Harbinger
According to the Washington Post’s Ezra Klein the Chicago teachers are not striking over pay. Rahm Emanuel has offered a 16% increase over four years that is acceptable to the union. What they are striking over is whether the teachers may be evaluated strictly, and whether lousy teachers who have already been fired can be rehired. Here’s Klein:
What do the two sides agree on?
Emanuel has proposed that, instead of the rescinded 4 percent pay increase, teachers see a 16 percent pay increase over the next four years. The unions say they’re close to agreement on pay, though they still think higher raises are necessary to make up for rising health costs ….
What do the two sides still disagree on?
The Chicago Public Schools in March unveiled an evaluation system (pdf) in which standardized testing makes up 40 percent of the rubric, a percent that increases by 5 percent every year thereafter (45 percent in year two, 50 percent in year three, etc.), which was designed by panels that included teachers, principals, and teachers’ union officials (including the president). The system goes above and beyond the state requirement that testing make up 20-40 percent of teacher evaluations. The teachers’ unions are resisting this system, calling it too punitive.
Teachers also want laid off teachers to be able to be automatically “recalled” to positions if they open up. Emanuel would allow these teachers to apply to new openings, but given his desire to focus layoffs on worst-performing teachers, does not want automatic recalls.
Klein notes that the “2010-11 annual teacher salaries ranged from $47,268 for teachers with bachelor’s degree with a year’s experience or less, to $88,680 for those with doctorates who have at least 16 years of experience … All told, teachers in Chicago make an average of $74,839 a year.” And a 16% raise is not bad in a recession economy.
But with 80% of Chicago students unable to meet the Department of Education standards in both literacy and mathematics, it not obvious that taxpayers are getting a lot of value for money. All the same, it’s good theater.
Observers are being treated to a glimpse of what might have been called a “rectification campaign,” a term used to designate a struggle within a bureaucratic system for power in the guise of seeking reform. A faction will come out on top; the problem in Chicago will be “fixed’ in some way. Why, the miserable education that students receive may even be improved somewhat as a byproduct. But the system will remain unchanged; everything will happen — the buildup, the crisis, and the resolution — within the Democratic Party system.
Things need to be tuned up every now and again. Even a basically one-party city like Chicago has occasional need for the law to make sure that things stay within guidelines. This is illustrated elsewhere. Thus, the arrest of Trenton Mayor Tony Mack on charges of corruption and the withdrawal of Democratic Party candidate Wendy Rosen for voting often and early prove that even within the tolerances of the Big Tent excessive liabilities are dumped.
Rectification has its uses.
Teachers who are illiterate, innumerate, or incompetent should not teach; they should be fired. Teachers should be given the same competency tests required of their students, only the bar should be raised to 100% correct. Miss a question, you are fired.
…why the miserable education that students receive may even be improved…
…the only chance the public has of shifting anything…
Politics is a rough world. That’s just a fact. Why is it so?
Cuz a wimp won’t be able to hold and wield power, and among other negatives of this, it will turn out that your vote will have been wasted.
There are additional factors other than the teachers that contribute to the poor performance of the Chicago students. Foremost among them is that a large number of the students come from “families” who’ve been dependent on welfare for multiple generations. The vast majority of these are not two-parent households. There is no parental support to the education system. The community does not value education or demand anything of the students (or themselves). These are some of the most consuming problems that we as a nation face. They are social issues that are on the back burner for many right now, but they are destroying the fabric of our society.
More politics in school. Holder favors racial quotas for school disipline.
Which factions here are strugling for power? Who will be hurt?
http://pjmedia.com/blog/up-next-for-team-obama-racial-quotas-for-school-discipline/
1. As I once discussed with Roger Innis of C.O.R.E., blacks should sue for education vouchers basing their argument on the XIIIth Amendmant. Their children are now property of the teachers union.
2. The set a theif to catch a theif theory got Hitler into the Chancellory. Chicago needs to arrest the crooks, not elect them.
3. No Votes for Tax Eaters.
Democracy in America has failed. It never had a chance from the beginning. No polity that bases its fundamental freedoms on a Constitution that treats some people in its midst as less than fully human can survive except by force of arms. Roe v. Wade uses the same fouled logic to deny a different group of powerless persons the right to life because they are not fully human.
I can understand why the Founders went ahead with a less than a perfect union. Their plan was the naive hope that slavery would go away on its own. We all know how well politicians’ hope works out in real life. I cannot understand why today’s elites believe that killing your own children is a societal good. Abortion has been around forever but it’s practice was never protected by the state until the Soviet Union did so in 1927. Nice role model.
If the core motive force of the polity is not the protection of the dignity and value of each and every person then the driving force cannot be anything else other than that some people are more deserving of the beneficence of the state than others.
Government employee unions, including teachers’ unions, are symptomatic of the larger rot that permeates the body politic – the public treasury is up for grabs.
The failure is difficult to see because most of us live fairly comfortable middle class lives. An Indian friend pointed that out when she said that Americans are consumed with First World Problems which mask the uncertainty of daily survival experienced by most of mankind.
When is the last time you heard the word Gentleman? Would anybody under 50 even have a clue as to what living as a Gentleman might mean? The culture condemns us.
What if the strike is a false flag event orchestrated by Rahm, the Obama campaign and the teachers’ union in ChiTown? They play for a week or so. Media cranks up the pain and suffering of The Children. Obama steps in, parts the seas, issues his diktat proscribing the new contract, and the strike ends. Cue release of Mourning Doves and the cries of happy children as the media sows rose petals in his path as he walks.
There is some speculation that either the steelworkers (Garard) or teamsters (Hoffa) may be cooking up similar entertainment events. Cheers -
The set can contain four objects: students, teachers, parents, & politicians. The universe of sets of schools that function well only contain three objects. It’s not that difficult to identify the object that must be deleted.
It’s not solely dependent on teachers. Book lernin is not two-part epoxy that the teacher mixes and pours into an open cranium. In fact, lernin the three R’s (Readin, Ritin, & Rithmatic) is indeed hard work.
Hard work requires a certain mindset or attitude on the part of the students. Motivation can come from many sources. It will be scarce if government succeeds in providing scarce resources to all who have unfulfilled need.
Education should never be absolutely necessary or sufficient for a successful life, but it should remain an important asset on that journey.
Families that train & teach their children the value of education typically do well. Consider the many first generation children from Asian families that do exceptionally well in our systems.
Teachers can never completely replace family values in that regard. Nor can teachers accomplish miracles in systems were politicians and administrators have destroyed disciplinary effectiveness.
The attitude of students is first among these. Classroom discipline second. Teacher quality a distant third.
No amount of hurdles, placed in front of teachers by politicians who have no clue how to operate school systems, can overcome the lack of the first two.
9. epignosis
I think you are saying what I’ve been saying for decades. The way to fix our school system is to get better students.
Here in the south, the average school is pretty bad. Some of the private schools are world class. The tradition for centuries was to educate those that could use it. The knuckleheads are for field work anyway. Take a big strong young man who isn’t very smart and it is a waste of time trying to teach him nuclear physics. Teach him to area rebound instead. Everybody will be much happier. Power forwards make more then nuclear physicists anyway.
OT, I have been trying to find the total payroll for non-military government employees. The ‘Official’ site has no data. I’m trying to figure how much it would save to cut ALL civil service paychecks by 20%.
It’s Tess, not Ted.
I heard on the radio that this is a set-up so the President can fix everything at the last moment to look good.
However they didn’t mention that people are too smart to fall for that…
Knowing this to be obvious, the real set-up is against Obama. It’s all so predictable.
Thank you for your post, Wretchard. It is important that this be brought to light, that this event be seen in the context of the larger issue of what is driving this election, the war between the producers and those who would use government to relieve them of their wealth.
The key thing that you point out is the bone of contention for the teachers – the notion that the taxpayers have the ability to apply some sort of metric to the performance of public employees with the end goals being:
1. Imcompetent, dishonest, frequently tardy, or criminal teachers can be removed QUICKLY and lose their pensions, thus preventing waste of taxpayer money, and
2. By making them know that this is the case, marginal teachers will be inspired to voluntarily “take their game up a notch”, meaning that the segment of the population they serve (in this case schoolkids) will benefit from an elevated work ethic and attention to excellence.
All public sector employees are resistant to ANY public sector employee being fired for ANY reason, no matter how imcompetent the worker or egregious the offense, even if it is in another branch of government or another agency. Why? Because that would create an environment where they themselves might be fired for some reason. It introduces the concept – the possibility – that there could be a reason at some future time for their OWN income to be interrupted. This results in anxiety. And anxiety for public sector employees just will not do.
To understand why this is so, one must get back to the main reason 90%+ of the public work force has chosen the job they occupy. It isn’t to be excellent, or to help, or to solve any particular problem. It is to get a guaranteed paycheck and a guaranteed pension with no possiblity of being fired for any reason, once you are in.
