union I'm not sure if I should be allowed to vote. I realize my salary come from taxing productive members of society. I do believe that my job is constitutional. But if those people that pay my salary decide they no longer want to fund the agency I work for I shouldn't have a vote in the matter.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
Nerdfest is talking about Canadian teachers, not Chicago teachers.
The Ontario premier's wife is a teacher, and over the past eight years he's seemed to have little to no interest in doing anything but hiring more teachers and giving them large raises. Our teachers are already paid far more than in the US. When the budget shortfall became an obvious problem (although anyone with a clue could see it coming), did he start talking about freezing teacher salaries? No, he started talking about reducing *doctor* salaries.
you shouldn't have the right to unionise
I see you're espousing freedom as usual.
So let me get this straight, a school system with a low graduation rate is supposed to be a shining example of why schools need teachers that can't be fired? Explain to me again how that works?
I believe our teachers are already paid quite a lot more than US teachers as well. Up to about $100K, I believe.
Slashdotters are heavily anti-union. Anything that pisses them off generates lots of posts, page views, and . . . PROFIT!
You have a very distorted view of history. The 8 hour day and 40 hour work week was instituted by FDR, ruled unconstitutional and then overtime pay was created as a fix. This was all part of FDR's fix to unemployment during the recession. The concept was if spread a little work around it was better then someone grabbing a lot of work at the expense of others. It was a mantra of the Socialist parties and the communists parties in th3 first part of the 1900's.
Safer working conditions would have been the norm without unions too. As soon as the government got into the habit of playing insurer for occupational injuries, working condition standards began being implemented by law and tort. You can thank the Unions for getting some state workers compensation laws passed though. But they have been in place long before Unions had legal rights to exist (1906 for federal employes and earlier in some areas). To claim safe working conditions outside a specific factory or a specific job is a little misguided to say the least. OSHA and MSHA are direct results of the government paying out for on the job injuries. They were created in the 1970's specifically to increase workplace safety and reduce the worker's compensation payouts.
No it wasn't.
For nerds, education is important. We are who we are because we love to learn. As intellectuals, nerds, and geeks, we benefit from anything that improves the state of education, and we suffer from anything that is detrimental to the state of education.
Palm trees and 8
And when you have quality educators who produce works like this...
http://illinoisreview.typepad.com/illinoisreview/2012/09/ctu-believes-in-neiborhood-schools.html
It's no wonder you'd be afraid of Teacher Evaluations. Yes, they can be problematic. But when the teachers themselves can't seem to exercise basic literacy skills... when their union representatives have typos and grammatical errors in their press releases and public websites, it makes the whole effort seem like it's being conducted by a bunch of hacks not highly trained professionals who are irreplaceable in their basic tasks.
At CPS, average individual teacher salaries are higher than average US dual earner income by more than 10%. They're higher than teacher salaries in other major urban districts like NY and LA where costs of living are higher. But remember, compared to you and me teachers only work 9 months of the year! And CPS teachers are people who - I've seen them - show up to work 5 minutes before the start of school bell and are all out the door within half an hour of the end of the day bell. Entire schools full of "dedicated" workers like this. Many years ago they got a contract that stipulated they only had to be in school for 6 hours and 15 minutes a day, and that their prep time and grading papers and all of that could be done at home. Well, now the new mayor would just like his teachers to be in school a little longer each day - do that prep ON SITE again - in part to facilitate students being able to participate in activities like PE and recess and more than 10 minutes to eat lunch.
Do I believe teachers deserve to be well paid? Yes. But sweetheart deals from the former Mayor Daley HAVE paid the teachers well and continued to do so when they received 4% raises in 2008, 2009, and 2010 while the rest of the US economy was in decline. I also don't think teachers who as a body have performed so poorly should be paid so well. I'd like to see a new contract that, whether it has individual performance evaluations or not, has a core condition specific metrics regarding the overall improvement of performance by the student body, e.g. improved graduation rates, reading levels, et cetera. Failure to improve should result in breach of contract... And Karen Lewis - she's a woman who has wanted to strike since the day she was elected president of the Chicago Teacher's Union. She's expecting to get thrown in jail... so I'm sure their strike isn't over yet: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1YXOSaMZzs
In the US, food and fuel is specifically exempted from determining the amount of inflation.
Yes, that's exactly why that politically motivated figure is meaningless.
If you could exist merely by purchasing iphones, for food, energy, and shelter, then the inflation figure would matter. As it is, its merely a measure of how much the govt has already decided to raise social security payments.
We do the same game with unemployment. Someday, in the American workers paradise, none of us will have jobs anymore while reported unemployment will be 5%, and inflation will always be 2% even if the price of a cup of coffee is doubling every month.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Rampant corruption and criminal activities of many unions aside, I don't have a problem with unions (even at federal level) existing to help workers avoid being abused and mistreated, but I do have a problem with them then becoming something that politicians at every level have to maintain employment for, even when they're no longer needed. Cutting government spending then always becomes a battle over "they took're jerbs!". Kind of like letting a family member move into your home and then kicking them out years later.
Of course, I don't even know that unions serve a real purpose, anymore. We no longer employ twelve year old kids for sixteen hours a day in dangerous machine shops for a nickel an hour and anyone who has been wronged can seek out legal representation.
However, in the tech industry, I would certainly not ever want a union to represent me and I would not want to be forced to belong to one. I would rather find a new career.
As for my perspective, yes I'm a union member and no I haven't had a pay raise for 10 years, my pension is gone, I work twice as much for 55% of the pay (in 2001). If the unions are so all-powerful and greedy, why has my standard of living dropped so much? Did unions in Wisconsin fare better? If union haters get their wish, the middle class is toast and the plutocracy will eventually prevail leaving the US with no backbone to hold it up. I don't have all the answers, but I know ragging on the unions and real attempts to bust them is a just wrong-headed.
Have you ever noticed that anybody driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac?
Why are you paying money out of your pay check for wars you probably don't think you should be in? After all your tax bill would be considerably smaller if the US didn't spend more on military spending than the next 26 countries combined.
We all pay for things we don't want, don't need or consider immoral. It's a fact of life.
Undoubtedly.
But I, as a mere citizen, feel that the Teacher's Union has done enormous harm to our educational system, and continues to do so.
I have two master's degrees and an undergraduate in physics/math, all from an Ivy League university, and was told that I could not become a teacher because I did not have a "teaching degree". Yet I regularly provide training in a corporate setting and am an experienced facilitator. Last week I conducted a training class and the comments afterwards were that "the instructor was excellent" and so on and so on. But when I wanted to have a career change, simply because I enjoy teaching, and become a teacher for a few years in a high school, I could not.
It is the Teacher's Union that is preventing us from having more qualified teachers. They act to protect their own numbers, acting like a guild. They do not have our kid's interests in mind, even though they say they do.
It should be up to a school to determine if someone is qualified to teach - not a union.
Despite agreeing with the CTU, teachers in Chicago make a hell of a lot of money.
My wife is a teacher in Broward County. It's the 6th largest district in the country and one of the lowest salaries for teachers. Has to be the worst benefits too.
They're using their grammar skills there.
Ah, the expert. Bankers are experts on banking, the politicians shouldn't tell them what to do. Politicians are experts on political decisions, the public shouldn't tell them what to do. CEOs are experts on management, the shareholders shouldn't tell them what to do. GNU/Linux nerds are experts on desktop operating systems, the users shouldn't tell them what to do.
So often special interest groups are captured by naked self-interest and deluded groupthink. The idea that teachers should decide education policy by themselves and dictate it to the parents and politicians is a position that seldom comes from anybody but a teacher.
No, and that is not what I said. There is a difference between being listened to and a group of employees saying that they should decide one thing should happen in schools when the government and overwhelming majority of parents who pay them want the opposite, which is what is happening in my country.
