The Violence of Chicago’s Teachers

Gary North reports on what is behind the teachers union:

Any school board that will publish a "help wanted" ad that is based on the prevailing annual salary of any teacher in the district, including the lowest-paid teacher, will find that it has a glut of applications.

Never say "shortage." Always say "shortage at a government-mandated price ceiling." Never say "glut." Always say "glut at a government-mandated price floor."

This means that the power of the teachers union is based entirely on legislation that grants to the teachers union the legal authority to strike. The threat of the strike, or the threat of intervention by the National Labor Relations Board, is what prevents any school board from reducing salaries by at least 25% across the board, and doubling the size of the classrooms.

There is not a school district in the United States that could not cut its overall expenses by at least 50% in one year by taking three steps: (1) cut the total budget allocated to administration to 20% of the total budget; (2) double the number of students in each classroom, and (3) drop next term’s salary levels by 25%.

If any public school teacher does not understand this, that teacher is completely out of touch with economic reality. Any school district that does not understand this is also out of touch with economic reality. With something in the range of 500,000 unemployed or marginally employed teachers in the United States, who are fully certified to teach, any district that pays today’s level of salaries to its teachers is simply flushing the taxpayers’ money down the drain.

You'll want to read the entire article twice.