Thus, you saw the behavior of the Wisconsin teachers. Thus, you see that even public employees who have nothing to do with hyperregulation are always, always in support of it because it creates a milieu where government employees in general are increasing their job security. Thus, you see the teachers in Chicago saying that avoiding their anxiety about the possiblity of being let go for any reason, even extreme incompetence which could be revealed by applying some metrics to their output, trumps everything including the education of their charges.
A real job is one where you can be fired quickly and easily for cause, where there are definite metrics for your performance, and where there is real competition. Most public employees and almost all public school teachers fail to meet these three criteria. They are aware of this and that is why the thug tactics are being used.
Put into the context of the election, this is part of the greater theme of the producers vs the consumers/destroyers of productivity and wealth. The welfare bloat is obvious. The public employees’ contribution is at least as big if not bigger. It has been said that the Dems vision of a perfect world is Detroit – a large, uneducated and unemployable class dependent on a ruling class of highly paid public functionaries, funded by a demonized and enslaved and disenfranchised private sector of producers. You can call it Cloward-Piven, you can call it communism, the names don’t really matter as much as its occurence.
In a very real sense, this election will determine whether or not we are at that point as a nation.
Yes, this election will be the “Tell” I too believe it is past the “point” already! neither Federal or State (Most States not all Yet!) Don’t want the masses to be “Smart” especially from the public schools system or the College’s, they would be too hard to control and tax if they were truly articulate and able to fully understand math, that’s why they don’t teach American History and drill in the basics of the three R’s… it was over when Clinton became President, we just didn’t know it yet… Our political class was able to use the slight of hand again. Tree of Liberty will ether get its drink of Patriot Blood or it shall wither away for a very long time, generations, possible centuries.
#4 remoteman
“There are additional factors other than the teachers that contribute to the poor performance of the Chicago students.”
Agreed. But those other factors require a level of remaking of society that is not going to happen unless and until the Nomenklatura is overturned. It may not be perfect, but reducing the number of incompetents and deliberately malevolent drones is a step and a start. Especially when they come from an over-privileged group that is over-compensated compared to those paying them, and who stand above the law that oppresses those who pay for them.
Politics IS a rough world. And it is not honest, fair, and as systems collapse, legal. There is no guarantee that political means will work for a society, and one can do everything according to the “system” and find that unforgiving reality leaves you dead.
The thing that is forgotten by those inside a political system is what the meta-purpose of politics is. Politics is how a society chooses to allocate power and resources within itself other than brute force, routine killing, and the biggest SOB [or group thereof] just taking everything at will. In the absence of a working political system; matters revert to brute force. Ultimo Ratio Regum.
When things break down, having been on top of the failed system makes you what is technically referred to as a “target”. The more that you have made objective conditions worse and prevented any act to make life better for those who suffer because of your greed and vanity; the more likely you are to end up with your head on a pike.
And this is regardless of what faction of the Nomenklatura you may have been part of. And there is no guarantee that an “Eliot Ness” will end up on top after the fight between Capone and Yale. There likely will be a new Capo di tutti capi who will be as much of a secret devotee of the Constitution as the Democrats claimed that each new head of the Soviet government was really Thomas Jefferson in disguise.
If this election shows that there is no hope of avoiding dictatorship by electoral means, there are those who will learn the lesson.
Subotai Bahadur
Obama and Biden discuss the latest contretemps in Chicago, in which the President is torn between his love for Rahm and his love for the Teachers Union.
I tell you, Joe, it’s kids this hurts
Think of the PhDs
We’ll lose if all these little squirts
Are sitting home at ease
While they should be a-studying
Their Latin and their Greek
These teachers sure are muddying
Their lives now as we speak
It’s not as bad as you might think
Said Joe with goofy grin
Chicago schools just mainly stink
So better out than in
The kids can hang out on the streets
While pickets walk the line
And learn to dance them shufflin’ feets
The kids will be just fine
But Joe, Rahm frets about his fate
He’s caught between two sides
He has to set the union straight
To prove his bona fides
Joe says, with grin, that guys like us
Raise kids with all the tools
And that’s because our kids don’t bus
Or go to public schools
Shoot me now.
agimarc (8) and Baobo (12): “…this is a set-up so the President can fix everything at the last moment to look good.”
I was fantasizing about Obama fixing everything the same way he fixed the Chicago Olympic bid.
But then the Olympic Committee isn’t part of the machine and thus not under control, so yes, they could play this game. Whether or not anyone would buy is is the question.
imho Obama is not going to win. not by a long shot. however, he is the second jimmy carter to come along in 30 years. so that school is no longer an aberration.
the dems mean to lock that school in over time with the mexican vote. so what they want is government like they have south of the border.
is that the fate that awaits us in a couple decades or a century.
not necessarily.
but a new stream bed of intellectual life in america has to be laid down to draw more americans to the american side.
Hey, they’re teachers. Can’t you tell? http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/213528.php
“Fox News reported that “a Gallup official said in an email he thought Axelrod’s pressure ‘sounds a little like a Godfather situation.’”
Democrats who revel in the “Chicago Way” should be forced to watch the entire “Godfather” trilogy repeatedly to see what awaits them. The only one of the original Corleone siblings left alive at the end of “III” is Connie, the most innocent of them all, and she’s turned into Lucrezia Borgia.
If 80% of school students are illiterate and can’t add, then close the schools and sell the buildings. Take the tax money and apply it to some welfare program to make children healthy and feed humgry children.
Ain’t possible any child be worse off educationwise. If they can’t add, they can still multiply. If they can’t read, they still vote.
Back in 1995 Mayor Daley was given dictatorial power over the Chicago Public school system. This included the power to bust the unions. Seemed to work at the time but I guess the innate corruption will always win out.
Grey Eagle: 80% of Chicago students are below grade norms in reading and math. That’s not the same as “illiterate and can’t add”. Most can read and figure at least somewhat.
Many of course are functionally illiterate and innumerate, and a lot are barely functional. That’s not good enough – but it is not quite as bad 80% illiterate.
You’ll find an article on Drudge reporting that the Department of Defense is now being used to prop up sales of the Chevy Volt, that no-one else will buy.
Yay. We were so afraid that all those highly useful little popcorn-makers might be pulled from the market, and no more manufactured.
But He Who Can Part the WATERS, who can calm the storm and make fertile the lands has decreed that the Volt shall not perish from the EARTH. Greener shall be our military, since the Messiah has already turned away from defeating the sworn enemies of our nation, He trades the Olive (drab) branch for a high concept Green.
Thus for the Big Green Machine. We will smite our enemies with regiments and brigades of teeny tiny little golf carts, which by rolling to a stop on the battlefields, may actually delay the forward advance of their licensed manufacture M1A1 tanks by a few milliseconds. Then the lithium from their millions-of-dollar batteries being powdered and spewed across the field of battle, will make our adversaries pretty darned relaxed.
We will then be able to negotiate a splendid peace accord.
No, the Accord is a rival manufacturer…
Derp-a-derp. Break up the country.
Catherine Austin Fitts The Looting Of America
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=oUlQ7vElqqo
Financial terrorism and the war on the middle class.
Former Assistant Secretary of Housing under George H.W. Bush Catherine Austin Fitts blows the whistle on how the financial terrorists have deliberately imploded the US economy and transferred gargantuan amounts of wealth offshore as a means of sacrificing the American middle class. Fitts documents how trillions of dollars went missing from government coffers in the 90′s and how she was personally targeted for exposing the fraud.
Fitts explains how every dollar of debt issued to service every war, building project, and government program since the American Revolution up to around 2 years ago — around $12 trillion — has been doubled again in just the last 18 months alone with the bank bailouts. “We’re literally witnessing the leveraged buyout of a country and that’s why I call it a financial coup d’état, and that’s what the bailout is for,” states Fitts.
Massive amounts of financial capital have been sucked out the United States and moved abroad, explains Fitts, ensuring that corporations have become more powerful than governments, changing the very structure of governance on the planet and ensuring we are ruled by private corporations. Pension and social security funds have also been stolen and moved offshore, leading to the end of fiscal responsibility and sovereignty as we know it.
Fitts explained how when she was in government she tried to encourage the creation of small businesses, new jobs and new skills to compete in a globalized world otherwise the American middle class was toast, only to be forced out by the feds using dirty tricks. The elite instead wanted Americans to take on more credit card, mortgage and auto debt that corporations and insurers knew they couldn’t afford, while quietly moving their jobs abroad in the meantime.
Catherine Austin Fitts: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Austin_Fitts
What Catherine Austin Fitts does is show how what Richard calls the “design margin” — was stripped away–and how it can be restored.
80% of Chicago students are below grade norms in reading and math. American grade norms are below those of many competing countries. That means that more than 80% of Chicago high school graduates will be easy meat for foreign competitors.