Would you apply the same reasoning to government contractors?
Or to the employees of the privately run cafeteria inside the Pentagon (I assume there's such a thing, it doesn't matter, you get the idea: they make all their money through the government)?
What about government employees that own stock in companies and make more money out of that than out of their government jobs?
Honest questions, since you don't really give many reasons for your opinion. I don't know what you're doing exactly, but why are government employees (i.e. mostly schoolteachers, policemen, firefighters) not "productive" members of society? I don't think there's much disputing that the examples I gave add value to society.
Right. Back to those terrible days when high school graduates could actually read and write.
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
I live in Madison (where the last big teacher protest happened) and am relatively close to Chicago. So I'm getting to hear and see all the news/adds relating to this nonsense. The teachers are getting a HUGE raise, and are only protesting because the schools want to be able to hire "Who they want" when filling positions that were previously made open by a layoff. The union wants them to be forced to hire the teacher they laid off. That's just fucking stupid. We've got charter schools here, and parents are desperate to get their kids into them, but there's not enough room. Every parent I know has their kid on a waiting list for a charter school. Even the democrats. So I'm a bit confused who these teachers think they'll get on their side.
If there are any restrictions corporate participation in the political process (in the name of freedom to exercise property there should not be)
So your ideal political system is basically despotic feudalism. I don't see why property should have a say in politics.
no child left behind testing is the issues
Grading a teacher just on the test is not the right way to do it and let's we take a other poor grading systems like kids who go to / get in college?
That is poor as well as there are people out there who are not college material but CAN do a Trades / tech school track so why should a tech get a black mark on some who is not that that good with book learning / test cramming but is real good with hands on learning?
Give up your franchise because you work for the government? That's novel.
Working for the government doesn't change your citizenship. If you think that a weak argument, then consider this: you still pay taxes, and that alone normally provides a legitimate claim to a vote.
You're one of the people who decide what agencies get funded. Even soldiers retain the vote.
If opportunity came disguised as temptation, one knock would be enough.
3^2 * 67^1 * 977^1
Why am I paying out of my paycheck to something that will use for political campaigning for a party I may or may not believe in.
You need to investigate your Beck Rights. You are probably due a fairly sizable pile of money, and if you make enough of a public spectacle about it could potentially cripple your local chapter. Depending on how good or bad your local is, this could potentially help improve conditions, or it could make things worse. Make sure you fully understand the consequences before taking this approach. If you simply press the issue yourself, you probably will have a court battle ahead of you (you will win, this has been to the supreme court already). If you go about to all of your like-minded co-workers, you can expect a fair amount of backlash from the union.
-=Geoskd
I wish I had a good sig, but all the good ones are copyrighted
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/474/back-to-school?promo=1#play
Listen to This American Life this weekend. Ira Glass was a reporter for Chicago public schools for years, and he asks the relevant questions.
Why? This is (or supposed to be) a free country, you should be able to join any organization you want.
It is illegal for a group of CEOs to join an organization dedicated to fixing prices. Or did you think that was a bad idea too? Both concepts undermine competition and are bad for everyone except those in the organization.
-=Geoskd
I wish I had a good sig, but all the good ones are copyrighted
Why are you paying money out of your pay check for wars you probably don't think you should be in? After all your tax bill would be considerably smaller if the US didn't spend more on military spending than the next 26 countries combined.
That's a disingenuous argument. One thing has nothing to do with the other. You might be right about taxes, but it has no bearing on the issue at hand.
-=Geoskd
I wish I had a good sig, but all the good ones are copyrighted
If the Chicago Teacher's Union works like other unions, you are required to pay your dues whether you agree with their activities or not (you can choose not to be a member, but you still have to pay). And because these are public sector jobs, they can hold vital government services hostage and people dependent on these services have no alternatives. That's not a union and collective bargaining anymore, it's a protection racket supported by politicians who use it to advance their own careers. The public and education lose out in the process.
Yup. Competition from essentially unaccountable charter schools or private schools getting public money with little or no oversight, and under a variety of guises able to reject students with physical, mental or behavioral issues. There have been studies showing that the "new school effect" is what may account for any short-term gains in charters, and that renovating and relaunching public schools could have the same effect. Charter and private schools aren't expected to act like social service agencies, dealing with all sorts of damaged kids. The regular public schools are. And recent studies about the effects of stress on neurological development pretty much shows that these kids are being wired to fail by their environments. Poverty, home problems, crime, etc. are the actual problems.
The motivated parents who move their kids to a new school? Those kids probably have less stress than the kids who have parents who are having more problems and aren't focusing on them. Charter/private with vouchers will lead to tons of kids being left behind.
Please understand - the for-profits, consulting companies, etc. have NO interest in actually fixing education. Education is one of the few places where there's a lot of public money, it's staying public, and it's largely going to middle-class employees. The entire point of the reform - from the standpoint of these companies - is to siphon off a ton of that money. Their profit margin will be built by lowering wages - leading to lower-quality teachers over time - and eventually making the whole thing even worse.
I halfway expect to see some of these for-profit companies running juvenile detention facilities soon as well. They make money either way if they do.
There are a few issues at play here:
First, the teachers were foolish to start this strike right before an election. This miscalculated action will ultimately hurt democrats and their own interests.
Second, the system is rigged in the following ways:
The new teacher evaluation instrument is designed to "weed out" bad teachers, but the reality is that it is designed to weed out ALL teachers. It doesn't really matter what pay teachers are offered when they are unemployed. The way that it is implemented, a teacher can be "Highly Effective" in many areas, but if they are "Minimally Effective" in one area, they are a "Minimally Effective" teacher. Likewise, administrators are told that if one teacher in their building has a rating below "Effective", then they must not be "Effective" administrators. The administrators can then be immediately removed.
The testing system that is used is inherently flawed. In our State, students were performing reasonably well on the test, so the decision was made to increase the passing score. Now less students pass (Duh!) and almost all of our area schools are considered failing. In testing, if students do poorly it is the educators fault, if students do well the test was too easy. This creates a lose-lose situation for teachers.
State funding for education has dried up. This has caused school districts to endure significant financial strain. This situation, caused by the State, entitles the State (led by republicans) to replace the superindendant with an "Emergency Manager". The emergency manager then turns the entire district over to a "Charter School" which is able to fire all of the teachers, therby eliminating unions, and rehire whomever will take minimal pay.
When the "Emergency Manager" takes over a school district, they also nullify the school board, elected by the people. That means that people living in these districts, mostly black, lose the right to vote for their elected officials. This is an affont to democracy, and an attempt to establish an oligarchy.
Of course, it is illegal for teachers to strike in our State. They have cut over 15,000 jobs, taken away benefits and pensions, and put teachers in a position of saying, "Thank You. may I have another?"
REMEMBER THIS WHEN THEY COME AFTER YOU!
and negotiate a contract with another government worker for a share of taxpayer money, the taxpayer is not fairly represented.
And who is going to make that evaluation? How are they going to hire and fire?
In essence, you want a free market in education in which parents evaluate schools and outcomes, successful principals win and schools grow, and bad ones get closed. Government has a function in such a market: it can keep schools small and the market free and efficient (instead of having large corporations and churches take over entire counties or states), it can ensure that low income families can afford education for their kids through vouchers, and it can create some public schools to fill in gaps where there are market failures. But that's very different from the all-expenses-paid centrally planned public school system that we have right now.
Now try to get that past the teachers unions...
By themselves, unions are an association of people with common interests and goals, just like corporations, and they are a useful and important component of a free market. They actually increase market efficiency by simplifying negotiations over pay and work conditions.
Unions become a "monopoly" only when membership becomes de-facto mandatory or when they involve the public sector. Unfortunately, that's the case in the US in many cases, but it is not an intrinsic feature of unions.
No, I'm not a public sector worker; nice going, trying to erect a straw man to batter to pieces.
