A Bad Day for Bad Teachers
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A Bad Day for Bad Teachers
Sixty years after Brown, a California court strikes a blow against the 21st Century equivalent of Jim Crow
By Richard Berman
Summary: In 1954, the U.S. Supreme
Court issued the landmark decision
Brown v. Board of Education, which
struck down racially segregated schools
because, the court said, they were inher-
ently unequal and they unjustly harmed
poor and minority children. Last month,
a California court cited Brown as it
struck down multiple state laws, passed
at the behest of teachers’ unions, which
the court said unjustly protected incom-
petent teachers and unconscionably
harmed children, especially the least
fortunate.
I
Nine young people and their families filed suit against California’s
n a landmark decision that sent laws on teacher retention and dismissal, which, they say, protect bad
shock waves through the educa- teachers and deprive students of an equal, high-quality education.
tional establishment, Los Angeles sary of the Brown decision, in which over more capable junior teachers, the
Superior Court Judge Rolf Treu ruled the U.S. Supreme Court struck down rules deprive students of the education
last month that California’s teacher state and federal laws establishing that the state constitution guarantees
tenure laws unconstitutionally deprive separate public schools for students them. Further, because these rules
students of their guarantee to an educa- classified by the government as funnel bad teachers to districts with
tion and to equal rights. “The evidence is “white” and “black.” (In Brown, large numbers of poor and minority
compelling,” Judge Treu wrote. “Indeed, the Court consolidated cases from students, those students are denied the
it shocks the conscience.” Kansas, Virginia, South Carolina, equal treatment of the law.
In Vergara v. California, nine students and Delaware, as well as the federal
The Vergara lawsuit was backed by
sued the State of California, claiming jurisdiction of Washington, D.C.) The
Students Matter, a nonprofit educa-
that ineffective teachers were dispro- Supreme Court found that the practice
portionately placed in schools with large of segregation violated the provision
numbers of “minority” and low-income in the U.S. Constitution that “No State July 2014
students. Judge Treu agreed and quoted shall make or enforce any law which
the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1954 Brown shall . . . deny to any person within A Bad Day for Bad Teachers
v. Board of Education decision that edu- its jurisdiction the equal protection Page 1
cation “is a right which must be made of the laws.”
available to all on equal terms.” Labor Notes
The argument in the Vergara case
Page 8
The Vergara decision came down less is that by forcing schools to favor
than one month after the 60th anniver- incompetent teachers with senioritytional policy advocacy group funded to a teacher of even average ef- ute, and that given these facts, grossly
by Silicon Valley entrepreneur David fectiveness. Students assigned to ineffective teachers are being left in
Welch. “The state has a responsibility more than one grossly ineffective the classroom.”
of delivering an education for the bet- teacher are unlikely ever to catch
terment of the child,” Welch told the up to their peers. Judge Treu concluded that “distilled to
San Jose Mercury News. “The state its basics,” the unions’
And far from wanting to attack all
needs to understand that [its] respon- position requires them to defend
teachers, Welch in the same article
sibility is to teach children, and teach the proposition that the state has
pleaded with his fellow Californians
all of them.” Welch’s organization re- a compelling interest in the de
to reward good teachers:
cruited the nine students, from several facto separation of students from
school districts, to serve as the public Let’s offer teachers opportunities competent teachers, and a like
face of the case. for promotions, such as to master interest in the de facto retention
teacher, teacher mentor, or depart- of incompetent ones. The logic of
Astonishingly, the teachers’ union ment chair, where the skills of a this position is unfathomable and
response to the ruling was that it was truly excellent, creative educator therefore constitutionally insup-
actually an attack on children. “This can reach more children—as well portable.
decision today is an attack on teachers, as better pay with incentives for
which is a socially acceptable way to excellence and taking on extra re-
attack children,” said Alex Caputo- sponsibilities or difficult positions. Seniority vs. merit
Pearl, the president-elect of the Los
The Vergara decision overturned a
Angeles teachers union. Instead of No less a union friend than Rep.