Now add in the inability of many young educated Americans to cope with life, extend that to the national scale and you have the real damage done to Americans’ prospects by a dysfunctional public education system. To say it again; they’re turning Americans into easy meat for foreign competitors. What or who is driving this urge to lose? Are American teachers crazy or just dumb? I don’t understand it.
Chicago teachers should take a leaf out of the Arkansas teachers union book. When Hillary Clinton reformed Arkansas public education, she actually received high praise for a very tough reform package. The linchpin of her plan was mandatory teacher competency testing. After the reforms became law, the teachers started testing. The failure rate was enormous. In the delta (majority black), it was 70 percent. Hundreds of teachers faced losing their jobs. So the union went to Hillary and told her if she didn’t “fix” it, teachers would organize against her husband’s next election. Since Bill was on the brink of going large, Hill couldn’t have that, so she reformed the reforms by taking all the teeth out of them so it became virtually impossible for teachers to get canned for incompetency as long as they kept trying to pass the test. They, of course, were allowed to continue teaching while they tried…and tried…and tried…
Years later, Hillary’s supporters in the State house admitted the reforms had amounted to nothing and hadn’t improved the schools one iota. But, what the heck, Bill became president and Hillary’s star ascended along with his. What’s a decent education for Arkansas’s kids stacked up against that?
I’m in California, Los Angeles, so just how am I gonna throw stones at Chicago?
I’ll just wave my hands a bit, that a lot of this has been coming for a long time and hooray, now it’s here.
Every problem is an opportunity, and in that mode this is a time of the greatest opportunity in eighty years. I wonder just how much more opportunity we can stand.
–
c @ 27: I’m watching/listening to the video, but so far I can’t find a point to it. Eh, six minutes in, I give up.
The Bible — that two-thousand year old book of delusions — observes that “the love of money is the root of all evil.”
No it doesn’t. Look it up.
OT, or maybe not
A massive longitudinal study (http://healthland.time.com/2012/08/28/does-weekly-marijuana-use-by-teens-really-cause-a-drop-in-iq/) of marijuana use during teenage years has indicated that if a person begins smoking marijuana before age 18 and continues to smoke it frequently for 20 years, he will experience an average IQ loss of 8 points. Obama’s problematic personality (narcissism) is not the only non-political factor that should disqualify him from being President. Given his history of substance abuse (Choom Gang, nicotine addiction) and frequent verbal missteps, the cited research suggests that he may simply not be bright enough to entrust with national office. He reduced his qualifications every time he toked up. Very few Americans, if staffing their own business, would choose to hire a pothead over a straight-arrow. Spread the meme.
The sequestration of funds scheduled for January 1 will not harm defense provided we reform procurement. Require the contractors to eat the cost of fixing/replacing defective/incomplete equipment, and don’t pay them anything until they deliver something that meets contract specs.
SB #15:
“But those other factors require a level of remaking of society that is not going to happen unless and until the Nomenklatura is overturned. It may not be perfect, but reducing the number of incompetents and deliberately malevolent drones is a step and a start.”
Not only a start, but potentially a finish.
The social contract between the public and private sectors as conceived by the Founders ran something like this:
1. A good contract is one where each side gives, each side gets, and risks and benefits are shared.
2. The public employees would give up on the financial end and accept for a salary a VASTLY less amount than the average person in the private sector plus a MODEST pension, in exchange for which they would have bulletproof income stream security in good times and in bad
3. The private sector taxpayers would give up the ability to fire someone on a whim (as long as they performed at some minimal level), but in exchange would receive a person willing to do a functionary job for life at a reduced rate, therby lowering the tax burden.
The public sector violated this contract. For instance, over the past eighty or so years, they have arrogated to themselves pay which is as much as the private sector if not more. The justifications for this have been specious at best. Consider, for instance, the claim by teachers that since most of them have a “masters” degree, it isn’t fair to compare their pay to that of the average citizen who does not. What BS. First of all, the truth of the matter is that, while some small number education majors are very bright and highly skilled, a chimp can get an education degree, even a masters. Most teachers are from the very bottom rung of college graduates.
Secondly, teachers do not only serve that segment of the population with masters or doctorate degrees, they serve ALL citizens.
Lastly, teachers generally do not negotioate in good faith. They desire contracts where the teacher has all benefits and no risks, and no exit strategy for the other party (meaning us). No good cotract works that way.
Yes, with ridiculous contortions of reality, teachers (and other public employees) have broken the contract. They now have all the benefits from the original contract (guaranteed pay and pension) and none of the risks or downsides. They give nothing to get everything. The private sector taxpayer must pay the higher salary and gets no concessions at all from the public employees in terms of their behavior.
Add to all of this the arrogance and imperious attitude that the public sector now projects – that they are our rulers instead of our servants – and one can understand the private sector’s fury at the clerisy.
There are only two ways forward. One is to drastically cut the benefits, pay, and pensions of public sector employees and return to the original social contract. The other is to leave the pay and pensions intact but make it very easy and quick to terminate public workers for cause (hence metrics). The public employees will do whatever things they can to avoid dealing with this reality but in the end it will be one or the other.
To 32:M@rk – First Epistle to Timothy in the New Testament (1 Timothy 6:10) starts “For the love of money is the root of all evil” (in the King James translation).
Charles@27/28: Catherine Austin Fitts blows the whistle on how the financial terrorists have deliberately imploded the US economy and transferred gargantuan amounts of wealth offshore as a means of sacrificing the American middle class.
Yep.
Fitts explained how when she was in government she tried to encourage the creation of small businesses…
Nope. I don’t see how so-called “small business” can fit in the modern corporate environment. Just the surface argument – they can’t compete due to economies of scale. And how many “niche” product/services are required to sustain a large Middle Class. I just don’t see the logistics and I don’t see a future for small business. Sounds good on paper but the dog don’t bark.
Which leads to the follow-up point that corporations should be “encouraged” to re/train labor. The “why” of encouragement being another subject. Modern capitalism could use some modernization.
The teachers strike is a joke. It will be over when the Union bosses get their payoff in the form of high salaries/benefits/cash for their choosen few and when the Democrat bosses get assurances that they will lock down the teachers vote as well as get political contributions and Union PAC ads against anyone that dares oppose the Democrat political machine in Chicago.
The teachers will get their 4% per year raise, lax standards for job performance while teaching students who don’t want to be there continue to not meet “government” testing results guidelines. Yawn…welcome to the USA in 2012.
I lived in Chicago for 40+ years until recently.
The Chicago Teachers Strike is not a conspiracy; “President can fix everything at the last moment”. Obama won’t get involved because he doesn’t have to. It’s not a Federal Issue. Whether the teacher union votes effect the election may be immaterial. The citizens/parents in Chicago might just be angry enough to vote Republican or not vote at all. “The Times They Are A Changin”
No Mo #35:
I believe that the original idea behind the retirement benefits package and limitations on dismissal for public sector employees was to make sure that they did not have to sell themselves to special interests in the private sector in the course of their jobs. They could protect the interests of the taxpayers and then not fear being left out in the cold. They were recognized as being, of necessity, a group that were to be protected against the temptations of politics and the dangers of capitalism.
But what occurred is that some public sector employees became their very own special interest group.
I think that the teachers appear to be the worst of the lot because they got started so early. In the 60′s the Left targeted the schools very heavily to further their agenda. One reason was it was a useful side effect of the Civil Rights Movement, which focused on the schools. Another is that it was a ready source of people who had not too much in the way of other prospects, given that degrees in Education are so easy to obtain.
Sukie #30: Interesting! And a few years ago the Florida chapter of the NAACP called for a boycott of the state for vacations because the statewide testing of student produced low scores for most black students. They wanted the tests to be made easier. To my knowldege the boycott was ignored.
Sleeping #33:
An alternative explanation is that people who smoke pot are stupider to begin with. But also note that in the case of the study you cite, the chief researcher is of the opinion that marijuana use makes EVERYONE who uses it stupider, regardless of age, even if he does not have the data to clearly support that conclusion at this time.
#27 DRS:
Are you saying that going forward there will be no small businesses? That there will only be big corporations and big government?
Walter Russell Meade’s essays on the demise of the blue state model (domination of big companies and big government) apply here. That paradigm is done and something different will be necessary going forward.
Before you write off small business, you need to look at the statistics for total jobs and job creation. Without small business there is no real recovery. Never has been, either.
Unfortunately for all the parties, student success is one of those complex, multiply-determined outcomes that defy quick and easy proposals such as teacher evaluations, particularly evaluations dependent on variables such as motivation, ability and family values that lie outside the teacher’s control.
Teachers can certainly be evaluated. For example, it is possible to develop tests that identify good teaching practice: evaluation of current student skill sets; development of appropriate remedial or advanced teaching techniques where warranted; application of curriculum-appropriate lesson plans; rapid and balanced marking of student work; classroom discipline that does not rely on good students or ignore those having problems; timely consultation with parents and so forth.