How about the special entitlements given to employers by the government?
I am convinced that you only desire to strip public sector workers some of their basic rights out of vindictiveness. Do you think that the public sector as an employer is incapable of making a mockery of its employees?
And no, I don't care at all about what FDR thought.
I'm from Wisconsin so after reading "The striking Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) is holding a massive 'Wisconsin-style rally' Saturday as ongoing negotiations try to bring an end to the strike" I feel I should mention that teachers going on strike is illegal in Wisconsin. It's actually against the law.
I never said that you are a public sector worker, maybe you just went to a public school, so you can't actually process what you are reading.
My first sentence: "if you are a public sector worker" is the response to your statement: "espousing freedoms as usual". I said you took my comments out of context, which you did.
Public sector unions are in a unique position whereby their members operate important or vital national infrastructure. The police in many places are forbidden to go on strike, in recognition of this fact. The bottom line is that if you have unions with often effectively unsackable members in charge of things like water and power, you're going to get bent over a barrel.
I am not sure how to feel about a few of these issues but at the same time clearly the school board has/will have money issues. Does anyone on slashdot know what kinds of computer systems they use? I went to school in a large school district in south Florida and everything was Windows, with as many expensive Microsoft productivity programs as possible, of which no one really used. It seems like an easy to use Linux distro and open/libre/google docs office program would be more than adequate for most schools needs and would seriously free up some money in the budget. Does anyone have any insight into Linux/open source software in public schools, particularly Chicago Public Schools?
Your mistake is looking only at the history of the USA. There are other countries which got 8-hour work day and other labor protection laws literally decades earlier, and in all those cases unions have been instrumental. US was a late comer to that party.
The reason why laborers colluding is not bad is because the balance of power is tilted heavily against them and in favor of employers (which are predominantly large corporations today) in the first place. It may be a free market in a sense that you're free to take the offer or go elsewhere (where you'll be offered the same exact thing), but it's certainly not a fair market. Unions make it that much fairer.
It has everything to do with the matter at hand. Many states require that if it's a union job, you're required to join that union. Then union money comes out of your paycheck, whether you like it or not - much like taxes.
I think FDR said it best:
"[A] strike of public employees manifests nothing less than an intent on their part to 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."
It is illegal for a group of CEOs to join an organization dedicated to fixing prices. Or did you think that was a bad idea too? Both concepts undermine competition and are bad for everyone except those in the organization.
Nice straw man, but you unintentionally pointed to exactly the right comparison. CEOs head organizations which are comprised of many people gathering together to obtain mutual benefit, namely pooled resources that allow members of the organization to engage in activities and reap benefits that they could not individually. These folks all gather together to have greater bargaining power in the market. We even privilege these collectivist organizations under law by providing the individual members immunity for the (negative) actions of the organization.
"Big Money Interest Groups"
You mean like the NEA?
Let me tell you about what my union did for me. I am a federal employee in a large building for a large agency. I get paid well and have many fine benefits. One day some years ago a rat died in the subfloor under my desk. I called in a work order for the dead rat and not much happened. A week went by and the rat smell intensified. I asked for an update on the rat issue and was told it was in the system and awaiting a tech. Another week and it was unbearable. I spoke to my union rep, he made a few phone calls, and the next day they took apart my floor and removed the dead animal from under my cube.
This is one reason you need the union guy. All of my managers agreed that there was a problem, but they all were powerless to fix it. The union guy put on his hat with the extra bit of legal force and the problem is solved.
I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
Like teacher's unions?
I'm fine with that.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
It is illegal for a group of CEOs to join an organization dedicated to fixing prices. Or did you think that was a bad idea too? Both concepts undermine competition and are bad for everyone except those in the organization.
Nice straw man, but you unintentionally pointed to exactly the right comparison. CEOs head organizations which are comprised of many people gathering together to obtain mutual benefit, namely pooled resources that allow members of the organization to engage in activities and reap benefits that they could not individually. These folks all gather together to have greater bargaining power in the market. We even privilege these collectivist organizations under law by providing the individual members immunity for the (negative) actions of the organization.
The point wasn't that all organizations are bad and / or should be illegal, it was that not all organizations should be tolerated / legal. I can come up with lots of organizations that are good, or at least innocuous too. I was giving an example of an organization that was bad for the same reasons that unions are bad. That doesn't mean that unions don't have their uses, just that all else being equal, they are bad for everyone who is not in the union, including joe average citizen. Unions are not victimless, and some of their behavior should be a crime.
-=Geoskd
I wish I had a good sig, but all the good ones are copyrighted
Public unions should not be permitted because these guys are sitting on both sides of the bargaining table. They have massive clout and can influence local elections. This means they'll get a sympathetic ear elected, and when it comes time for contract negotiations, it's them and the guy they basically put in charge.
You can see how this turns out. Public unions reaping all sorts of benefits that aren't found in the private sector, cities literally bankrupt yet still being coerced into giving public employees raises.
Who represents the taxpayer in all this? Nobody, that's who. The main entity that funds all of this doesn't get say, and that's why it should be prohibited for public employees to collectively bargain.
The unions are just another corporation, like any other. Specifically, they are a commodities brokerage. Their commodity is human labor. This is capitalism how it was meant to be, competition amongst various business interests, all seeking special favors and protections from the authorities (which, on the face of it, is kinda wag the dog, since the authorities exist to serve them, and can be easily replaced). The ancillary benefits to the commodity is nice and all, but it's just designed to keep the product fresh. Pump it full of antibiotics and fertilizer, and 500 TV channels, and it will provide many years of reliable service. Damn near as long as a typewriter. But let's not dismiss the idea of organized labor. It sells. Whether it's intentional or not, it pushes back at abuses from the factory owners, while also forming gangs to shake down the completion. What are you gonna do? When people smell money, this is how they act. There is no 'socialism'. It's just business. If you want to pick sides, well, that's up to you. To me it's just a tiny part of the eternal battle for domination.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
You're free to not work for the government if you don't like the rules.
Shite mastery of English, lad. Nice faux-elitism there as well; "Hah, public schools".
So, definitely not fond of freedom for public sector workers, then?
because education is too important to run like a business, with profits maximized. I buy a lot of crap that I know isn't very good because I don't make a tonne of money. I don't want my kid to get a Ramen Education while Mitt Romney's kids are the only ones eating steak.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
either that or you're one of their shills (possible, but apologies if you're not since people hate being accused of that).
The rich learned long ago that the best way to stay in power and keep all the money was to pit groups of people against each other. Traditionally this is done with racial or cultural boundaries. Black/white, Christian/Islam, etc, etc. But since they've been globalizing the economy to take advantage of all that cheap labor they've got a problem. They're having a hard time keeping us segregated, and keeping a single large voting block they can count on. The "Southern Strategy" is breaking down.
So they're sicking you on public employees. They don't really have it that good, it's just that after 30 years of lower wages and longer work hours their lives look like heaven. That's the trap. You're too busy asking, why do those guys have food, shelter and health care? to ask "Hey, why don't I have those things?".
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
How do you hope to ensure that the evaluations do not favor teachers who work in "safe" schools in middle class areas
You don't hope. It doesn't matter. Some teachers will coast by there, yes. But meanwhile the teachers that cannot teach the harder kids will get churned out until you find someone who can.
And who even thinks it takes the same kind of teachers to teach in "safe" schools vs. the more challenging ones anyway?
You are trying to make life fair. Life is not fair and the sooner you adapt for that the better your solutions will become.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I feel for teachers, I really do. They have to put up with all the red tape, helicopter parents, disrespectful students. But, that being said, no one held a gun to their heads to force them to teach. If someone offered me a 16% raise in THIS economy, I'd take it. Most unions are nothing more than a money funneling scheme to political parties. You don't have a choice where your dues go, other than to line the pockets of the union bosses. Keep going Chicago teachers unions. You'll keep demanding the sky and it will eventually fall on your head. If they want more money, then they should be EVALUATED just like any other employee who wants a raise. Let's see...50% of Chicago students NEVER graduate, and even those that do, some can't even read or write. How about fixing that, then come back and ask for a raise.
