Union Bosses Against School Choice
by Jason HartThe National Education Association (NEA) and its state affiliates push an agenda that benefits union bosses at taxpayer expense. In America’s 28 forced-unionism states, teachers in NEA-organized schools who opt not to join must still pay dues, creating a huge pot of money for NEA to spend portraying teachers as victims and union bosses as their only friends.
NEA calls its political action committee “The NEA Fund for Children & Public Education.” Subtle, right? But NEA doesn’t stop at spending tens of millions on Progressives who will shovel money at public education without demanding reform for broken tenure and compensation policies. The nonpartisan materials on NEA’s member-funded website include, to sample a few recent items:
Given the union’s claim to stand for Middle Class workers, a casual observer might expect the salaries of NEA officers and staff to resemble the average working stiff’s. That casual observer would be very, very wrong.
Based on the most recent U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data, 90% of full-time private industry workers in America are paid $39.81/hour or less. Assuming a 40-hour week, NEA officers and staff are paid an average of $55.23/hour.
Average annual pay for NEA officers and staff is $114,882, using figures from the union’s most recent filing to the U.S. Department of Labor. NEA bosses preach collectivism while collecting hefty paychecks from members who they insist are underpaid!
You may want to put down any liquids before looking at specifics:
- John Wilson, Executive Director: $492,484
- Dennis Van Roekel, President: $460,060
- Lily Eskelsen, Vice President: $371,904
- John Yrchik, Executive Director: $328,617
- Becky Pringle, Secretary/Treasurer: $325,384
Last year, 44 NEA staff and officers were paid more than $200,000. Out of just over 700 officers and staff, 446 were paid six figures. Review the numbers from the Department of Labor.
If an NEA member ever berates you about the shortcomings of school choice legislation, cut them some slack! Only an Obama strawman says free markets are perfect, but Obama strawmen are the only counterpoints offered in NEA materials. Wait for a pause in the union script, share this info, and ask why forcing kids to attend a school where teachers are forced to fund NEA beats messy individualism!
The National Education Association and its affiliates throughout the country will lie about who they are, reward themselves richly with member dues, and attack anyone who points out the appalling truth. Don’t let selfish NEA posturing dissuade you from fighting for what’s right.
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24 Comments
Unions = legal extortion
They take dues and conduct activities contrary to paying members wishes.
Workers are required to pay dues regardless of a desire to be a member.
Unions openly engage in political activity with members money.
End Unions
The NEA practices the most despicable form of racism still pervasive in the country–denying the poor and minorities choice in education. And Democrats, you own this too!
Educators (so called) consider themselves like the MSM as close to elites. What both groups along with Union Bosses are is nothing but the stupid vote selling LACKEYS. Those on and of the Plantation MENTALITY are a whole new book.
This is exactly why the arguement of pouring more money into schools " for the children" makes no sense. Education is poor in this country because money poured into the education system ends up in hiring administrators, building 100 million dollar schools (on old landfills, no less) and buying overpriced progressive textbooks.
When some accountability is put into the system, cheating prevails to skew test scores.
It is ALWAYS all about the money.
And a good way to measure the results of,……
our wonderful AMERICAN educational system;
How many people understand the bar chart in this article.
I sure would like to see that "mean" percentage.
What's really sad is that many good teachers think that the unions will make a difference in their schools. Any criticism of school budgets is met with the teachers' lament of their plight. I try to tell them that they'd have better schools and pay if, at the least, the union leaders would work for free and if the NEA had no lobbying ties to politicians. So much money wasted and the teachers can't see it. And they are teaching your children to be just as blind and slow as themselves.
There is a very simple solution for MOST school problems. BAN THE UNIONS. IT IS that simple.
“All Government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service. It has its distinct and insurmountable limitations when applied to public personnel management. The very nature and purposes of Government make it impossible for administrative officials to represent fully or to bind the employer in mutual discussions with Government employee organizations. The employer is the whole people, who speak by means of laws enacted by their representatives in Congress.”
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Teaching our children doesn't serve their purpose….. what do we expect–? Maybe the charade is over for them……..
or you could kill 2 birds with one stone — voucher system would improve education and eliminate the unions at the same time.