However, tests of teacher competence while necessary are not sufficient to produce student learning. That requires something like a contract. For example: we guarantee that your child will learn the following material if you, the parent, guarantee that your child will do whatever work the teacher determines is appropriate for your child. In the event that your child does not learn to criterion despite carrying out all the work required, the school will assign a teacher to work with your child during the summer and evenings to remedy the deficiencies.
Models like this are the reason that charter schools succeed – all the parties are working towards the same goal with each party responsible for discrete aspects of the model.
The strike is a political posturing for Obama to save the day. They strike and Obama comes in and has a beer summit and everyone gets what they want.
ILA ( intl Longshoreman ) on Oct. 1 are getting ready to strike, therefore stopping all import and export out of the east coast to the gulf coast.
NO IMPORT OR EXPORT 2 MONTHS BEFORE THE HOLIDAYS.
With executive order Obama can save the day and solve the ILA problem.
New political tactics by this administration , his union buddies, and the media.
This is my initial look at your site, which was referred to me by a friend. I like it & would like to receive the Daily Digest on a regular basis.
Spurgeon Terry
Both sides are stuck on stupid. Rahm should have given themn a take it or leave choice of the big pay raise out of a fixed budget and layoffs to keep the budget intact. The Union should have told the Mayor cave or we go for Romney. Neither side was smart enough to go those routes. So now it’s a test of wills and we will find out if Rahm is Tom Kane or Ben Zajac.
Rush predicts Obama will sweep in and save the day. This is political theater. Watch for that. This is Chicago and such thoughts are not paranoid.
Try not to be so easily conned.
Obama is brilliant at ONE thing, CONNING people.
Do you really think that Obama’s CHICAGO home base would allow anything that could adversely affect his reelection chances?
His CHICAGO home base run by his CHIEF OF STAFF and his Union thug bedfellows?
The union rank and file are easily manipulated by the bosses and organizers. History has proven that too many times to count.
Remember where we are talking about here, CHICAGO. Obama’s CHICAGO.
Obama wants his Chris Christie moment and his Chicago buddies are going to give it to him.
He sees how significant Christie’s stance with the teachers has been for Christie and he wants that for himself, except the only way Obama can get it is by having his Chicago mob set it up for him.
And he doesn’t care who suffers to get there!
Rarely disagree with Wretchard, BUT…
Who but Rahm Emanuel can take on the Chicago educational unions? Did you think the Boy Scouts of America could?
C’mon now, who fears teachers? Lots of people want to take ‘em on, head on, and pound them into the ground. Unfortunately, Romney and party milquetoasts are not among them.
Here’s a modest proposal from Mike Shedlock:
1/ Immediately fire all 25,000 teachers, disband the union, and kill defined benefit pension plans
2/ Offer teachers their jobs back with a zero percent pay raise with three days to decide
3/ For each day beyond three, the city would reduce its offer to teachers by $2,000 a day
4/ Offer generous relocation expenses to those willing to come to Chicago to teach
5/ Offer substitute teachers full-time jobs.
http://tinyurl.com/d7ld69k
Good heavens, this could raise issues that challenge self-esteem!
Derp-a-derp. Break up the country.
I agree. The designated hitter rule is NOT baseball.
Looking back several posts, the Teacher’s strike is the Magicians cape. We are supposed to watch that so we don’t notice what his other hand is pulling out of his sleeve.
Conservatives should practice a little political judo and point out that if the economy wasn’t suck city, there would be no strike. Bump that 4% per annum to 5% per annum and see if those teachers don’t go back to their lesson plans.
Solidarity is best when somebody else pays for it.
Celer, Silens, Mortalis.
agimarc at 8 has it about right, though I’d be surprised if Comrade Obama intervenes personally. The game in the Clinton Administration was using the Federal Mediation and Concilliation Service as a blind for giving the unions what they wanted even though technically the FMCS has no jurisdiction in public sector labor disputes.
Unfortunately, Republicans have very little experience in dealing with communist tactics and public employee unions. Most places with unionized public employees are deeply and irredeemably Blue. When I was Alaska’s head of labor relations only Swartzenegger’s guy and I were Republican poltically appointed heads of a state’s labor relations function. All the rest were Democrat hacks in the Blue states or powerless technocrats in the purple states. Of the states that countenance full collective bargaining rights for public employees only Alaska has a truly adversarial bargaining relationship and then only at the state level; most of Alaska’s polisubs and school districts are wholly owned subsidiaries of public employee unions.
First, 16% over 4 years is an obscenely high offer in these times and that wage increase is cooked in no matter how this turns out. Since few of his constituents are going to see any raise in the next four years, Rahmbo has to be careful how he plays this and needs to look tough and make it look like he was dragged kicking and screaming into giving the teachers that money or make it look like he got something really valuable for the money, maybe some combination of the two. He can help his old pal Comrade Obama by suggesting or having Obama suggest that the FMCS be brought in to apply their special (nonexistent) expertise to bring the parties together. If it goes that way, the great wisdom of the federal government will be brought to bear to make it look like the teachers gave in on some of the accountability and management rights issues in exchange for which they got the 16% wage package.
If Rahmbo really wants to look tough but reasonable and trying really hard to reach a settlement he’ll use the FMCS but mediation will fail to produce a settlement and Rahmbo will implement the terms of his offer, the 16% and the pro-management changes. He’ll tell the World how he stuck to his guns and got the changes necessary to better educate the kiddies and gave the citizenry its babysitters back. As I said above, since he’s already offered the 16% solution, it is cooked in because if he tried to go back, he’d get an unfair labor practice complaint for failing to bargain in good faith. Actually you can go back and you can defeat the ULP charge, but it takes too long and would indicate that the parties were actually bargaining. Rest assured, they’re not bargaining in the adversarial sense that true collective bargaining contemplates, they’re just acting out an elaborate charade to make it look like Rahmbo is looking out for the taxpayers while he’s actually giving the union what it wants.
The whole evaluation and management rights thing is just a Potemkin Proposal. It really doesn’t matter what goes in the labor agreement if nobody is going to live by it anyway. In a Democrat government, you could have a labor agreement that says that management can run the government in its sole discretion and that government will still be a wholly owned subsidiary of the unions.
I haven’t read any reports in which the writer understood unionized labor well enough to really describe what the issue is regarding recall of former employees. I’ve heard the subject former employees described both as fired and laid off. Lay people often use the terms interchangeably but they have very different meanings. A teacher without tenure, usually one with less that two or three years’ service can be denied tenure for lack of work or for failure to perform adequately. I don’t think any manager would have much problem with giving recall rights to a person denied tenure for lack of work. The problem is that commonly “lack of work” is a pretext for being denied for poor performance, so the hiring manager wouldn’t know if he was getting a decent teacher that was denied tenure simply because there was no need for his/her services or was denied tenure because the previous manager wanted to get rid of him.
Once a teacher achieves tenure, they can only be dismissed for cause or laid off for lack of work or funds. Again, there is the issue of the pretextual layoff of an employee who really should have been fired. In the case of a legitimate layoff for lack of work or funds, commonly the laid off employee retains some sort of usually seniority based recall rights for some period of years. In the case of the employee who was dismissed for cause, an exceedingly rare event for teachers, all relationship with the employer is severed upon dismissal and it would be an extraordinary thing to give recal rights or even any hiring preference to an employee dismissed for cause. In my experience, even Democrat managers would resist such a notion and I’m surprised a union, even in Chicago, would make such a proposal. All that said, I don’t know what the precise issue on recall is, but this will give you an idea of what sort of issues can be involved.
We tried the scheme they’re at impasse on in which employee performance was factored into order of layoff when you had to lay employees off for lack of work or lack of funds. It really doesn’t work because it is pretty much impossible to get honest evaluations in a unionized workforce and trying to factor in performance ratings in order of layoff causes it to rain grievances and lawsuits. Either it isn’t a real proposal, or the person making it is horribly naive. We had an excuse, it was a new and neat idea thirty years ago and hadn’t had its chance to fail yet.
Fundamentally, any teacher strike that begins after school has started is a charade carefully worked out between the union and the employer. You start school so people give up their babysitters and change their routine. Then just as the rubes settle into the back to school routine, the teachers strike and take away the babysitters and disrupt the routine. The Democrat managers respond to the anguished outcries of the people who’ve lost their babysitters and pay any price and bear any burden to get the teachers back to babysitting. Oh, and all it is for the teachers is just some more vacay because the law usually requires that little Johnny get 180 (or some similar number) days of school and a teacher’s salary is based on that number of days. So, while they might miss a paycheck or two while out on strike their yearly earnings will be unchanged because they still get paid for teaching 180 days.