LIFO (last-in/first-out) law requiring
providing for smaller classes or more George Miller (D-Calif.), whose larg-
that teacher layoffs be based on se-
counselors, the reformers “attack est campaign support comes from
niority, rather than individual merit.
teacher and student rights.” unions, has bluntly admitted, “Vergara
California’s Permanent Employment
will help refocus our education system
Welch answered that claim in an op- Law required that a teacher be tenured
on the needs of students.” No wonder
ed for the San Jose Mercury News in after two years at a school (which, be-
the teachers’ unions made five sepa-
which he described the harm students cause of an early notice requirement,
rate legal efforts to have the lawsuit
suffer from bad teachers: worked out in practice to 18 months
dismissed on grounds other than the
or less). California is one of only five
According to the testimony of merits of the case.
states in which tenure may be received
Harvard economist Dr. Thomas
California teacher union members after such a short period. As noted by
Kane, a student assigned to the
number some 445,000. Both the Cali- the blog “Voice of San Diego”:
classroom of a grossly ineffective
fornia Teachers Association (CTA, an
math teacher in Los Angeles loses Regardless of what we call it,
affiliate of the National Education As-
almost an entire year of learning here’s how it looks in San Diego
sociation) and the California Federa-
compared to a student assigned Unified. Once they’re hired, rookie
tion of Teachers (CFT, an affiliate of
the American Federation of Teachers) teachers have to make it through a
Editor: Steven J. Allen
plan to appeal the court’s decision. Jim two-year probationary period, dur-
Publisher: Terrence Scanlon
Finberg, a lawyer for the two teachers’ ing which they can be dismissed
Address: 1513 16th Street, NW
unions, said that Judge Treu’s decision for pretty much any reason.
Washington, DC 20036-1480
Phone: (202) 483-6900 “ignores overwhelming evidence the But because the district has to tell
E-mail: sallen@CapitalResearch.org current laws are working.” teachers by mid-March whether
Website: CapitalResearch.org they’ll be invited back for the
Actually, less than 0.002% of teach-
ers in California are dismissed in any next school year, the trial period
Labor Watch is published by Capital
given year. Judge Treu noted that when is actually shorter than two years.
Research Center, a non-partisan education
an effort is made to fire a teacher: In the past, the district hasn’t
and research organization classified by the
IRS as a 501(c)(3) public charity. Reprints “It could take anywhere from two to been particularly aggressive in the
are available for $2.50 prepaid to Capital almost ten years and cost $50,000 to number of probationary teachers it
Research Center. $450,000 or more to bring these cases sends away—only about 1 percent
to conclusion under the Dismissal Stat- wasn’t given tenure.
Page 2 Labor Watch July 2014“With such little time, you don’t ernment and private-sector employees loses his or her license to practice
even have enough information to facing dismissal. “Why,” he pleaded, medicine, and one of every 97 lawyers
actually consider whether they’re “the need for the current tortuous loses his or her license to practice
an effective teacher,” said Nancy process” that is mandated only for law. Yet, in many major cities, only
Waymack, a managing director for teachers, a process so unjust, he added, one out of 1,000 teachers is fired for
the reform-advocacy group Na- that it was even decried by witnesses performance-related offenses. The
tional Council on Teacher Quality. called by the teachers’ unions? reason is tenure, or as the unions call
it, “permanent status.”
Compared to other states, California James Taranto of the Wall Street Jour-
has some of the strongest laws in nal noted an irony at the center of the Tenure is the practice of guaranteeing
place to protect teacher employment. ruling: a teacher his or her job. Originally,
The effect of this case may spur ac- The California Supreme Court had this was a due process guarantee,
tion throughout the nation. “Without applied the same legal premises something intended to work as a check
a doubt, this could happen in other to hold unconstitutional funding against administrators capriciously
states,” said Terry Mazany, who served disparities among districts and firing teachers and replacing them
as interim CEO of Chicago’s public one district’s decision to end the with friends or family members. It
schools in 2010-2011. A lawyer for school year six weeks early owing was also designed to protect teachers
Students Matter said they are already to a budgetary shortfall. Vergara who took political stands the commu-
hoping to “engage with policymak- doesn’t break new legal ground nity might disagree with. Tenure as
ers in New York and nationally,” and so much as apply precedent in a we understand it today was first seen
donor David Welch said the group way that threatens the education at the university level, where, ide-
would consider suits in other states establishment. It’s a case of judi- ally, professors would work for years
(New Jersey, Connecticut, Maryland, cial activism coming back to bite and publish many pieces of inspired
Minnesota, New Mexico, and Oregon the left. academic work before being awarded
were mentioned as possible sites). what amounted to a job for life.