"competition" This is not even a word that should be spoken if we are talking about education.
It is if you want any quality to result.
What we have now is almost zero competition, and the results suck.
Competition is what you introduce when you want results to stop sucking.
Government-enforced monopolies are usually not healthy for anyone.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
You have a very distorted view of history.
I believe your own distorted presentation of history is misleading. The eight-hour workday was not an emergent property of depression era unemployment. The depression was simply fuel to an already existing fire. How legislation emerges is often as important as the emergence itself...
Carpenters in America went on strike in the early 1790's for a 10-hour work day. This had become a general public sentiment and by the mid 1830's Philadelphia workers staged a general strike -- organized and lead by Irish workers in the coal industry. The American eight-hour workday found its initial foothold in Boston in the early 1840's and by the 1860's it was being demanded in Chicago. Baltimore 1866, the National Labor Union made it the first and most pressing issue to normalize on an eight-hour workday. The Illinois legislature passed a (largely ineffective) eight-hour workday law in 1867. The ineffectiveness of the leglislation resulted in a city-wide strike in Chicago that lasted a week before crumbling. Later, in 1868, a similarly impotent eight-hour workday law for federal employees was passed by Congress. In 1869, Grant signed the National Eight Hour Law Proclamation. The movement persisted through out the 1870's and in the 1890's labor strikes of 10's and hundreds of thousands of peoples in Milwaukee, Chicago, Cincinnati, New York, and other cities and townships throughout America -- organized labor standing united for that which civilized management and government were unwilling (or unable) to deliver.
The fight was not just in the north... in San Fancisco, the eight-hour workday was implemented at a mill at the turn of the century -- following arbitration and in the face of boycotts and strikes.
Most notably in history, in 1914 Henry Ford called for the doubling of wages and the cutting of work hours from nine to eight. Many sibling companies, while unhappy with Ford's move could not argue with the productivity increase he demonstrated...and they soon followed with similar moves. In 1915, a series of strikes motivated toward the eight-hour work day swept the northeast...successfully.
The Adamson Act of 1916 (signed by Woodrow Wilson) solidified the eight-hour day in the United States for railroad workers. It was the first time in American history that the private industry workhours were regulated by federal authority. The law was challenged and upheld in Wilson v. New, 249 U.S. 332 (1917).
The Adamson Act blazed the trail for all the related legislation in America that followed...
Similarities around the world (timeframes) --
Australia, 1855-1956
Spain, 1873-1919
Portugal, 1919
Germany, 1899
France, 1936 (Matignon)
Russia, 1917
Iran, 1919-1946
Mexico, 1910-1920
New Zealand, 1840-1899
Puerto Rico, 1899
Puru, 1919-?
Uruguay, 1914-1915
Chili, 1924
Why are you paying money out of your pay check for wars you probably don't think you should be in? After all your tax bill would be considerably smaller if the US didn't spend more on military spending than the next 26 countries combined.
Got it. We've now identified two areas where government spending could be reduced if we changed the goals somewhat. There's some work to be done to get there, but the benefits are numerous. Also, this suggests that there are other areas at the local and national level where we could "do less with less" and benefit everyone.
We all pay for things we don't want, don't need or consider immoral. It's a fact of life.
Hmm.. not where I was expecting you were going with this. I'm not sure I can get behind the idea that we should all just suck it up over the things we don't like government spending money on because we've always paid for it in the past.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
OR perhaps they were powerless to fix it due to the fact that if they did do something, the unions would have complained.
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Thats the point, I should not have to pay some 3rd party so that I can work a particular job. the government is one thing, we all have to pay the government, but there is no logical reason that joining a union should be mandatory.
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
I believe our teachers are already paid quite a lot more than US teachers as well. Up to about $100K, I believe.
My high school trig and calculus teacher made that much 20 years ago. Of course it took a doctorate in education and 40 years of experience. Frankly he was probably worth every penny.
Something non-teachers don't understand is the slope of pay and how it varies but is generally huge in teaching compared to other fields. You work IT and you'll get basically no pay raise as long as you keep doing the same thing for the same employer plus or minus some inflation adjustment.
Teaching is different and its assumed you'll make lower class wages to hire and before retiring you'll get lower upper class wages. I saw a copy of my school's contracted union payscale and 20 years ago they started at $20K outta school no experience BS degree and topped out around $110K with 40+ years and a doctorate. This is same job day in and out for 40 years, not some kind of IT career starting out on the helpdesk and ending up as an exec. The point is people with an axe to grind will solely discuss an extreme to make their point, the reality of life as a teacher is you bought into a lifestyle where you begin poor and end up rich. There's nothing wrong with that, its just how they budget. If they paid $55K to everyone from 22 yrs to 70 yrs then it wouldn't cost any more or less but there sure would be a lot less whining on both sides.
I guess some people hate them for it, why can they advance their lifestyle as they age whereas mine is stagnant to declining. A bit less hate and a bit more organizing would probably help with that.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Good. Many of the teachers send their kids to those private schools, so at least their kids are still in school and learning.
Thanks!
They are part of the monopoly set up by the ruling class, I don't even want them to have those jobs, why would I want them to have those jobs with ability to hold the services hostage?
Get rid of the gov't services in those sectors (like education) stop running education and allow the free market to take care of it and then yes, go ahead, unionize if you must.
But again, the employees must be free to associate and this same right to associate works the other way around, you must not be forced to associate with anybody, so employees must be free to associate, but they shouldn't be able to force anybody to associate with them, not other employees nor employers.
If an employer finds it easier to deal with a union rather than with every separate worker, he can do it. If the employer doesn't want to have a union shop, he shouldn't be forced to, and if they strike because he doesn't want to negotiate collectively with them, he should be able to fire them.
The ridiculous part is that many believe that gov't should be able to force employers to keep providing jobs to people who don't show up to work. (an audio interview on the issue of unions and striking with Chris Rhomberg, professor at Rutgers University & author of The Broken Table: The Detroit Newspaper Strike and the State of American Labor, on why America would be better off if there were more strikes. From 11:40 to about minute 40 and then some more thoughts on this until minute 50.)
Libertarians want freedom for themselves at the expense of others.
A few high level admins and some research professors at Univeristies make that kind of money.The median is pretty low. It only seems high because everyone else's wages have been dropping for 30 years thanks to Trickle Down Economics (aka 'Supply Side').
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
don't get to pick their parents. We all deserve the same opportunity to succeed. If you go to a poorly funded 2 year trade school whose sole purpose is to maximize shareholder value and I go to the best private schools in the world, how is that right?
The free market might have it's place, but it's not the ultimate answer to mankind's happiness. Widen your view.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
There are wonderful teachers who avoid teaching because of sentiments like this. I'm sorry, I'm not interested in entering a toxic work culture where I am demonized by the press, politicians, and parents. Where people on the outside lust over taking away my job security, and where my salary is a race to the bottom of supply and demand. Listen, if you want to restrict pay raises for public school teachers, great, go for it. Divide the country even further along class lines and support private charter schools without the salary restrictions, who snap up the most passionate, brilliant instructors.
That is a foul harvest to reap.
I guess I don't need this pesky AMA membership and Doctor's license (another unnecessary origination that should be voluntary). I'm off to practice medicine! Maybe if I practice enough I'll get it right!
