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I know in our high school, there is a guidance counselor going....
I guess they just want to hit the teachers (read "kids"). What about administrators? What about those that can (read "should") retire?
Are they trying to make the parents cave and say, "who cares, raise our taxes"? For a lot of people, if taxes are raised any more on no more income, there will be more homes in foreclosure and then they will lose a lot more jobs....
My husband's union agreed to a two year pay freeze to keep jobs in their company. The union members voted and it was 70-30 to agree to it. 70% don't want to see the guy next to them out of a job. Why can't the NJEA do the same thing??[/quote]
They say Wall Streeters are greedy, they say private sector workers are too, but lo and behold, the NJEA is just as GREEDY, if not more so.
You know, nobody would ever complain about teachers' salaries OR benefits if state aid was distributed equally to all municipalities. If this were done (meaning Abbott would be no more) property taxes in suburban towns would be instantly cut in half. Why the governor won't take on the activist court and equalize state aid to ALL New Jersey communities is beyond me.
Middle income families are being driven out of this state in droves. It's time to equalize state aid NOW!
I guess they just want to hit the teachers (read "kids"). What about administrators? What about those that can (read "should") retire?
I agree with the overall sentiment of your post, but state education laws are extremely complex and in many cases, certain levels of administration are required by state statute. A school board can't just eliminate certain positions, as they are required by law.
The NJEA has no authority on if any district unions open up their contracts and freeze wages. The whole state does not collective bargain under the NJEA, they collective bargain as in each individual district. One district does't have the same contract as other districts.
It seems we listen to the same radio station, I posted something similar in another thread.
Again, Christie's agenda is to consolidate school districts... the issue is he doesn't have authority as Governor of the state to force that... by reducing budgets, he was pushing the districts to consolidate themselves to save money... unfortunately the BOE's and Admins are saving their own jobs first by laying off teachers vs consollidating. Members of communities need to step up and do what they can to put a stop to that nonsense.
One last thing... check with your employer... loss of a job may qualify as a "life changing event" which would allow you to change your health insurance coverage, I don't know... I know things like deaths and births are covered... I thought job loss might be in there as well. Hope that works out for you.
I whole-heartedly agree with consolidation and I live in a small town (Manasquan) that could surely consolidate with its neighbors since we already share a high school. But I do not think that is Christie's agenda with cutting funding to districts.
He cut the largest countywide district in Monmouth County (the monmouth county vocational school district) much harder than the average district. We lost 22%. Even with a pay freeze and the 1.5% contribution we will still be down 11%. Why punish one of the most successful, both financially (we have a comparatively low cost per pupil) and academically (we have some of the best schools in the country) districts in the state and the very model for what county wide consolidation could and shoud be?
you have absolutely no idea on what your talking about do you?
The state didnt make those payments for 10 years. Why because they either took money directly from the fund or took the money they were supposed to pay into and used it for other programs and also use it to plug that gap in state budgets. At least know what your talking about. If a private pension plan operated like this state did, the admins of the plan would be in jail.
Defined benefit plans are designed to be abused. When you have a plan that is based on the flawed premise that you can "assume" whatever return you hope for (8% or 10%) into existence, you have a ticking bomb on your hands. The only return you can truly "assume" is the risk free return of the markets (e.g. whatever the return on US treasuries is -- more like 3-4%, not 8-10%).
I agree that the plans would be better managed if they were in private hands, e.g. if the union were responsible for them (and the state weren't on the hook if the plan failed to make the "assumed" returns).
But adding better management doesn't alter the fact that the defined benefit scheme is an elaborate scam.
There's always a few people who will banter about strong opinions in regards to teachers and what they do. My assumption is that most of them have something personal against teacher(s) or are simply angry when they listen to the 12 o'clock news while home and out of work and hear what the NJEA is saying and doing.
I think overall most sane and literate people around here, have nothing against the teachers. Their union...that's a different story.
Politics plays a huge roll on this board. As we know it leans heavily right and that reflects the opinions of this boards. That being said it would be nice if people put politics aside and realized most of these problems were caused by Trenton and not the hard working people of the state. Then again nobody would fight if we looked past politics. So just keep fighting.
You know, nobody would ever complain about teachers' salaries OR benefits if state aid was distributed equally to all municipalities. If this were done (meaning Abbott would be no more) property taxes in suburban towns would be instantly cut in half. Why the governor won't take on the activist court and equalize state aid to ALL New Jersey communities is beyond me.
Middle income families are being driven out of this state in droves. It's time to equalize state aid NOW!
What then do you think would happen to urban cities? Just give me an idea what you think would happen?
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