A permanent job At the elementary and high school lev-
Undue process
As noted in Waiting for ‘Superman,’ a el, tenure has evolved from the original
The term “due process” refers to a le- documentary promoting educational understanding of “due process” to the
gal or quasi-legal system that protects reform, one out of every 57 doctors university-style “job for life.” In most
the rights of an individual, such as
requiring a trial before a person can
be executed. Unions defend the com- Gaming the system
plicated procedures for firing teachers The New Teacher Project (now known as TNTP) is a group that, according
by claiming they amount to “due pro- to its website, focuses on “giving poor and minority students equal access
cess” that protects those teachers from to effective teachers.” The Project collected this story from a school princi-
arbitrary, unfair treatment. As the Pew pal about one major problem, the priority that must be given “excessed”
publication Stateline reports, “The teachers—those whose positions have been eliminated, but who get first
unions argue that the rules protecting crack at new job openings:
teachers are needed for school districts If you are smart enough, you hide your vacancies. You say to the HR
to attract and retain good teachers and staffing liaison, “I don’t anticipate that I will need another English
to ensure that employees are not fired teacher.” At the same time, you have already identified the teacher
for arbitrary or unfair reasons.” you want for the position. You say to the teacher, “If you can hang in
there and not start officially teaching until late September, but remain
But the judge ruled in Vergara that the
as a substitute until then, I will do everything to try to hire you.” Then,
process has become so cumbersome— you call the liaison back when you know all of the excessed teach-
that it’s become so difficult to get rid of ers have been placed someplace else, and say, “Oh I actually do need
bad teachers—that it deprives students someone.” You say, “I have some resumes” and pretend to just find
of their rights. He ridiculed the process someone for the slot even though I had them all along. If you are a
as “über due process,” and observed smart principal, you do this all of the time. But it is very hard to do
that California state laws already pro- this where there are a lot of excess teachers, like in social studies.
vide a great deal of protection for gov-
July 2014 Labor Watch Page 3states, teachers are awarded tenure af- ►In New York City, the New York According to the Wall Street Journal,
ter only a few years, after which time Daily News reported that “just 88 out the ironclad union contract requires
they become almost impossible to fire. of some 80,000 city schoolteachers that any teacher with tenure be paid
The main function of these laws is to have lost their jobs for poor perfor- full salary and benefits if he or she is
help bad teachers keep their jobs. mance” over 2007-2010. sent to the “Absent Teacher Reserve
pool.” The average pay of a teacher in
►One Los Angeles union represen- Then there were the so-called “rub-
that pool is over $80,000 a year, and
tative has said: “If I’m representing ber rooms” of New York City, which
some teachers have stayed in the pool
them, it’s impossible to get them out. officially operated until 2010. Teach-
for years. The Journal reports that the
It’s impossible. Unless they commit a ers who couldn’t be relieved of duty
majority of teachers in the pool had
lewd act.” would report to these “rubber rooms,”
“neither applied for another job in the
where they would be paid to do noth-
Unfortunately for the students who system nor attended any recruitment
ing for weeks, months, even years.
have to learn from these educators, fairs in recent months.”
virtually every teacher who works According to the New York Daily
►Things are no better in New York
for the Los Angeles Unified School News, at any given time an average of
as a whole. The Albany Times Union
District receives tenure. In a study 700 teachers were being paid not to
looked at what was going on statewide
of its own, the Los Angeles Times re- teach while the district jumped through
outside New York City and discovered
ported that fewer than two percent of the hoops, imposed by the union con-
some shocking data: Of 132,000 teach-
teachers are denied tenure during the tract and the law, to pursue discipline
ers, only 32 were fired for any reason
probationary period after being hired. or termination. (A city teacher in
between 2006 and 2011.
And once they have tenure, there’s no New York who ended up being fired
getting rid of them. Between 1995 and spent an average of 19 months in the ►In Chicago, a school system that has
2005, only 112 Los Angeles tenured disciplinary process.) The Daily News by any measure failed its students—
teachers faced termination—eleven reported that the New York City school only 28.5 percent of 11th graders
per year—out of 43,000. And that’s in district spent more than $65 million met or exceeded expectations on that
a school district where the high school annually just to pay the teachers who state’s standardized tests—Newsweek
graduation rate in 2003 was a pathetic were accused of wrongdoing. Millions reported that only 0.1 percent of teach-
51 percent. more tax dollars were spent to hire ers were dismissed for performance-
substitutes. related reasons between 2005 and
►One New Jersey union representa- 2008. When barely one in four students
tive was even blunter about what his After the embarrassing Daily News
nearing graduation can read and do
union does to keep bad teachers in the story and an exposé in the New Yorker,
math, how is it possible that only one
classroom: “I’ve gone in and defended the union agreed to end the practice of
in one thousand teachers is worthy of
teachers who shouldn’t even be pump- rubber rooms but refused to expedite
dismissal? It may well be that most of
ing gas.” the dismissal process. Instead of whil-
the city’s teachers are good teachers,
ing the days away doing nothing, the
but can 99.9% of them be good?