I am eagerly awaiting the horse head being delivered to Emanuel’s bedroom courtesy of the White House, C.O.D.. I am concerned that the Anointed One might run out of buses to throw poeple under. In addition to his other great5 successes, Barry has managed to highlight the tawdry government that is Chicago.
@48 – Yeah, genius, it’s all easy if you are just a real tough guy, a “true conservative,” and don’t know a damned thing about what you’re talking about.
Peter, of course, has it right.
A culture that considers it desirable to prevent or eliminate it’s children can’t possibly, under any circumstances, be expected to do a good job of caring for those that make it past those preliminary obstacles to natural development.
On the other hand, a society that values its children above all else will, in a general sense, nurture them to fruition, whatever their potential may be. Guaranteed.
I want to interject a note about a new educational “reform” that is being proposed, and is even taking root: Common Core-based learning. Some of you may have heard of it. The vast majority of the states have already signed onto the concept.
What is this “Common Core?” The intent is to make the students better at learning and retention of what they learned. At the heart of the concept is something called “deep reading,” where a student is required to read on a subject matter extensively, and is required to comprehend what he/she has read and then prove that he/she has succeeded.
Sound familiar? It is a repackaging of how us early boomers and our predecessors were taught! No condescension to younger folks here intended, but us ‘boomers were the last batch of Americans to be taught fairly well in K-12 en masse, and even then we were slipping from previous even higher standards.
Sounds promising and hopeful, doesn’t it? Well . . . there’s a problem: far too few American students can read and write and comprehend at the grade level they are in, supposedly by as much as two or three grade levels — even in “good” school systems. Large chunks of teachers are in a panic, because they know this. It’s possible to start this in the lowest grades, and grandfather out 6-12 for now, but I’m afraid that Common Core is going to hit a wall and be discarded. I hope I’m proven wrong, but I’m not optimistic.
“dep reading,” should be “deep reading.” Sigh. Editing is turned off. Editing is back on, but “request deletion” not responding. Oh well . . .
This issue touches many of the reasons why America is in trouble.
1. The very thought of a public employees union is not justifiable under our Constitution as I see it. Given that abominable situation, one should not be surprised that this illegal teacher’s union extorts excessive pay and benefits, dictates work rules and suppresses academic achievement .
2. To my way of thinking, the education establishment has no right to cram the Leftist view of life down our children’s throats. Our viewpoint should be as equally protected as any politically correct point of view. But this leftist point of view also includes a disdain for all things masculine. As a result our male students have often been psychologically damaged and their thirst for knowledge derailed by the constant refrain to think and act like a girl. The future of America has been gravely threatened by this travesty.
3. Maineman is correct to point out that part of the problem starts with the unbelievably high number of students that come from single parent or dysfunctional households, a problem that has been fueled by government policies, btw. As a parent that was involved with his local schools, I know that one of biggest problems facing a parent is to protect their child from the danger these kids from dysfunctional household pose. This is a very serious problem that few want to openly talk about, but I believe it is reason number one why parents send their kids to private schools. Our public schools in many cases are simply not safe for our children.
4, But perhaps the biggest problem is that those who should speak out won’t. These problems exist often because our leaders refuse to tell the whole truth about our problems and refuse to protect our rights. One cannot begin to truly solve a problem unless one properly defines it truthfully. As with our Presidential election, our so-called “conservative’ representatives, the Republicans, simply refuse to discuss any issue that they feel might upset the muddled headed moderates. There is simply no concerted effort by Republicans to seriously address any of the issues that affect schools, or many of our other problems. That is no way to solve our problems and return America to greatness.
Hold your elected officials accountable. FreedomWorks tracks the votes of Members of Congress on key issues of economic freedom to make it easier for you to know how your representative is voting.
If you or anybody you know is involved at the grass roots you will need to share this tool with them. This is way to compare words with their actions!
http://congress.freedomworks.org/
On Nov. 6 we will find out who our fellow Americans are.
The distressing thing is, our currect President and his minions do not like the American people in general, and are certainly not big on the “idea of America.” But now, should Obama win a second term, we BC’ers will find reason to not like our fellow Americans “in general.” The disheartening part would be that many of these people are dear freinds who are not stupid, nor do they lead stupid lives.
When the colonists rebelled against Crown and Parliament, almost all colonists who were not slaves shared the common values of self-reliance, industry, and thrift, and also held that they were free men protected by English Law. That view was held not only by the rebels, but also by Loyalists (Tories) and fence-sitters. The rebels, a plurality by the way — according to more recent reavaluations — were simply more aggrieved than the others.
We don’t have enough Americans today who would be an equivalent of our colonial forebears; it would be as if the gin alleys of 18th-century England had been dumped on the colonists to skew the sentiment in favor of despotism and the Crown. That there are Tea Parties and a resurgence of libertarianism gives us hope, but it remains to be seen how those sentiments will bear up against the tide of government intrusion and dependence.
Whatever the case, I am voting Romney/Ryan on Nov. 6. Steady as she goes. One step at a time.
@41: No I’m not saying that. My larger point was digging a little deeper into the details of the logistical interface among business enterprises of widely disparate size, as measured by any number of metrics – revenue, employees, capitalization, etc. There are some issues to be teased out re locality vs globalization, supply chain competitiveness and so on. (WRM’s demise theories may be a tad premature.)
As an example: Nice Chart
That tall blue line on the left? That’s showing you that most businesses in America are tiny. One to four workers. The red and green lines on the right? Those are showing you that most workers are employed at businesses that are huge. Nothing about this should be surprising: Of course there are more small firms than big ones, and of course the big firms employ more people than the small ones.
Bernstein calls this “the most commonly misunderstood fact about the job market,” and he may be right. You often hear that small businesses are the only businesses that really add news jobs. Careful economic research has shown this isn’t true. Young businesses are really the only businesses that add news jobs. It’s their age, not their size, that matters.
But the fact that most businesses are small businesses means, in practice, that small businesses are extraordinarily politically powerful, as there are lots of them and they are everywhere. Every single congressional district in the country hosts the headquarters of dozens or hundreds or thousands of small firms. The same can’t be said for large firms, which are often quite concentrated in particular areas.
52. Art Chance. Well, there you are again, just couldn’t sit on it could you? After a lifetime as a bureaucrat, now all of a sudden retired and without the ‘respect’ of a padded life at the trough, your friends dwindling by the day, we’re now all to assume that your ability to sneer ‘yeah, genius’ makes you, somehow, special and different from the rest of us? I recall you like to brag how you once appeared at state administrative hearings sometimes, maybe that’s why. Wow.
Sorry, Art, but you sound like just another sad little man with much to be sad about, yet another 60-something-yr-old time has passed by, now losing it bit by bit.
Try reading that post again. Unlike you, I don’t claim to be as smart as Shedlock (I’m not), nor do I know Chicago well enough to know what the best solution is. I’m absolutely sure, though, that you don’t have a clue either.
Is this where you bluster about those MMA tapes you watch late at night?
Conservative vs Progressive ideology?
Or the more simple case of Rich vs Poor?
If you want to help small businesses, cutting taxes for rich individuals — some of whom file as small businesses — is an awful way to do it. The average business income on a 1040 is $40,000. Extending the tax cuts for filers making more than $250,000 isn’t going to do much for small businesses. But you know what would do a lot for small businesses? The small-business bill, which spends tens of billions of dollars opening lines of credit to small businesses that want to expand. And you know why we don’t have a small-business bill? Because Republicans are filibustering it.
The writer being obviously suspicious of the trickle effect.
Today’s Government can’t be run by under educated, under trained and under paid “Patriots”! I do agree Unions have no place in “Government” controlled environments and they should all be dissolved (Government Unions).
As far as Holder is concerned, America has made no racial progress in 50 years. For him (who was never on the frontlines of anything more threatening than a Starbucks coffee line), it’s still 1960s and America is Selma, Al. writ large. Combine that with his official DoJ policy that minorities cannot discriminate or commit hate crimes, and you have a potently destructive mindset at Justice. Even if Romney wins in Nov., Holder’s racist warriors will borrow into DoJ and prosecute their agenda to their maximum ability.
Why does any teacher need and Ed.D.? The only plausible reason for having such a worthless degree is to justify higher pay.
@60 – OK, genius, let’s take that genius’ proposal apart:
1/ Immediately fire all 25,000 teachers, disband the union, and kill defined benefit pension plans
2/ Offer teachers their jobs back with a zero percent pay raise with three days to decide
3/ For each day beyond three, the city would reduce its offer to teachers by $2,000 a day
4/ Offer generous relocation expenses to those willing to come to Chicago to teach
5/ Offer substitute teachers full-time jobs.
