The Big Myth in Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker's Union-Busting Crusade

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Yeah, privatization of education. Great idea. I'm sure parents would love paying teachers over 100,000 a year as in that example. At least it wouldn't come out of their taxes right? Who cares if we are paying more, at least it's not in the form of those evil taxes!
Wait, but what about those families that can't afford it? They just won't send their children to school. Oh well, who cares. The more uneducated our country becomes the more the big businesses can brainwash the stupid people into thinking that the Tea Party will benefit them and not just give tax breaks to the rich!
Some of you really have this figured out! Great work Tea Baggers!

John Smith of WI 12:37PM February 28, 2011

Short Term Gains (re-election) vs. Long Term Gains (actually funding things that are promised rather than pretending it will all go away) - and the banks. That is the source of the problem.
Get rid of the lobbyists - not the unions.
check out www.viewser.com for the full story.

ADE of IL 12:17PM February 28, 2011

@John Smith
So you argue for privatization of the educational system?
I agree wholeheartedly. The government has no business in education.

Brock Lee of WI 12:16PM February 28, 2011

Go to college- get your degree in education- and do the job for a week and then say teachers are over-paid. Do people want less government? Then quit asking the school to do more. Also, if yo u think there is an achievement gap between the poor and the wealthy now, just wait and see what happens if we continue in this direction. Lastly, If the governor would have said we want 10% of everyone's salary-Nobody would agree with that. However, pension and insurance contributions are o.k...nice spin...because in reality if there is less take home it is a pay-cut. If that is what the state needs then fine...but have enough guts to call it what it is.

John Montgomery of WI 12:14PM February 28, 2011

This specious logic at work, and swallowed whole by the writer.
The issue is that these unfunded "benefits" which will vary in cost based on retirement age and length of retirement (i.e. life) were extracted through use of mass coercive action (threat to withdraw public services, crippling economy, education, public safety, etc. aka blackmail), primarily at the local level where the coercion resulted in rising property taxes and the reduction of local ability to attract private sector employers.
That is why benefits are being removed as a collective bargaining chip. Instead, a rational regime will be instituted.
Another excellent approach would be to make all education bargaining, for example, centralized to eliminate competitive coercion.

Dan Cummings 11:59AM February 28, 2011

Every three/four years we negotiate a contract. Do I have great health care? Yes. Do I make more than the other average workers around the country doing the same job? Yes. What I don't think people realize is the amount of money my company makes. Should we be deunionized so my company can pay us less and kick us when they want? It's a shame that people wanted to be millionaires 30 years ago and now the same people want to become billionaires, understood. Thanks for your time.

John Conroy of MN 11:59AM February 28, 2011

I've gotten this comment before: "You basically babysit my kids, why we paying you so much for that!" (by the way, I'm a tax payer too so I pay part of my own salary!)
Well, here's the math for you. I have a son that we take to daycare. It costs us $25 a day to take him there, which I am happy to pay as I know he is safe and well taken care of. If you pay me what I pay for daycare, the numbers will look like this.
$25/day per child times 25 students in my class = $625/day. I have 180 face to face days with students so that = $112,500. I will gladly take that money as my salary. I will even pay 100% of my healthcare if that's the case. All this and now instead of educating them I can just care for them.
The fact is that I make $39,935 (take the 10 largest school districts out of the average teacher salary and the average drops drastically. $52,000 is our highest paid teachers in our district, not average) a year in salary and pay nothing to pension and 10% to healthcare. I have my masters degree and $50,000 in student loans, and am required to take 6 credits every 5 years to keep my license.
If you think we are overpaid, fine! Maybe all of you who think that teachers are freeloaders should have gotten a education degree and starting teaching. It's the sweet life! My wife and I throw all of your taxpayer money on the bed and roll around in it at night.

John Smith of WI 11:52AM February 28, 2011

What Walker's doing is no different than if a private employee's company decided that their employees' 401k contributions suddenly belonged to the company.
Moreover, this is the same scam Republicans are pulling with our Social Security. They've borrowed against monies taken from taxpayers to fund foreign wars and tax cuts for the wealthy, and don't want to pay it back.
This is theft, by Republicans, from working people, for the wealthy and for corporate interests. Nothing more, nothing less.
The only question is whether and to what extent Americans are willing to permit the same stealing that landed us in our present economic mess to continue and accelerate, or not.
The entire national budget "crisis" can be solved by setting taxes for the rich back to Reagan-era levels. It is the wealthy, who benefitted from our economy-smashing real estate market bubble, who must "tighten their belts," not teachers and janitors and policemen and fireman and the rest of us.
Enough already.

Orlando J. of FL 11:41AM February 28, 2011

Public employee unions are using taxpayer dollars for political campaigns.
I say taxpayers need to ask the States for their money back and states need to demand that unions give that money back.
There is something Illegal about public unions using taxpayer dollars for political
campaigns. And Unions have spent Hundreds of Millions of dollars campaigning
for liberal/democrat candidates.
Taxpayers unite, and demand that money back. I'm dead serious about this.

Paul of OH 11:09AM February 28, 2011

So instead of saying that WI teachers make on average $52,000 for a part time job, we should be saying that they make $89,000 for a part time job, since all of their contribution to their benefits is from 'their' salary -- according to this article. Hmmm 89 thou for a part time job. Not bad.

sportutegirl of WA 10:51AM February 28, 2011