Of course we know your statement is precisely what needs to be done.
It takes politicians to make it happen. Like that will happen.
I have a Union member who recently got into a debate about the impending economic collapse. He said "what do I care, it only affects the rich". As long as the rest of the people, and the very people who are having their money extorted from them are either blind, or don't care, nothing will change for the better, only get worse.
Union Zealots worry more about lining their pockets with cash than the institutions they send their children too. tsk tsk tsk
Of course these marxists are against right to work legislation, school choice, and vouchers.
Teachers unions are their biggest contributers, their base, as it were.
Now is the time to do the right thing "for the children"…
Unelect ALL dems and repubs NOT on the side of the taxpayer..
Why is it that the biggest supporters of public education unions send their own children to private schools? Think Obama for one.
When the job is "outsourced" (read moved offshore) and they are relegated to eating mud pies, maybe the tone will change. The demonizing of the rich has gotten out of control. Ignorance and covetousness rules the progressive mind. They are weak and feral.
Yes but we do need to ban all public unions, so they can not ever come back. They are the biggest source of corruption in the country, and must be stopped!
My girlfriend is a NJ educator. Her school tops out at like $95k. They've been working without a contract for over a year and are unhappy with their old contract. They have car placard that say "working with no contract", they wear solidarity ribbons, they have meetings, and they wear Tshirts. Got help her if she stays late, and one of the militant union reps sees her. She gets a talking-to. "How can you stay late if we don't have a contract? How can you put in extra time under these conditions"?
I have to shut my mouth around her friends. They are so militant. They really believe they deserve average pay of $65-70k and free health care and nice pensions. Some of the specialists literally mail it in, only seeing kids half their day. This is all while people in the district pay $6-7k in property taxes on a townhouse, plus about 6% income tax.
These unions and their teachers are not in touch with reality. They will never see the light. The only way to fix this is to force them via law, and vote NO on every local tax referendum.
I love reading that letter FDR wrote. He really saw the future, even if I don't agree with him on a lot of things.
Next year, the Chicago Teachers Union agreed,….
to extend the school day with,…….
the additional time to be utilized for a longer gym period and,……
a longer unsupervised lunch / study period.
If the teachers are to dumb to understand that unions are nothing more than an extra tax on labor that is robbing the schools of money, then they shouldn't be teachers. It is simple math. Pay unions millions of dollars, or put the money into the schools. Which one will help the kids and the teachers? If you can't figure that out then then you have NO business being a teacher.
Here in WI, the Union for teachers and State Employees (W.E.A.) owned the Health Insurance Co, that was those employees Provider (W.E.A. Trust), ok.
Now, W.E.A. Trust was over-charging the WI Taxpayers for their plan. The amunt was about $00 per month, when
compared to an identical plan offered by a private provider, Blue Cross/Blue Shield..
This is a huge money-scam. $500 per month X 100,000 employees….is beyond belief.
Teachers can still stay in their union, but our State,
It’s an ugly cycle that perpetuates these startling numbers. The NEA is essentially just a large special interest group, masquerading as group that is “for the children.” Taken together, the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association have been the nation's leading political donors in federal elections over the past two decades, and teachers' unions are either number one or number two in terms of political giving in 60% of US states (http://bit.ly/pdU7XL).
The lack of honesty and transparency when it comes to the lobbying and bargaining processes with unions is severely damaging the social and physical infrastructure of states throughout the country. You simply can’t sustain a system where public and private sector compensation is so out of whack, especially during a recession (http://bit.ly/pn5weF). The longer this problem is ignored by the politicians who enable it, the worse the situation will get.
This is your brain on public schools and drugs: believing that teachers unions give a rats a$$ about kids.
And you want to know why…America? Because they do not want their inner city slaves in the inner city plantations getting out to the suburbs to get educated.
Because an educated slave…is NOT an OBEDIENT slave!
That is it in a 'nutshell'!
Get it?
STATES PRESSING THE BIRTH ISSUE FOR 2012 AND BEYOND; GOD BLESS THEM!
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pag...
IS SHERIFF ARPAIO (AZ) FINALLY GETTING TO THE TRUTH…
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pag...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oLIUT16ko0
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