1- The teachers have a legal right to strike under IL law, Chicago ordinance, or both. It is illegal to fire them for participating in a legal strike. If you want to change that, you have to change the enabling statutes/ordinances. To “disband the union” you’re going to have some issues with the freedom of association provision of the US Constitution’s 1st Am. and it probably has an analog in the IL Constitution. If you want to eliminate the duty of a public employer to bargain with a union, you have to repeal the state statute, local ordinance, or both that compel such recognition of a bargaining representative. And finally, if you want to “kill” defined benefit pensions you’re probably going to have to amend the IL Constitution, the Chicago city charter, or both to touch the defined benefit plan for anyone already participating in it. To eliminate defined benefit for new and future employees you have to get a majority of the IL Legislature, the Chicago legislative body whatever they call it, or both. I’m not saying any of those things couldn’t or shouldn’t be done, but the doing of any or all of them won’t be done in time to resolve this labor dispute and some of them won’t be done in my or your lifetime in a state like IL absent some very dramatic externality.
2- Absent a change in the bargaining law, it is probably an unfair labor practice to make a take it or leave it offer. In any event, under current law, all the union has to do is say, NO; they don’t even have to say No, thank you, and there’s nothing you can do about it. You can sit on your offer to impasse, but all it does is get you back to strike, lockout, or implement terms.
3- It’s probably a per se unfair labor practice and you couldn’t persist in such an offer to impasse. If you do, the union can still strike as an unfair labor practice strike which in most states would give the the immediate right to collect unemployment for the strikers, something that is normally prohibited. Provoking an unfair labor practice strike is one of the dumber things an employer can do.
4- If you start hiring replacements for the striking workers you can pay relocation expenses for the replacements, but you’d best budget for relocation expenses for sending them back to where you got them because you still have to bargain their status with the incumbent union unless and until you can legally decertify them. And if you do #3 and get an unfair labor practice strike you cannot legally hire permanent replacements, so you’d best budget for relocation costs for all your replacements.
5 – See #4, the substitutes hired fulltime would just be replacement workers.
There might be a few differences between the rights and duties I describe here, mostly based on federal law, and the rights and duties under IL or Chicago law, but the burdens will be roughly what I’ve described. This situation has evolved over the last 100 or so years; there are no silver bullet, one dramatic shot permanent solutions. If Rahmbo played real hardball and ran this dispute out to replacement workers and decertification of the AFT-affiliated CTU, the NEA would be knocking at the door the next day with 30% cards in its hand and you’d be right back in bargaining. If you repeal the bargaining law, the bargaining law will be the dominate issue in every election and every legislature for the forseeable future. If you eliminate defined benefits retirement, it will be an issue in every election and every legislature for the forseeable future. We eliminated defined benefits for future employees in ’05; it’s been a litmus test for union endorsements ever since and a bill has been introduced in every legislative session. I’m not so much of the has-been you’d like to cast me as that my Party doen’t look to me, so I did the candidate school this year on how to deal with our state’s unions. I basically told them to simply avoid it; you couldn’t be a Republican and give answers the unions would accept so they’d always endorse any opponent that would give them the answers they wanted, but I also cautioned them that while there was really nothing they could do to get a unions support, there were things they could say and do that would turn their election into and existential battle between them and the unions and maybe even turn their election into a National election so they should choose carefully.
Those sweeping threats, especially the bravado in #1 provoke an existential battle. You haven’t a prayer in Hell of doing any of those things unless you ran and were elected on a platform of doing so; that is the only reason Walker made the rather modest changes in the bargaining law that he made and, first, got it passed, and, second, survived. He was just doing what he ran on promising to do, and he would NEVER hav survived that recall if it hadn’t been Nationalized.
There are solutions but none of them are either quick, simple, or permanent and anyone who says they have solutions to the issues inherent in public employee bargaining that are quick, simple, or permanent simply doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Oh, and I promise Shedlock I won’t try to get into financial consulting if he’ll stay out of public sector labor relations.
At the heart of all the noise, it cannot be ignored that during the ‘golden age’ in the US, teachers got better results with much less money and ZERO computers. I am thinking of the education received by the guys and gals that made our Moon lading possible. Every year educational costs go up and the test scores go down. (note I said educational costs, not teacher’s pay) Education needs to be reformed drastically. The consumers, the parents, deserve the options found through free market competition. Which means outlawing public employee unions.
We also have to accept the reality that not everyone is capabe or will benefit from college. Our dad’s were correct, the world needs ditch diggers too. There should be tests to qualify for college based on a demonstration of competency, not just numbers that can be ‘gamed.’ No ethnic set-asides. You want to compete? Then compete. This of course means we have to acknowledge that not all kids or people are equally capable. We all know it to be true but for some reason we can’t say it openly. Losers are losers and no set asides will change that, it only takes an opportunity away from someone else who will put it to good use. Funny how Darwinian concepts are only useful when trying to lessen religious influence.
27 – “Fitts explained how when she was in government she tried to encourage the creation of small businesses, new jobs and new skills to compete in a globalized world otherwise the American middle class was toast, only to be forced out by the feds using dirty tricks.”
In other words, her attempt to increase the pervasiveness and power of government was defeated by somebody else.
Seperate school and state.
Home school your children.
#66
I am thinking of the education received by the guys and gals that made our Moon lading possible.
And those people were pre-boomers, even “Great Generation” age (among the space program leadership). The bulk of the Apollo program and other space workers had graduated from high school well before the 1958 post-Sputnik National Science Education Act.
We also have to accept the reality that not everyone is capabe or will benefit from college. Our dad’s were correct, the world needs ditch diggers too.
One of the great tragedies regarding the sabotaging of the American energy sector is that millions of Americans of modest education could make very nice livings in the energy sector, in the manner of auto assembly and steel mill workers of days past. That the largest total hydrocarbon resources in the world are largely untouched due to the ideology-driven mischief of Obama is criminal.
“The unions say they’re close to agreement on pay, though they still think higher raises are necessary to make up for rising health costs”.
I’m sure I’ve read that unions are exempted from obammcare so what rising health costs? I’m thinking the unions just want a pay increase because it increases their take.
Let the teachers & unions take a hike, there are thousands of unemployed teachers looking for work and probably willing to settle for whatever’s already on the table.
65 – “There are solutions but none of them are either quick, simple, or permanent and anyone who says they have solutions to the issues inherent in public employee bargaining that are quick, simple, or permanent simply doesn’t know what they’re talking about”
All you’ve managed to say is that the problem cannot be eliminated because it is not legal to do so. Instead, you propose that we keep all the problems and finesse the nooks and crannies.
The fact is that public employee bargaining is the problem and as long as anyone bargains with public employees, the problem remains. There is no solution possible when public employees bargain with other public employees.
I would propose that teaching ought to be opened to anyone, regardless of ‘officially certified’ educational levels, subject only to competency tests. Second, there should be no tenure for K-12 educators; tenure is a solution looking for a problem. Third there should be no public employee unions, period. Fourth, teacher salaries should be set by the school district voters, not bureaucrats, not elected officials, not school boards.
Finally, every national law currently on the books should be issued a termination date two years hence. Including regulatory decrees, no reprieves, no exceptions. Any law that we cannot live without will have to be legislated anew with the requirement that it has an automatic termination in two years.
That will, hopefully, keep our legislators and bureaucrats permanently occupied.
“The teachers have a legal right to strike under IL law, Chicago ordinance, or both. It is illegal to fire them for participating in a legal strike.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taft%E2%80%93Hartley_Act
pinched
“The amendments codified the Supreme Court’s earlier ruling that employers have a constitutional right to express their opposition to unions, so long as they did not threaten employees with reprisals for their union activities nor offer any incentives to employees as an alternative to unionizing. The amendments also gave employers the right to file a petition asking the Board to determine if a union represents a majority of its employees, and allow employees to petition either to decertify their union, or to invalidate the union security provisions of any existing collective bargaining agreement.”
Read the Wikipedia entry. While no fan of wikipedia, on non-political issues they are OK. Rhambo can shut down the strike by getting an injunction from one of the judges in his pocket. I don’t think he can directly fire anybody but enough “accidents” and those asked to resign will. One can always find another job. Unless, of course, one is the guest of honor at Joey’s Funeral Parlor.
They take their politics seriously in Chicago. When they say enrollment drive, think Valentines Day. Hanging chads are the parts left AFTER the Thompson is done.
44. Spurgeon Terry
Welcome. Wipe your feet, don’t turn the barstool upside down, watch out for Subotai Bahadur, Josh, RWE ( any of the 3 initial gang), and never never argue with the boss.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxztDpiWXo4&feature=related
OH yeah, Walt rules the web.
I would rather shower at Penn State then vote Democratic.
Markedly OT:
Two things that happen when you bow to the King of Arabia:
1) Instant pussyhood
2) Muslims storm the Cairo embassy and burn the torn-up American flag
All in all, another foreign policy triumph for our CinC.