In 10 years, only about 47 out of teachers were assigned to do clerical
100,000 teachers were terminated work and perform other semi-useful
from New Jersey’s schools. Original tasks. Effects of tenure and related
research conducted by the Center for teacher “protections”
As of 2013, the city still spends $29
Union Facts (CUF) has confirmed Modeled after labor arrangements in
million per year to pay teachers reas-
that almost no teacher is ever fired in factories, the typical teachers’ union
signed away from the classroom, ac-
Newark, which is New Jersey’s largest contract is loaded with provisions
cording to the Daily News.
school district, no matter how bad a that do not promote education. These
job the teacher does. Over one four- The problem isn’t limited to teach- provisions drive away good teachers,
year period, CUF discovered, New- ers accused of wrongdoing. The city protect bad teachers, raise costs, and
ark’s school district successfully fired spends more than $100 million every tie principals’ hands.
about one out of every 3,000 tenured year paying teachers who have been
excessed (i.e., whose positions have ● The Dance of the Lemons
teachers annually. This is a city where
roughly two-thirds of students never been eliminated) but have yet to find One of the more shocking scenes in
graduate from high school. jobs. the documentary Waiting for ‘Super-
Page 4 Labor Watch July 2014man’ is an animated illustration of about the best-qualified [teacher] but “Children in the highest-poverty
“The Dance of the Lemons.” This is rather satisfying union rules.” schools are assigned to novice teach-
no waltz or foxtrot. Rather, it’s the ers almost twice as often as children
systematic shuffling of incompetent ● Thinning the talent pool in low-poverty schools. Similarly,
teachers from school to school. These One problem related to the destruc- students in high-minority schools are
teachers can’t be fired because union tive transfer system is a hiring process assigned to novice teachers at twice
contracts require that “excessed” edu- that takes too long and/or starts too the rate as students in schools without
cators, no longer needed at their origi- late, thanks in part to union contracts. many minority students.”
nal school, must be given first crack at Would-be teachers typically cannot be
new job openings when slots open up hired until senior teachers have had ● Bad apples stay
elsewhere in the district. Administra- their pick of the vacancies, and the A study conducted by Public Agenda
tors at other schools don’t want to hire transfer process makes principals re- polled 1,345 schoolteachers on a vari-
these bad teachers, but districts are luctant to post vacancies at all for fear ety of education issues, including the
unable to fire them. of having a bad teacher fill it instead role that tenure played in their schools.
of a promising new hire. When asked “does tenure mean that a
What happens? LA Weekly document-
ed just how this process plays out in In the study Missed Opportunities, teacher has worked hard and proved
Los Angeles in a massive 2010 investi- The New Teacher Project found that themselves to be very good at what
gation. “The far larger problem in L.A. these staffing hurdles help push urban they do?,” 58 percent of the teachers
is one of ‘performance cases’—the districts’ hiring timelines later to the polled answered that no, tenure “does
teachers who cannot teach, yet cannot point that “anywhere from 31 percent not necessarily” mean that. In a related
be fired. Their ranks are believed to be to almost 60 percent of applicants question, 78 percent said a few (or
sizable—perhaps 1,000 teachers, re- withdrew from the hiring process, more) teachers in their schools “fail
sponsible for 30,000 children. … The often to accept jobs with districts that to do a good job and are simply going
Weekly has found, in a five-month in- made offers earlier.” through the motions.”
vestigation, that principals and school When Terry Moe, the author of Special
“Of those who withdrew,” the TNTP
district leaders have all but given up Interest: Teachers Unions and Amer-
report continues, “the majority (50 per-
dismissing such teachers. In the past ica’s Public Schools, asked teachers
cent to 70 percent) cited the late hiring
decade, LAUSD officials spent $3.5 what they thought of tenure, they
timeline as a major reason they took
million trying to fire just seven of admitted that the byzantine process
other jobs.” It’s the better applicants
the district’s 33,000 teachers for poor of firing bad apples was too time-con-
who are driven away: “Applicants
classroom performance—and only suming: 55 percent of teachers, and 47
who withdrew from the hiring process
four were fired, during legal struggles percent of union members, answered
had significantly higher undergraduate
that wore on, on average, for five years yes when asked “Do you think tenure
GPAs, were 40 percent more likely to
each. Two of the three others were and teacher organizations make it too
have a degree in their teaching field,
paid large settlements, and one was difficult to weed out mediocre and
and were significantly more likely to
reinstated. The average cost of each incompetent teachers?”