Oh, and come off it. There are lots of good reasons to be required to join an organization before you can do something. Principles are lovely, but don't let them blind you to cold hard reality. For one thing, in a right to work state it's easy to discriminate against Union employees. When I say 'discriminate', I don't mean 'Not Hire'. I mean real discrimination. Like, 'Not sell food to' and 'Not allow to own a house'. This was done to blacks, so there's no reason why the powers that be won't do it to Unions. After all, Unions (and public sector employees) are the new Black. They're the group the rich pit the middle class against so you won't start asking questions like "How come there's 30 TRILLION dollars in off shore accounts?" and "Where did that national debt come from again?".
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Just to give you guys an idea about this CPS strike... our teachers make an average of about $75k before benefits, which are considerable. And payraises weren't off the table, they were going to get (iirc) 4% per year. They're still striking and nobody can afford to go any higher due to the ballooning pension costs of retired teachers.
Shit is out of control. I have the same amount of education, working in my field for 15 years, and I make well under half of what their average workers do.
Unions, I guess.
You have to extract the power 4 as % raaise are multiplicative. So 1.16 power 1/4 = 1.037 so it is a 3.7% rise per year. But roughly the inflation was about ~3% per year in average (1.6 lowest in last decade i think , 3.8 highest). So it is still a rise of 0.7% purchasing power per year or 3% rise in purchasing power over 4 year. I wish I had that , my purchasing power is actually getting lower because we get rise lower than inflation.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
'nuff said.
You can't evaluate against a national average or even a state average. Why ? Because some school are in more difficult area with less funding and over worked teacher. Why should they be compared against a teacher in a high d nice area with lot of funding and no problem kid ? The evaluation would have to be done locally agaisnt the other average teacher and combined on the state and it get horribly complicated : was the teacher badly noted because of some kids that year , a criminal in shorts ? Was the next year incredible because he got a group of well nice kids wanting to learn, but in reality the teacher is bad ? teacher evaluation is horribly complicated and there is no way whatsoever that a a group would do it properly without funding. And you know what ? That will be more expansive for everybody because those evaluator will have to be paid. And if you go for a simple solution , then are very high chance is that you will not evaluate the teacher at all, but the environment and children. Which is pretty much idiotic.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
Right, so unions are bad... why? What is wrong with people banding together for greater negotiating power against organisations that already have an excess of negotiating power?
The city and the union have been arguing back and forth over whether or not they're the first or second best paid teachers in the country, as if that would really change public opinion on the matter.
The primary issue seems to be performance evaluation. Lots of people want testing and performance considerations. The teachers, obviously, do not, because otherwise their relatively high salary jobs are largely guaranteed for life.
And they do have a point about pinning their jobs to student performance. Chicago schools perform very badly, but it's hard to argue that it's the teachers' fault. At least not entirely. So I can understand why a teacher doesn't want to get a class of 35 students (which is common), worse than the class she had last year, and have her employment hang in the balance over how those kids test. From everyone elses perspective, the teachers are very well compensated while education is getting worse all the time.
So naturally, everyone is pissed, and everyone has a legitimate gripe.
Of course, I don't even know that unions serve a real purpose, anymore. We no longer employ twelve year old kids for sixteen hours a day in dangerous machine shops for a nickel an hour and anyone who has been wronged can seek out legal representation.
How do you think we got those rights? How are we supposed to maintain them? There has to be a balance, no excess of power on either the amployer's side or the worker's side.
OR perhaps they were powerless to fix it due to the fact that if they did do something, the unions would have complained.
Where the hell did you pull that argument from?
Tell her to join the union then.
in some jobs, if you are not in the union, you cannot do some tasks. In this thread I read of a guy who couldnt use a voltmeter and had to have a union member hook it up every time he needed to use it, if he did it, he would have been written up. so yes, it is possible that they were not allowed to do anything because of the union rules. Not saying that is what happened, but only that it does happen
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
> I don't see why property should have a say in politics.
A wonderfully stupid statement. Like saying "I don't see why gravity should have a say in my physical orientation".
That's nonsense. Libertarians want equal individual liberties for everybody, including themselves and a very limited government with very limited authority.
You made a statement that is based on a strange idea and emotion, not on rationality and reality.
Then move to a 'Right to Work' state. There are plenty of them where you don't have to join a union if you don't want to.
Jimmy Carter took away the collective bargaining rights of the federal employee unions back in the 1970's.
Because you don't understand how to end a sentence with a question mark (to pick on one of several grammatical errors) and are, therefore, an idiot.
"Teaching is different and its assumed you'll make lower class wages to hire and before retiring you'll get lower upper class wages."
So that's why my old junior high gym teacher makes $70K in a town where the median household income is $28K? Yeah, real reasonable there.
Fuck teachers.
I don't think that is typical - my dad retired at 58k and he was a public school teacher his entire life. He also made the top pay scale which only requires a masters degree.
Administrators make about that much though.
In the US, food and fuel is specifically exempted from determining the amount of inflation. Perhaps it is the same in Canada.
Doesn't that make it pointless for a large proportion of the population.
Well, only the part of the population that needs to eat and drive around. Negligible!
I'm a state employee (I really am - I belong to SEIU 503) - I think I should be able to associate with whoever I like, and to vote for my own best interests.
Right, and that's why governers have recently killed the power of teachers, police, and firemen unions in many states. Because people can't elect anyone who will go against them. Oh wait, you are just totally wrong.
Why should teachers have job security when nobody else does? What makes them so special that they can't play by the same working condition rules as everyone else? The thing I can't stand are teachers unions who believe teachers are just above everyone else and everyone should just give them everything they want because that's who they are. Yes, salary is a matter of supply and demand. Live with it.
As with so many other neocon policies, President Obama has managed not just to extend the George W. Bush policies, but to expand them.
While Bush went after the students to sabotage their education with his "No child left behind" fiasco, Obama has expanded that to go after not only the students, but the teachers as well, with his "Race to the top" -- moving towards the final Wall Street goal of the complete privatization of American education.
At the Chicago --- or city --- level, Obama's former chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, now Mayor Rahmney of Chicago, carries on the corporate model. (Rahm, or Rahmney, was a former private equity banker with Wasserstein Perella, so he's well suited for the job of the destroyer of public education.)
It was Obama's man, Arne Duncan (formerly of Chicago, now Sec'y of Education), who stated that Hurrican Katrina was the best thing to happen to education in New Orleans. Aside from the sheer obscene crassness of that remark --- Katrina killed thousands in New Orleans --- Duncan intended that remark to mean that the aftermath of Katrina's destruction allowed for the establishment of widespread charter schools --- the privatization of education --- and the destruction of the teachers' union.
The standard scam, or process, is exemplified in Chicago: the testing is non-curriculum based, producing poor test results, which leads to support for shifting to charter schools, or the complete privatization of education.
The building of charter schools is a lucrative profit center, given the tax breaks and structure for educational real estate development.
Profit, profit and more profit, coupled with the further destruction of unions with the subsequent reduction in workers' rights and quality of education.
While education suffers in Chicago, Rahmney's children attend the best of private schools.
While education suffers nationally, President Obama's children attend the best of private schools.
Once again the American electorate is given real "choice" by Wall Street: Mutt Romney who supports the complete privatization of America, or President Obama, who supports the complete privatization of America.
Rampant corruption and criminal activities of many unions aside, I don't have a problem with unions (even at federal level) existing to help workers avoid being abused and mistreated, but I do have a problem with them then becoming something that politicians at every level have to maintain employment for, even when they're no longer needed. Cutting government spending then always becomes a battle over "they took're jerbs!". Kind of like letting a family member move into your home and then kicking them out years later.
Of course, I don't even know that unions serve a real purpose, anymore. We no longer employ twelve year old kids for sixteen hours a day in dangerous machine shops for a nickel an hour and anyone who has been wronged can seek out legal representation.
However, in the tech industry, I would certainly not ever want a union to represent me and I would not want to be forced to belong to one. I would rather find a new career.