@stoicheion – Neither Chicago teachers nor any other public employees bargain under the federal Labor-Management Relations Act of which the Taft-Hartley Amendments you cite are a part. They bargain under state laws and local ordinances enacted by Democrat-controlled state legislatures or local legislative bodies acting in concert with the unions all of which hate the Taft-Hartley Amendments, and consequently few state or local bargaining laws have any of the employer and public protections of either the Taft-Hartley or Landrum-Griffin Amendments to the original National Labor Relations Act.
Art Chance:
-” The teachers have a legal right to strike under IL law, Chicago ordinance, or both. It is illegal to fire them for participating in a legal strike. If you want to change that, you have to change the enabling statutes/ordinances. To “disband the union” you’re going to have some issues with the freedom of association provision of the US Constitution’s 1st Am. ”
Under current law, respecting current Supreme Court decisions, yes, they have a legal right to strike. To change that, you do not need to “disband the union”, just make collective bargaining with public employees illegal. A citizen of the United States should not need to be coerced to join a union just to work for the government. The power to coerce a free individual to join a union does not exist anywhere in the Constitution.
In regards to “some of my best friends’ comments. The deplorable situation of our schools was largely caused by the teachers’ unions. Public Employee union power has warped and severely damaged many of our civic institutions, and a change in the current law is absolutely necessary to reassert the control of the people over local and state governments particularly in Blue States and Cities. Current Labor law can be changed. Collective bargaining is not a constitutional right.
Drastic problems often require drastic solutions. So while his solutions may be harsh, they, or something like them, may be the right antidote for what ails our schools.
These Chicago teachers have quite the deal.
Retired teachers average $42,000 in retirement income from the school system, with 20% of those receiving $20,000 or less. Than means the other 80% average at least $47,500 in retirement income. That is the same as the average family income in Chicago, so being retired is just as financially rewarding for them as 12 months of work is for the rest of the city.
With the current contract, (http://www.ctunet.com/grievances/text/2007-2012-CPS-CTU-Collective-Bargaining-Agreement.pdf?1294199486) a starting full-time, 38.6-week teacher with only a bachelor’s degree earns $49k a year. Add a MA and it’s another $3,600 or so, with another $1,600 for each 15 hours of grad work beyond that. With PhD or EdD and no experience, a teacher would start at about $60k. They top out (step 16, which might mean 16 years of tenure) for 38.6 weeks at $83k for BA and $93k for PhD/EdD.
Those PhD/EdDs who work all 52 weeks top out at $112k (while the BA-only would get about $100k, since the increases for the degrees are relatively consistent).
4% increases every year in the last contract, when even Federal employees had their wages frozen.
Teachers have it tough, but not in Chicago. There, they are on a gravy train.
The PJ resident bureaucrat rises to the strong defense of his fellow brothers. Surprise, surprise, surprise.
@MSO -
“All you’ve managed to say is that the problem cannot be eliminated because it is not legal to do so. Instead, you propose that we keep all the problems and finesse the nooks and crannies.”
Except that I didn’t say that and I certainly don’t believe in trying to finesse the nooks and crannies. I’ve been named as the charged party in one Helluva lot of unfair labor practice complaints and it wasn’t for my finesse.
As I said, most of the stuff the original writer proposed is illegal. Like it or not, you’ll have to find 50% + 1 of the appropriate legislative body to make it legal and you’ll have to repeal the freedom of association provisions of the US Constitution to “disband” the union.
The reality is that can probably repeal the bargaining law in most states by getting a Republican governor and Legislature or by passing a citizens’ initiative in those states that allow them. Your odds are better if you cut off their dues before you start and that takes a very agressive AG, not having one is the biggest reason Swartzenegger’s initiatives failed. But once you repeal the bargaining law or reduce the bargaining duty, e.g., WI, the unions won’t just say, “OK, you won” and fold their tent and go away. They never forget and they never forgive. They’ll be back after you and everybody who supported you for as long as the grass grows and the rivers flow. They will NEVER forgive Republicans for passing the Taft-Hartley Amendments in 1948 even though at least in the private sector most of their members vote Republican. Union leaders will endure the oppobrium of their members and even challenges to their union security and certification rather than support a Republican, yet there are still all too many stupid Republicans who think that if they’re just nice to the unions, they’ll like them. They’ll back a Republican only if s/he’s an unassailable incumbent who can do something to them or if a Republican challenger looks unbeatable and they don’t have a viable candidate, but the most you’ll ever get from them is the money on the dresser and they’ll leave for any viable challenger.
Did anyone ever tell you, you look like Chris Mathews?
Sorry, if that hurt.
75. Art Chance Sorry about that but the US Constitution GHives certain powers to the feds and the States and citizens get what’s left over. The USSC decided back in the early 19th century that Labor Law was under the feds. THAT is why Congress has passed many laws regarding Labor Rights. State labor Laws are SUBORDINATE to Federal labor laws. That is why Reagan was able to kill the Traffic Controllers union.
I don’t like the Whiny little bitch but the law IS on Rhambos side. Me not liking him doesn’t change a thing, Neither does you not liking the law.
It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool and all that Stoicheion. When I feel like working, people will pay me a lot of money for labor relations work and I know my way around it pretty well. The National Labor Relations Act (as amended) does not apply to the states or their political subdivisions nor does it apply to businesses not engaged in interstate commerce, some specifically excepted employers, or to those regulated under other federal labor laws, e.g. those subject to the Railway Labor Act. In a PRIVATE SECTOR labor dispute with an employer subject to the Labor-Management Relations Act, federal law prempts state labor law and in instances where a state moves against an employer or employee representative subject to the Act, a party may under Section 301 petition the matter to the federal district court rather than be subject to the state’s courts.
The reason President Reagan was able to fire the striking ATCs was that strikes by federal employees were, and to a large extent remain, illegal.
I don’t know IL public sector bargaining law well enough to know the circumstances under which the employer could enjoin strikers. I suspect that like most laws only an illegal strike or a prohibited practice, e.g., an unfair labor practice, is cause for an injunction. In any event, it is extraordinarily unlikely that any Democrat would seek an injunction against a union unless the employer is in extremis.
I like the Taft-Hartley Amendments, Landrum-Griffin amendments too. Like them so much I drafted the legislation for my state’s Republican controlled Legislatures attempts to rein in our unions under our bargaining law that is pretty much the old NLRA pre-Taft-Hartley. We had a veto-proof majority and couldn’t pass it over union opposition; there are still Republicans who think if they’re nice to them, the unions will like them. The one that was the main holdup got beat in the next election by Democrat whose campaigns the unions financed.
Oh, and you ought to give some thought to your notion that the states get the powers that are left over. The States and the People have all the power and have specifically delegated some powers to the federal government. In this case, the Commerce clause purportedly gives the US the power to regulate labor in businesses engaged in interstate commerce and the 10th Am. reserves all other powers over labor, including the states’ powers over its own workforce and the workforces of their political subdivisions to the states.
How many
angelslaws can dance on the head of a pin?stoicheon 73,
Now you’ve done it. I’m offended you didn’t warn him about me. What am I here, chopped liver?
Art Chance @65: ” if you want to “kill” defined benefit pensions you’re probably going to have to amend the IL Constitution, the Chicago city charter, or both to touch the defined benefit plan for anyone already participating in it”
Is it your contention that an act of a “public employer” (for example, the Chicago Board of Education) in making a so-called “contract” binds future Illinois Legislatures or Chicago City Councils, not yet elected, such that they MUST raise revenues through taxation or otherwise to pay for these “contracts”?
That is obviously absurd. It defeats the very purpose of elections, and overturns the sovereignty of the People of Illinois or Chicago, as the case may be.
These public employee so-called “contracts” are anti-constitutional and not worth the paper they are written on. If voters in the future elect legislators who won’t raise the necessary taxes, to whom would the unions turn, and by what right?
What I find hilarious is that these ‘in the tank’ Dumbocratic Teachers and their Union justify their immoral pay rise in part by claiming ‘Health Care Cost Rises’. Don’t they know their Messiah the USURPER has PROMISED that adding millions and millions MORE people and people with pre existing conditions and allowing children up to the age of 26 to still claim on their parents policies, will bring Heath Care costs DOWN.
Its as if they believe that the USURPER and his Dumbocratic REGIME might have been LYING to them.
@ 85 -
It is becoming painfully difficult to deal with the painfully stupid here. If something is in the state’s constitution, you can’t just fu*k with it because you want to. You must either amend the constitution or have a convention and establish a new constitution. If something is in statute, you have to repeal and replace the statute. See, dumba**, there’s this stuff in constitutions, both state and federal, about prohibiting statutorily impairing rights granted under a contract. The sanctity of contracts is pretty uniquely an Anglo-American thing, but I’d have thought some brilliant “true conservative” would have understood all that. Idiot!