have completed educational course-
battle is $500,000.”
work” than the teachers who ended
● The union tax on firing
Unintended Consequences, a study up staying around to finally receive
bad teachers
by The New Teacher Project (TNTP), job offers.
documented the damage done by So why don’t districts try to terminate
● Keeping experienced teachers away more of their poor performers? The
this union-imposed staffing policy.
from poor children sad answer is that their chance of pre-
In an extensive survey of five major
metropolitan school districts, TNTP Another common problem with the vailing is vanishingly small. Teachers
found that “40 percent of school-level union contract is a “bumping” policy unions have ensured that even with a
vacancies, on average, were filled by that fills schools which are more needy victory, the process is prohibitively
voluntary transfers or excessed teach- (but less desirable to teach in) with expensive and time-consuming. In the
ers over whom schools had either no greater numbers of inexperienced 2006-2007 school year, for example,
choice at all or limited choice.” One teachers. In its report Teaching In- New York City fired only 10 of its
principal decried the process as “not equality, the Education Trust noted: 55,000 tenured teachers, or 0.018%.
July 2014 Labor Watch Page 5The cost to eliminate those employees adjusted salary for U.S. teachers rose for teachers meant that, on average,
averages out to $163,142, according modestly—while “the range of the more talented teachers were receiving
to Education Week. The Albany Times [pay] scale narrowed sharply.” less, while less talented teachers were
Union reports that the average process Measuring aptitude by the quality of receiving more.
for firing a teacher in New York state the college a teacher attended, the re-
outside of New York City proper searchers found that the advent of the The earnings of teachers in the lowest
lasts 502 days and costs more than collectively bargained union contract aptitude group (those from the bottom-
$216,000. In Illinois, Scott Reeder of
the Small Newspaper Group found it “If teachers don’t improve kids’ learning,
costs an average of $219,504 in legal what are they there for?”
fees alone to move a termination case
past all the union-supported hurdles. In For a report on teachers unions and the media, veteran Philadelphia
Columbus, Ohio, the teachers’ union Inquirer education reporter Dale Mezzacappa summarized one (former)
president admitted to the Associated union activist’s evolving attitude towards the union contract:
Press that firing a tenured teacher can Teacher collective bargaining, which was to address injustices, in-
cost as much as $50,000. A spokes- stead added to them. Recently, I had lunch with a retired Philadelphia
man for Idaho school administrators teacher who spent 30 years in the system. In her younger years, she
told local press that districts have had participated in more than a dozen strikes and lockouts, often risk-
been known to spend “$100,000 or ing jail.
$200,000” in litigation costs to toss Now, she trains young art teachers and tries to get them jobs in city
out a bad teacher. schools. She laments how the contract prevents her from choosing the
best mentors for her student teachers. She’s upset that burned-out, in-
It’s difficult even to entice the unions effective teachers are holding positions that her students would thrive
to give up tenure for more money. In in, and nothing can be done. She finds herself placing them more and
Washington, D.C., school chancellor more often in charter schools.
Michelle Rhee proposed a voluntary
But what about all those days walking picket lines? What about all
two-tier track for teachers. On one
those bruising battles over protecting teachers’ rights?
tier, teachers could simply do nothing:
Maintain their regularly scheduled The swiftness of her answer surprised even me. “We were wrong,” she
raises and keep their tenure. On the said.
other track, teachers could give up Mezzacappa also recounted this story, the only time in her reporting career
tenure and be paid according to how when she was goaded into responding in kind to someone who yelled
well they and their students performed, at her. The provocateur in question was an attorney for the Philadelphia
with the potential to earn as much as Federation of Teachers, angry at her for her coverage of a 1996 contract
$140,000 per year. The union wouldn’t settlement between the union and the district:
even let that proposal come up for a “We won!!” the lawyer shouted at me. “That should have been the
vote among its members, and stub- headline! He” — the superintendent — “got nothing!”