Don't you know that if Unions went away it would be merely 10 minutes before all the fat cat industrialists immediately forced 12 year old kids into working in their newly built dangerous factors for nickles! :D
I was raised on the command line, bitch
"Nemo me impune lacesset"
Let me tell you what my union did for me.
I'm a decently paid IT support guy who needed a teleconferencing system installed in my office's conference room. I'm competent in electrical installation, networking, and all the other skills needed; I could have done it myself in a day if I could have gotten the hardware in. But the union deals mean we have to follow certain protocols.
One guy came in, cut a hole in the wall for the outlets. Left. Another guy scheduled another appointment days later, put some wires in, and left. A third guy came in and installed the wall mount for the screen, and left. Another guy hung the screen and telecom system, and left. Someone else connected up the network. Then the admins finally got it running, about four weeks later. Overall cost--about half a year's worth of my salary.
Teacher's unions are not about educating students. They are about protecting and increasing teachers' salaries. Students are the second priority and always have been.
I like the idea of vouchers. They introduce competition. Competition is good for schools for the same reason it's good for businesses. When you have no competition, you're basically The Telephone Company before the government busted it up: shitty performance, infinite attitude, and a sense of entitlement. When there IS competition, it lights a fire under your ass and forces you to actually COMPETE.
If public schools are as good as charter schools, then they face ZERO problems from the existence of vouchers. The fact that someone else figured out a way to run a school and actually get shit done for the same or less money than these public schools that keep demanding money in return for poorer and poorer results tells me that vouchers are the way to go. Without that, what do we have? More of the same.
Then move to a 'Right to Work' state. There are plenty of them where you don't have to join a union if you don't want to.
All states should be right-to-work states. Being forced to pay protection money to hold a job is the type of thing the Mob does. Mandatory union membership has no place in today's world of massive amounts of government labor laws and regulations protecting worker safety and rights. Whether or not labor unions helped bring about those protections doesn't matter. The protections are there now, and public sector labor unions are without purpose other than to soak the taxpayer and gain political power & influence for their leaders.
Public sector unions should be outlawed. Both because they place essential services provided by government at risk from strikes, and because the taxpayers who pay the union wages & benefits have no say in how much the unions get, it's between the union and the politician they helped elect. It's two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for lunch, without the sheep being allowed a vote. It's corruption incarnate.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
You mean the socialist party and the communist party not union.
Few countries allowed or protected labor unions the end of WWI. Don't get confused on labor unions either, they are not the same as trade unions which was active since the building of pyramids or before. The free masons are one of these unions.
One of the first international labor unions was actually a political group of socialists that included Marx
Unions are supposed to protect the worker from the evil robber barons.
There is no such thing in the public sector, in the case of the public sector union you end up with the workers and the state colluding together against the interests of the civil society.
Ex-Broward teachers union chief charged with theft, fraud
ARRESTED: School Board Member Stephanie Kraft and Husband Mitch
Ex-Broward School Board member Beverly Gallagher sentenced to 37 months in prison
Read more here: http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2010/06/exschool-board-member-beverly-gallagher-sentenced-to-37-months-in-prison.html#storylink=cpy
That's just in the past 5 years.
They're using their grammar skills there.
Can I suggest that the union isn't the right answer. Your management chain is.
Why didn't you raise this as a health and safety concern? Why didn't your manager raise hell about it? Why didn't you keep escalating up the management chain until someone listened?
This isn't rocket science. This is a dead rat. Fucking deal with it.
"Ooh, I need my mummy. I mean, my union guy." Grow up.
Want an education?
Don't to Chicago.
So Unions are really vital if you work in a totally inefficient workplace where someone can't fix simple problems that should take 10 minutes to resolve.
How do you think they got to the point where they are totally ineffectual and can't fix a simple problem?
I'm of the opinion that all public service jobs (and that of politicians) should have increases pegged at inflation. And I work for the government, so I'm not just saying that because I think government employees are undeserving. If the government finds it tough to hire some particular skill (or in some area) they can add incentives, but otherwise the question of pay is off the table. For the government, it's a win since budgeting becomes far more predictable. For the employees, it makes the whole negotiation process go a lot smoother.
Unfortunately, the unions would fight it tooth and nail because it dramatically undermines their ability to use strikes as bargaining tools. Aside from pay issues, most of the negotiations between the union and the employer are noise. It usually takes disagreements about real money to get the rank and file union member wound up enough to walk a picket line.
Log in or piss off.
Of course your question is somewhat rhetorical. The bottom line is that idiots like Geoskd think the playing field is level and we live in a meritocracy. I find that most "people" who hold these kinds of viewpoints are middle to upper class white males who have never truly struggled or wanted for anything in their life. In other words, Geoskd was born on third base and mistakenly believes he hit a triple.
Seriously, making $75,000/yr isn't enough for them? They need to be fired and those that really want to teach will get hired for half that amount. The average city income is $50,000. Stupid selfish teachers, money isn't going to make them better teachers as they claim.
". I have the same amount of education, working in my field for 15 years, and I make well under half of what their average workers do"
What? You mean you have the BA minimum degree, various teaching certificates, child development training, continuous education at own cost, shelling out for work materials, and combat scars(PTSD, emotional, physical, political games etc. from the community) as they do for the highest responsibility of caring and guiding our young and you only get half? /sarchasm
Seriously, quit your job dude.
Once you're a DC voter, you have no power in Congress, and they're the ones that control the budget.
"Additionally the Unions hate the citizen United decision because they think it gives some corporate interests undue influence."
Look around at all the money flying around in the elections during a major recession/depression and long running downturn aftermath. Let's not forget the various laws and decisions in the last few years. The Unions were right on if not understating the problem.
Jesus fucking Christ you live in a fantasy world. I can only hope that when this race to the bottom all blows up that you are one of the first to have your back against the wall. I would happily pull the trigger on human excrement like yourself.
Don't get confused on labor unions either, they are not the same as trade unions which was active since the building of pyramids or before. The free masons are one of these unions.
One of the first international labor unions was actually a political group of socialists that included Marx
Your lexographic taffy-pull is an abomination. An abomination that may as well include the ufologists and vikings.
Seriously...? Red Scare is so last century. We have mobile computing now...and something called... the internets. They even have an app for that.
In an effort to further your myopic (and I dare say, subtly bigotted) vision of western civil society, your argument has gone from strawman to strawman-on-fire. Free Masons? What's next, Scientologists? Heaven's Gate? Perhaps you would like to cite the disappearance of the the entire Mayan Civilization or the genocide of the Native American peoples into your cause against civil society?
Personally, I think your argument would be more credible if you cited Hagar the Horrible or Starfleet regulations...
[/reductio ad absurdum]
Any modern economic or social discussion on the internet can and will eventually make a (sloppy, casual) comparison or reference to Marx... Reductio ad Marxium -- whether or not the citation to Marx is appropriate, such a discussion has achieved a nader. The abuse of out-of-context Marx references dilute and distort the legacy and the learnings from the body of knowledge. Because the reference may be appropriate contextually, casual use of Marx should be avoided.
Gasoline and food do seem to be included in all of the calculations of the Canadian cost of living index I could find.
... or people have hit their breaking point. It's happening in a lot of areas.
Apparently the voters and their elected officials in several states disagree with your viewpoint, and are free to set things up how they like.
Firstly, some public sector unions workers are already prevented from striking (police). They still have the 'blue flu', which could happen unionized or not.
And s I already pointed out in another thread, your second reason for them being outlawed is seriously flawed. Elected officials in several states just took away a lot of power from Teachers/Police/Fire unions. Teachers aren't the only voters, by a long, long shot. Want things to go the other way? Convince other voters to vote your way. But you better use better arguements than you have so far.