One amendment to #87: if there is an explicit requirement that there must be a specific appropriation to support a labor agreement or an explicit constitutional or statutory requirement that any expenditure must be supported by an appropriation by the legislative branch, a contract cannot be enforced on any terms that require public funds for performance absent such a legislative authorization. Most state and local constitutions and charters emulate the US Constitution in requiring a specific appropriation to support an expenditure. Consequently, if a legislative body refuses to appopriate the money to support a term of a collectively bargained contract, that term is not enforceable. I’ve been through doing that; the war with the unions only took about ten years but we did win though they grouched about it and tried to get it back for a decade and more.
@76. Unsk
Well said, it all sounds about right. The question resolves into a quest for the quickest, most effective solution. Top of the list: bankruptcy. Bankruptcy law is entirely federal; state laws are superseded and/or pre-empted. A bankruptcy judge has enormous power, and could be expected to appoint one of the near-proverbial ‘blue ribbon panels’ to provide analytical cover for a final, decisive attack on vested interests in Illinois. The secret sauce: pick your judge and your panel very, very carefully.
IL, it will be remembered, is either at the very top or second on the list of states that are de facto bankrupt. Per capita, I believe it’s top by a good margin (makes CA look good by comparison). The heart of the problem is Chicago, of course. So the decision becomes whether to bankrupt the entire state or just a couple of counties or, possibly, just the school district. There are templates everywhere. Many will recall the bankruptcy of Orange County in CA.
How to push a state/county into b/ruptcy? A number of ways, even including congress. You’d start with a careful analysis of bond covenants. And, as you say, there’s always the option of ending collective bargaining by public employees.
Top of my list would be how to unravel the pension mess. Defined-benefit, index linked plans for low-wattage state employees are a luxury the country simply can’t afford. It has to stop. Romney lacks either the wits or the will, so the task will fall to others.
Oh, and Art Chance is not and never will be part of the solution. Nothing to see there.
If Romney/Ryan were to voice their actual intent, they would scare away many voters. Since they haven’t been elected yet, they have nothing but promises to offer. Their #1 promise is to overturn 0Care, which will have significant ramifications for labor relations. Remember that the Dems seek to unionize the entire healthcare industry, throuch the Affordable Care Act.
It’s majorities in both the House and Senate that can make real change possible.
@89 -
“Oh, and Art Chance is not and never will be part of the solution. Nothing to see there.”
Well, I certainly won’t be a part of attempted solutions put forth by people like you and others here who haven’t a damned clue what they’re talking about. Your blog hero is proposing patently illegal solutions under current law and constitutions which would require a full-tilt statewide political campaign to capture a Blue state’s legislature and governorship then change the law and in the case of the defined benefit pensions probably amend the state constitution. Yeah, that’s going to happen quickly enough to get Chicago kids back in school this year.
And I’m not going to be a part of any attempted solutions that try to impose the provisions of the federal Labor-Management Relations Act on a state and local government to which it explicitly does not apply.
And I’m not going to be a part of any solution that gets a Democrat government to declare bankruptcy so it can get out from under its labor agreements and if the defined benefit pensions are enshrined in the State constitution, as many of them are, I’m not even sure that bankruptcy will relive the obligations. There is NO WAY a prominent Democrat governor or big city mayor is going to declare bankruptcy to relieve his government of obligations to organized labor so long as there is a Democrat President; he’ll wait for a Republican president, governor, or Congress/Legislature to refuse to bail him out so he can use that refusal politically. We will undoubtedly see that strategem in a Romney Administration by CA, IL, and perhaps other bankrupt Blue states. You might recall that GM held out to declare bankruptcy until there was a Democrat federal government that would bail them out and use bankruptcy to both pay off the UAW and scalp those with equity in GM rather than go through an honest bankruptcy under GWB. Bankruptcy may well be the tool if there is a Republican federal government, but it will be used as the instrument of a class warfare campaign to restore Democrat government in the ’14 elections and every election thereafter. 75 years from now Democrats will be railing about how the heartless Republicans destroyed the working class by letting Blue states go bankrupt back in ’13 the same way organized labor howls about the evil Republicans who passed Taft-Hartley over Truman’s veto in ’48.
There are solutions to the issues brought about by public employee bargaining and the political activities of public employee unions and associations. Unfortunately for the “true conservatives,” those solutions aren’t nearly as dramatic as taking an action certain to be overturned by the courts giving the unions a good opportunity to crow and tell the world how they defeated the evil Republicans, or proposing legislation to a hostile legislature or Congress that is certain to fail again giving the unions/left the opportunity to crow about defeating the evil Republicans, and it surely isn’t as much fun as those good Republican circular firing squads where all the “true conservatives” open fire on Republicans that they can characterize as RINOs or “milquetoast” because they’re unwilling to do the stupid futile things that the “true conservatives” say they should have done. I’ve been sent charging into the mindfields enough times by “true conservative” elected and appointed officials who when the explosions started forgot they sent me and started looking for a reporter to tell how much they disapproved of all the noise being made. Along the way I learned how to avoid minefields and get things done without making noise unless I wanted noise.
It isn’t the role of the President to “unravel” the pension “mess” or to deal with public employee bargaining in the states. It will be enough for a President Romney to refuse to go along with bailouts of bankrupt Blue states and, should the Democrats regain control of Congress, veto any stupid legislation extending bargaining rights to public employees, e.g., mandatory police and fire or teacher bargaining in the states, under federal law or enhancing bargaining rights under existing federal labor law, e.g., card check. What President Romney has to avoid is committing political suicide or being forced into politically suicidal positions by the “true conservatives” that don’t understand that everything is easy when you don’t know enough.
A new Romney Administration is going to take office with a huge, smelly turd in its pocket. Incurring debt that was “investing in our future” under Comrade Obama will be “unpatriotic” again under President Romney. The bankrupt Blue states will immediately begin agitating for a bailout. Missing children will be on milk cartons and homeless shelters will be overflowing the second President Romney takes his hand off The Bible. The Democrat mayors and governors will immediately begin demanding more federal money that a Congress with at least one body controlled by Republicans and a Republican President won’t give them. All it will take is those EBT cards not recharging on the scheduled day and in the promised amount and there will be fighting in the streets in the Blue cities; a mayor or governor can make that happen any time he wants and they’ll do it so they can blame the carnage on the Republicans. Like the sight of teachers picketting in Chicago? Wait til they’re picketting in every city in the Country over attempts to eliminate the Department of Education and federal funding of education in the states. Wait til they’re striking in every place they think they can get away with it in protest of “Republican” cuts to education funding.
I don’t know why Romney wants to be President. He has to cut the budget and restructure the US government or the economy will collapse perhaps irreparably. If he does it slowly and methodically so as to avoid civil unrest and economic and political disruption to the extent possible, he’ll be excoriated by the self-styled true conservatives and of course by the Paultards and the Left as well. He’ll also lose most of his support in the middle because the thing the middle hates most is conflict and dissention. If he does it quickly and dramatically, the Left and the moochers and looters will take to the streets and the middle will abandon him and he’ll first get a Democrat Congress to contend with in ’14 and then be defeated by a Democrat in ’16. We are living in interesting times. I’ll be a part of the solutions. You and the “true conservatives” will be as much a part of the problem as are the Lefties and the Paultards.
Art Chance @88: “if there is an explicit requirement that there must be a specific appropriation to support a labor agreement or an explicit constitutional or statutory requirement that any expenditure must be supported by an appropriation by the legislative branch, a contract cannot be enforced on any terms that require public funds for performance absent such a legislative authorization. Most state and local constitutions and charters emulate the US Constitution in requiring a specific appropriation to support an expenditure. Consequently, if a legislative body refuses to appopriate the money to support a term of a collectively bargained contract, that term is not enforceable.”
So, in other words, my “painfully stupid” and “idiot” post which made you painfully tired was correct in every particular.
OF COURSE mayors and governors cannot issue enforceable promises against future legislatures. If that were true, why would we have elections at all? Public employee “contracts” are meaningless.
@92 -
No, genius, that is a BIG if. Only if there is a specific statutory requirement of legislative approval can a contract be abbrogated. Only if there is a specific provision that a legislature cannot bind a future legislature; depends on the Constitution/Charter and other statutes or ordinances. Whether it is there or not depends on the law and the state or polisub.
My state’s law has a specific Legislative approval requirement and the legislature can and has disapproved labor agreements on several ocassions; I wrote several of the disapproving resolutions. I think that the requirement that an executive agency cannot expend funds without an appropriation to point it to is pretty universal, so if the legislative body just refused to give the executive branch any money, the contract could be abbrogated, but so long as the executive had an appropriation for personnel costs, it would be bound by the terms of a contract covering those personnel.
I’m with Art. Romney has just two years to get anything done and it will be hard for all the reasons he lists, plus the MSM bias which still persuades a lot of people.