bornly blocked efforts to ratify a new Uncharacteristically, I yelled back. The night before, I had found it
contract for more than three years. unsettling, to say the least, to watch as thousands of teachers cheered
When the contract finally did come up wildly at the news that they didn’t have to worry about whether their
for ratification by the rank and file, the students learned anything. They’d still get automatic raises even if
two-tier plan wasn’t even an option. none of their kids met achievement goals; they’d still get their pick of
jobs based on seniority; they’d still have the right to refuse extra train-
● Taking money from good teachers
ing even if their teaching skills were woefully out of date.
to give to bad teachers
“If teachers don’t improve kids’ learning, what are they there for?” I
During the expansion of teacher col- asked. “What should they be judged on? What are they getting paid to
lective bargaining in the mid-twentieth do?”
century, economists from Harvard
To which I got the remarkable rejoinder: “Teacher performance and
and the Australian National Univer-
student achievement have nothing to do with each other.”
sity found that the average, inflation-
Page 6 Labor Watch July 2014tier colleges) rose dramatically relative ability to monitor teachers for danger- teacher tenure, but it’s impossible to
to the average wage, so that teachers ous behavior. In one case, school ad- pretend that the number of firings actu-
who in 1963 earned 73 percent of ministrators in Seattle received at least ally reflects the number of bad teachers
the average salary for teachers could 30 warnings that a fifth grade teacher protected by tenure. As long as union
expect to earn exactly the average by was a danger to his students. However, leaders possess the legal ability to
2000. Meanwhile, the ratio of the earn- thanks to a union contract that forces drag out termination proceedings for
ings of teachers in the highest-aptitude schools to destroy most personnel months or even years—during which
group to earnings of average teachers records after each school year, he man- time districts must continue paying
fell dramatically. In states where the aged to evade punishment for nearly teachers, and substitute teachers to
highest-aptitude teachers began with 20 years, until he was finally sent to replace them, and lawyers to arbitrate
an earnings ratio of 157 percent, they prison in 2005 for having molested as the proceedings—the situation for
ended with a ratio of 98 percent. many as 13 girls. As an attorney for students will not improve.
one of the victims put it, according to
Data from the National Center for Edu- The Vergara case offers hope, but sup-
the Seattle Times, “You could basically
cation Statistics, as reported by Educa- porters of better education cannot rely
have a pedophile in your midst and not
tion Week, add further evidence to the on judges to fix America’s schools.
know it. How are you going to get rid
compressed-pay claim. The Center’s Parents and teachers must join together
of somebody if you don’t know what
stats indicate that the average maxi- to eliminate teacher tenure systems
they did in the past?”
mum teacher pay nationwide is only that protect bad teachers and that divert
1.85 times greater than the nationwide our best teachers away from many of
average salary for new teachers. The bottom line the students who could benefit most
Too many schools are failing too many from their skills and experience.
● Locking up education dollars
children. Americans should not remain Richard Berman is executive director
Much of the money commanded by
complacent about how districts staff, of the Center for Union Facts. Some of
teachers’ union contracts is not being
assign, and compensate teachers. And this material appeared previously on
used well, at least from the perspec-
too many teachers’ union contracts the website TeachersUnionExposed.
tive of parents or reformers. Several
preserve archaic employment rules com, a project of the Center for Union
provisions commonly found in union
that have nothing to do with serving Facts.
contracts that cost serious money have
children.
been shown to do little to improve LW
education quality. Even Al Shanker, the legendary former
president of the American Federation
A report from the nonprofit Education
of Teachers, admitted, “a lot of people
Sector found that nearly 19 percent
who have been hired as teachers are
of all public education spending in Please consider contributing
basically not competent.”
America goes towards things like now to the Capital Research
seniority-based pay increases and Center.
This is what the union wants: To keep
outsized benefits—things that don’t teachers on the payroll regardless of CRC is a watchdog over politi-
go unappreciated by teachers, but whether or not they are doing any work cians, bureaucrats, and special
don’t do much to improve the quality or are needed by the school district. interests in Washington, D.C.,
of teaching children receive. If these and in all 50 states.
Why? As long as they are on the pay-
provisions were done away with, the roll, they keep paying union dues. The Given the current economic
report found, $77 billion in educa- union doesn’t care about the children climate, every dollar counts...
tion money would be freed up for who will be hurt by this misallocation and we need your help to con-
initiatives that could actually improve tinue our important research.
of tax dollars. All union leaders care
learning, like paying high-performing about is protecting their members and, Your contribution to advance
teachers more money. by extension, their own coffers. our work is deeply appreciated.