...only which side you're on in the(ir) war. The fact is you're still caught up in the narrative the rich and powerful have created: Namely that lazy overpaid public workers are the problem with our economy. And not say, 30 years of declining wages while the rich line their pockets and hide their ill gotten gains in overseas accounts.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
I know people who teach at charter schools, and they really like it there. I also know parents who sent their children to charter schools, and they rave about the what those schools are doing for their children. What "foul harvest" are you referring to exactly? Charter schools have introduced competition to the public school marketplace, and certain public schools are getting slammed by the loss of students. Rightfully so, in my opinion.
For kindergarten teachers in my sorta-rich suburb, yeah the competition for teaching jobs is incredibly intense. For ghetto areas like big cities, where you need to wear a bullet proof vest, often there's racial hiring quotas, there are serious issues getting enough staffing. Its very much like the demand for police officers in different locales... oddly enough the nice places have 10 applicants per position, and the bad places have 10 positions per good applicant...
The problem there is the the jobs in questionable areas pay SUBSTANTIALLY less than the cushy jobs in the suburbs sometimes a third the amount or less.
Fuck RohmBo up his ass till he bleeds and cries MOMIE.
Firebomb RohmBo's house, apartment, Houch-House and apartment in D.C.
Such a Monster should have never lived, never breathed a breath of life.
8D
It is fine for the pubic service employees to strike. It is not however, fine for the public institution to negotiate with a 'representative' of the striking workers, because the government negotiator has zero real incentive to get a fair deal for the taxpayer. The government negotiators are generally salaried employees (like School Superintendents) who make their $140,000 a year plus benefits whether or not the taxpayers have to pay more money. The taxpayer always loses, and the public service union just has to hand some money under the table / buy dinner/ send on an expensive vacation the government 'negotiator'. In contrast, in the private arena it is possible to negotiate, because the person on the business side who is negotiating the deal has a direct incentive to maximize the efficiency of the deal.
What? You mean you have the BA minimum degree
Yes.
[certs, continuing ed]
Yes.
shelling out for work materials
Only occasionally.
and combat scars(PTSD, emotional, physical, political games etc. from the community)
Oh give me a break.
as they do for the highest responsibility of caring and guiding our young and you only get half?
They have virtually no responsibility for their performance.
Seriously, quit your job dude. sarchasm
Well I'd strike, but there are no unions to make sure I get paid 3x's market rate when my employer goes bankrupt.
I really do want teachers to make as much as we can manage. The good ones. But the city is broke and they want more, while the quality of education students receive continues to fall. They're among the best paid teachers in the entire country. It's time for a little accountability.
In Chicago that's the case, because they make a decent living. In most areas they get paid about the same as a factory worker. A factory worker in the assembly room, press floor, or tool&die apprentice.
Unions don't have to be legal to exist and function. In fact, being legal is kinda their natural state - it takes a special law to ban a voluntary association of people.
And, yes, of course labor unions - then and now - were associated with various socialist and worker parties, including communists. That was because those parties were most vocal in their support of various measures demanded by the unions. So what?
Why should public sector be any different from private sector?
Because I'm fucking tired of deadbeats living off public charity.
It is illegal for a group of CEOs to join an organization dedicated to fixing prices.
And yet the largest price-fixing organization in the world, the Federal Reserve, exists by government decree.
We all pay for things we don't want, don't need or consider immoral. It's a fact of life.
Not all of us.
Poverty, home problems, crime, etc. are the actual problems.
Which is mostly caused by.......the educational system.
It's a vicious cycle.
Troll. Sounds like you should get a union where you work- maybe use collective bargaining to improve your pay and work rules...
LOL. And yet, so utterly shamed and disgusted by your attitude, which typifies the typical American "don't give a fuck so long as yer gettin yers" non-forward-thinking DUMBFUCK viewpoint on the world.
"When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic." -- Benjamin Franklin
Apparently the unions with their people "on the ground", bags of cash, and their purchased elected officials in several states disagree with your viewpoint, and are free to set things up how they like.
FTFY
And s I already pointed out in another thread, your second reason for them being outlawed is seriously flawed.
How is it "seriously flawed" that unions have a long history of backing politicians in exchange for favorable treatment at the expense of the taxpayer? Have you been asleep for the last six decades or more, or have you never learned any history except what people with an agenda have told you?
Elected officials in several states just took away a lot of power from Teachers/Police/Fire unions.
Yes, for the first time in a long time. And it was so alarming and unexpected, the unions outside of Wisconsin threw massive amounts of money and resources into the fight precisely to prevent this setting a new precedent.
Have you seen Detroit recently? I'm not far away and get to see the damage unions and the corrupt politicians.they own have inflicted. I've watched it happen first-hand over the last 50+ years. I hate it. My aunt and her family used to live there in what was once a nice lower-middle-income suburban neighborhood that now has packs of feral dogs out in daylight and the occasional black or brown bear wandering through. That's not exaggeration. There are YT videos.
The rest of the state isn't all that much better, with several large municipalities having state-appointed emergency financial managers taking over all authority for spending and the budget because the corruption and union favoritism and cronyism have bankrupted them.
Want things to go the other way? Convince other voters to vote your way.
How many times does it take? Seems like there are a lot of judges and other politicians and unions across the nation that don't want the voter's will carried out when it doesn't go their way. How far do they go in fighting the decision of the voters before you can say they want to disenfranchise the voters by making their vote meaningless? How many injunctions? How many failed recalls? How many legislators on the lamb in another state to avoid losing a vote?
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
lol.. They were created by them not just associated with them.
That is an undeniable fact. So what is exactly right. I didn't say it was a good or bad thing, just that the 8 hour day was brought to us by the socialist and communist political movements and FDR attempted to institute it in 1933 but it was ruled unconstitutional so overtime became a work around.
The difference in my opinion is that I make my living from money that is taken by force. A union, even with all of the powers granted to it, still has an ultimate check on its power. If the push too far the company will go bankrupt. I guess even today that isn't much of a check since politicians have shown they will bail those companies out.
But as a government employee there is no check except the bankruptcy of the state or country.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
"Unions have a lot of money and political pull too."
Sure $10 million is a lot of money, and 10 billion is also a lot of money. Same difference, right?
And and don't have so much pull that unions did not get largely ignored wrt policy making by the supposedly 'leftist' Obama administration .
No it is nothing like that, people vote, not property. In case you were just scanning for sentences you could take out of context I was replying to someone who was saying there should be no restrictions on corporate participation in politics "in the name of freedom to exercise property". People can vote, corporations are made of people, so why do they need greater influence than their constituent members? Either they are voting with their shareholders and employees in which case those people are getting a greater say in politics than those not in a corporation, or they are voting against their members which is just stupid. Perhaps I could have phrased that more clearly but if you go around deliberately misunderstanding people you have to accept some of the blame for that.
I believe your own distorted presentation of history is misleading. The eight-hour workday was not an emergent property of depression era unemployment. The depression was simply fuel to an already existing fire. How legislation emerges is often as important as the emergence itself...
The depression had little do do with it other then FDR thinking he could use goals of the socialist and communist parties to spread the work around. There is no 8 hour work day in law at this time in the US as the supreme court ruled it unconstitutional. What replaced it was overtime.
Your pointing to trade unions wanting a 10 hour work day is not an 8 hour work day and trade unions are different then labor unions of today. The adamson act was actually the US government's attempt to break a strike and force railroad engineers back to work. Again, it was government not the unions. It only covered a small portion of rail lines to boot. Your tripe about Henry ford while beneficial to the 8 hour work day, only supports my assertion that it wasn't because of unions.
As for the National labor union, it was a sibling of the first international which was born directly out of the socialist movement in Europe and was more of a political organization then what we would consider a labor union. It actually failed and disappeared when it insisted on participating in the electoral process in an attempt to influence government directly.
The rest of your argument actually supports the socialist and communist political movements I mentioned. They were created around 1832 and gained notoriety closer to 1840 or so. It was a world wide movement and included Marx who ended up with his communist manifesto mainly because he grew frustrated with the ineffectiveness of socialism through political means.