● Putting kids at risk Most teachers absolutely deserve to Many thanks,
Teachers unions push for contracts keep their jobs, and some have begun Terrence Scanlon
that effectively cripple school districts’ to speak out about the absurdity of President
July 2014 Labor Watch Page 7LaborNotes In February, we reported on the elections in Seattle, where a socialist was elected to the city council on a platform that included a $15-an-hour “minimum wage.” Now the city council has passed such a measure. In effect, such a scheme makes it illegal to hire unskilled workers—anyone whose hourly labor is worth less than about $18 an hour ($15 plus the cost of taxes and of mandated benefits such as Obamacare). So much for leftists’ claims that they care about poor people! In response to the council’s action, Reason magazine noted sarcastically: “Seattle Prepares for Robot Revolution by Setting $15 Minimum Wage.” In Rhode Island, the state treasurer, Gina Raimondo (D) pushed a plan through the state legislature in 2011 that the Wall Street Journal called “arguably the country’s boldest pension reforms,” which “froze current workers’ accrued benefits, suspended retirees’ cost-of-living adjustments, raised the retirement age, and replaced unsustainable defined-benefit pensions with hybrid plans that include a modest annuity and a 401(k)-style component.” The plan would have cut the state’s unfunded liability nearly in half. Unions sued, and a judge ruled that pensions constitute “an implied contract,” but Raimondo and Governor Lincoln Chafee (D) negotiated a deal that kept 94% of the savings. More than 70% of state workers and retirees backed the compromise, but a majority of police officers voted against the deal, killing it. Now the case is set to go to trial a week after September’s primary election, in which Raimondo is running for governor (and unions hope to defeat her; they claim she’s trying to “enrich herself and her hedge fund backers”). The Journal editorialized that “the larger political lesson for government reformers is that public unions will never compromise until they are defeated in court and at the ballot box.” At the United Auto Workers, failure is a great way to get a promotion, as long as you’re a friend of the President of the United States. Dennis Williams served as UAW secretary-treasurer during a period in which the strike fund shrunk 40 percent, from $1 billion to $600 million, leading to a 25 percent increase in dues, the first dues hike in 47 years. Now, with 98 percent of the vote at the union’s convention, Williams has been elected as the UAW’s president. (Williams knew President Obama when the President was a member of the Illinois state senate; “I consider the President to be a friend,” he said.) Filling his old job as secretary-treasurer is Gary Casteel. Casteel’s previous job was as the regional director in charge of the campaign to unionize the Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, which ended in a catastrophic defeat. The UAW may have lost in Chattanooga, but the radical Service Employees International Union is doing fine. As noted by Matt Patterson of the Center for Worker Freedom, Mayor Andy Berke (D), who was elected with union support, quietly signed a “memorandum of understanding” with SEIU Local 205, which represents city employees. The pact allows the union to hold meetings on city property, provides for advance notice to the union for changes in personnel policy, and provides 600 hours of “release time,” during which taxpayers will foot the bill for union officials doing union work. “Release time,” also known as “official time,” plagues government agencies at all levels. Kimberly Strassel of the Wall Street Journal reports that, at the Department of Veterans Affairs, one federal employee— who happens to be the president of Local 1798 of the National Federation of Federal Employees— spends 100 percent of her time on union activities. This information was revealed when she broke her ankle and sued to be allowed to work entirely from home, on union business. (She won the lawsuit when the de- partment failed to respond to the complaint. Apparently the VA was too busy denying healthcare to veterans to defend itself in court.) For standing up to the public-employee unions that were bankrupting his state, Governor Scott Walker (R- Wisconsin) has been a target. Union officials conducted a massive campaign to recall him and his politi- cal allies, which he and most of his allies survived. Then, union-allied prosecutors, with the enforcement of campaign-finance laws as an excuse (but without actual justification for a search), went after Walker’s sup- porters. Columnist George F. Will described the scene: Their “fists pounding on the doors of private citizens in pre-dawn raids,” authorities used “floodlights to illuminate the citizens’ homes, armed raiders seized docu- ments, computers, cellphones and other devices.” Judges at both the state and federal level have thrown the case out—but not before the unions and their allies sent a message of, in Will’s words, “disruption and intimidation.” Page 8 Labor Watch July 2014
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