The Unions did not give us the 8 hour work day, socialism and communism did. The US Government tried to give us an 8 hour work day, but that failed.
Listen, the socialist political movements started in about 1832 or so in France. By 1840-1845- perhaps a bit later, socialism was the fashionable thing in Europe and spreading. It was these people who brought us the 8 hour work day. Marx was part of this movement and political affiliation before he wrote the communist manifesto. That work BTW, was a direct result of his frustrations over not being able to get his socialist agendas implemented politically. Marx carried the 8 hour work day with him in his turn to communism.
Until the turn of the century, labor unions did not exist as we know them today. What you had was political parties who claimed to be a union of workers who attempted to influence and seek reform through changes in and the creation of laws. They did have a lot of support of workers but they were not organized like a trade union or a shop union we know today.
This isn't a red scare, it's historical fact. It was these socialist and communists who brought us the 8 hour work day. The reference to Marx is simply a time frame and the connection to communism which didn't become a reality until after the socialists failed in implementing a lot of their reforms. Whether you think it is important or not is completely ancillary to this point.
Pay teachers like CEOs and we'll talk about your comparison.
For part time workers they are considerably over paid.
No good deed goes unpunished.
Charter schools are not a panacea.
http://www.tfn.org/site/DocServer/Charter_Schools_Report-FINAL.pdf?docID=163
Cheap storage VM.
The part about this that really irritates me is that they've been getting annual raises about four times the rate of inflation and threatened to strike during a huge budget shortfall at the first mention of pay freezes.
In Canada, yeah, but in Chicago the issue isn't money, it's tying teachers' performance to the kids' tests. I would find this problematic if I were a teacher, you get a classful of children of pimps and crackwhores and it's going to affect your performance evaluations.
I don't see why they don't measure the kids' test against how the kid progressed with the previous teacher. If Johnny got an F last year and he does so again, that's not the teacher's fault. If he got a B last year and a D- this year, that may well be the teachers' fault (or the kid may be on drugs).
Free Martian Whores!
If they push too far they are out on their ear...
Most of the thing Union members have that make non union member mad were give aways by the managment to avoid discussing meaty issues. They just happen to have worth now that so much has been cut away elsewhere.
Cheap storage VM.
Spoiled brats trying to instill the same attitudes in students. What do we expect? Privatize *all* education and make it results-based. Honestly, how can it be worse?
Organization? You must be joking..
Well said, too bad it will mostly fall on dead ears and brainwashed minds.
We, the corporate sponsors of Nu-Educashun(TM); , can certify these children to be free from all disturbing thoughts and ideas, and you can decide what your future customers will consider to be "disturbing" ! (Rates per meme per child are available from our marketing department, on sanguine signature of an eternal non-disclosure agreement. Reduced rates for orders of over a million child minds.)
Our list of corporate sponsors includes many of the world's biggest corporations, so get in there before your competitors cut you off at the pass by having us indoctrinate your next generation of potential customers before they get into the marketplace.
Special rate in this election year for political parties!!
If only it weren't true.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
Right. Did your parents pay for you to go to private school?
Odds are, no.
So are you saying you're an uneducated illiterate, who's not actually working, but living in your folks' basement?
And I *love* the media coverage. Hardly *anything* about the strike *also* being about class size, and teaching, not teaching to tests.
And the charter and other schools: they *don't* have to take everyone, and won't. Of course, studies have also shown that they're not especially doing better than public schools.
mark
Look at the kids parking lot and look at the teachers. Then tell me how much power it has.
8-hour work day was achieved by some workers in Australia and NZ before 1850. Which is to say, before the word "communist" even appeared, and before socialist parties gained any significant popularity. It was done directly by organized (according to their field - i.e. craft unions / trade guilds) workers, by essentially threatening a general strike.
You are free to not apply where there are unions.
Not really. In 1850, Australia was still part of England and that is where the 8 hour work day largely originated. Robert Owen is famous espousing his 8 hour working day and even set it in motion as a mill he operated in England. He is also famous for leaving England to attempt to start a socialist colony (New Harmony) in the US as early as 1825. It failed and was dissolved by 1829. To say or claim that the free masons of Australia did not know of him or his socialist goals is a stretch by all imaginable means.
Your argument is sort of recursive - 8-hour working day is a "socialist goal" by definition, so on that ground anyone who's promoting it would be a socialist, no?
How many legislators on the lam in another state to avoid losing a vote?
Gah!
Stupid auto-correct!
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
It's called reality. I used to work in a building where all electrical work had to be done by a union member (including running networking lines). Our telecom company (handled all of our installs for us) couldn't just come out to run the line. A job that would have taken an afternoon. They had to search for and schedule a union worker to do so. Total time it took? 3 weeks. And we added the outlets because the union worker said he was only allowed to run the wiring not actually finish the job. After that, we just did our own wiring in that building and just used our telecom company for our other locations.
I wish! get those little rapscallions off the streets!
How many times does it take?
More times than the other side is willing and able to fight you.
What you're asking for is like asking "how fast do I have to be to win a race?"
There is no fixed number. The answer is "faster than the other guy"
Seems like there are a lot of judges and other politicians and unions across the nation that don't want the voter's will carried out when it doesn't go their way.
Sure, the competition if fierce. So YOU got to step up your game and meet the challenge. ...or do you expect some sort of welfare handout where your rights and freedoms will just fall from the sky?
No. I think you might have tripped over all the but- but - but- replies I had to bother with.
Socialism brought us the 8 hour work day as apposed to the unions. Unions as in labor unionts came after as a direct result of the socialist movements. That's all I was saying.
Even a blind squirrel finds a nut. There is no reason to think all nuts are socialist now or it wasn't good for him to find it. I'm technically against both socialism (as it exists today) and unions (as they surpassed most of their usefulness and typically drag companies down creating a strain on the economy). But I will not say neither ever had good ideas. It is just that socialist and communists came up with the 8 hour day- not unions as was originally stated.
In Wisconsin the people did step up. Over and over. Competition is one thing, but using completely unethical methods to cheat and game the system to negate the will of the people is another. Like legislators abandoning their duty, fleeing the state, and going into hiding to prevent a vote. They should face automatic impeachment and censure with a special election held to replace them for violating their oaths of office.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
Seriously...? Red Scare is so last century
Not for the ultra-conservatives in the US. The current nonsense floating around in those circles is that Joe McCarthy was correct, the Red Scare was a much bigger danger than history books would have us believe, and that the left's attack on the HUAC and anti-communism and McCarthy in particular was horrible and shameful.
Unions are supposed to protect the worker from the evil robber barons.
There is no such thing in the public sector
Sure there is. There's the city council. The state legislature. The mayor. The governor. Any board that decides wages and benefits (whichever ones are applicable depends on which government body the worker is employed at).
Any situation where the worker has no control over hours, pay, or working conditions is one rife for unions.
One of my friends teaches at the middle school level and has been physically assaulted at least once per year that I've known him. We're talking stitches and stuff, not a simple shove.
They aren't arguing against being held accountable for the quality of their work performance. They are rightly contending that standardized tests aren't an accurate measure of that. Standardized tests are the favorite method of bean counters though because it is cheaper than any method that would actually be accurate.
I attended a nationally ranked top ten high school. I had some insanely good teachers. And I frankly didn't give a crap about my grades, I never completed homework and barely graduated. The only tests I remember blowing off in my life were some standardized tests my senior year. I knew they didn't matter for me, my grade wouldn't be affected by them and I knew I was graduating. So I took a nap, after filling in all of the bubbles. As a responsible adult I regret it now only because I bet my teachers were given hell over it.
Grand jury leads to school board member's sex life
This has to be a record. Four school board members and family plus the teacher's union president arrested in less than 5 years.
They're using their grammar skills there.