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3/30/2009
Free health benefits - or keep more teachers?
“Do you want to keep free health-care benefits or keep more teachers?” was a question asked recently of teachers at a Los Angeles area charter school.
Free from rigid union contracts, able to make spending decisions at the school-site level and continuing to see enrollment growth, charter schools can run their campuses like small businesses. At a time when the Los Angeles Unified School District faces layoffs of some 8,500 people and is dismantling popular programs to cut costs, some charter schools are actually hiring teachers. One principal that won’t have to hand out layoff notices is Ruben Duenas, in charge of a charter middle school in the Los Angeles School District.
"[Pink-slipping teachers is] in the best interest of adults - not kids."
To save teachers, Duenas said he's cut expenses to the bone - eliminating new textbooks field trips and reducing classroom supplies. "There is nothing left to cut in my budget," he said. "We don't have a bureaucracy, we don't have pay raises. We don't offer lifetime benefits." The union president responds that resulting turnover rates will affect educational programs – and Duenas disagrees. Read the article – does it offer another way for Wisconsin’s kids these days?
H/T Mickey Kaus, Salon.com
Jo Egelhoff, FoxPolitics.net
COMMENTS
It boggles my mind that we have so much opposition to a good universal health care system when it would help not just schools but all businesses and the nation's economy. An excellent case of ideology trumping pragmatism. See Medicare-for-all is best corporate bailout…
Jack Lohman (Mon Mar 30 07:51:53 2009)
Let me add that when the state of Wisconsin fritters away hundreds of millions of dollars on unneeded road projects because the road builders give more campaign cash than the teachers, we need our heads examined.
We spent $200 million to move an Appleton exit on Hwy 45 from the left-side to the right side when a $20M repaving would have sufficed. And we are poised to spend another $25M rebuilding a perfectly adequate Oconomowoc interchange, and hundreds of millions more tearing down the Hoan bridge and rebuilding a lower replacement, and gobs more widening I94 to Chicago. Why? Because campaign cash is more important than good schooling.
Political corruption affects every walk of life, and we wonder why the bankers are so happy?
Jack Lohman (Mon Mar 30 11:13:25 2009)
Jack, Jack. What are you going to do when universal health care is for once and for all finally dead and buried, by mutual/bipartisan/global/whatever-it-takes consent?
And Jack, pleeeeeze, please just try to get around those blinders of your incessant mention of public campaign financing. If you spent more of your time boning up on the Constitution, might that leave you with more time to constructively consider the critical issues of the day?
Just having a little fun Jack...
Jo (Mon Mar 30 15:44:23 2009)
Jo, I'll make a deal with you. Pass public funding of campaigns and I'll give up on the issue of universal health care. I can do that because once the political bribery has been removed it'll pass on its own. The only thing keeping it suppressed is the campaign cash from the insurance industry.
But that brings up our favorite debate. Public funding of campaigns are already constitutional, because they are voluntary. If you want to run for office and continue taking private money, you can. And if you elect to take a taxpayer subsidy, you can as well. It's already been tested in Arizona courts, and it increases speech rather than depresses it.
That said, universal health care is simply not going to die. It is absolutely necessary if we are going to retain a viable economy. There is no other issue as critical today.
Jack Lohman (Mon Mar 30 16:33:12 2009)
Clarification: I said "And if you elect to take a taxpayer subsidy, you can as well."
No, you can instead. You can't do both but you can choose which one you want to take. And in Arizona they don't use taxpayer money, they have a surcharge on criminal fines. If you don't want to contribute, don't speed.
Jack Lohman (Mon Mar 30 17:13:14 2009)
Tell me, Jo. Now that you know that public funding of campaigns are (1) optional to the candidate, (2) constitutional, and (3) do not have to use taxpayer money, would you support them?
Jack Lohman (Tue Mar 31 08:06:12 2009)
No.
No matter how you slice it, "Public funding" doesn't jive with Claim #3. Public funding is public funding. Court costs are state fees. No way to get around that Jack. Just to keep you busy and out of trouble today, perhaps you could research the many ways in which Wisconsin circuit court fees and fines are spent.
Jo (Tue Mar 31 8:14:15 2009)
This would be an additional surcharge on court fees for criminals. Conservatives should love that. If you don't want to fund the elections, don't be a criminal. Just look at the reduction in crime and DUIs.
That said, public funding of campaigns would level the playing field for challengers, and politicians don't like level playing fields.
Jack Lohman (Tue Mar 31 08:39:02 2009)
Jack, you need to study history more. Special interest groups and lobbies all started in a big way w-FDR. He was the one to use the government's gun to start stealing from taxpayers to give to those he thought more worthy.
In other words, he started the govt practice of giving money to this, that, and the other program/state/group. In the 1930s, if you didn't lobby, you didn't get money. Massachusetts took a stand against this; Illinois didn't.
Maybe if the govt didn't take so much taxpayer money, if it dropped all unnecessary programs, if it said "no work, no eat" to bums (yes, bums) on "disability" for ALLERGIES (yes, Ive seen more folks on "disability" for trivial things than you'd imagine)--maybe then there would BE no special-interest groups, lobbyists, etc.
Whether you believe it or not (one day, you SURELY will), the Bible IS God's word, and it pretty clearly spells out the role of a central government: law and order, which would also include national defense. That's it.
But nowadays, people want to put govt in the place of God, and they look to govt, not Him, for all their answers.
emily matthews (Tue Mar 31 08:43:10 2009)
Emily, the highest standard of living in the world is said to be Sweden. Also 50% taxes, but most of us could accept that knowing that it has only socialized healthcare and education. See At this point socialism looks pretty good…. Sure, socialization is a naughty word, but their public funding of campaigns keeps politicians in check and working for the public instead of the priuvate interests that fund their campaigns. Yea, history. Will we ever learn?
Jack Lohman (Tue Mar 31 09:13:04 2009)
Jo sez: "Public funding is public funding."
What if we changed the words to "Criminal funding of campaigns"? Is that any different from "Bribery?"
Jack Lohman (Tue Mar 31 11:57:31 2009)
So, Jack, you're telling me you are indeed looking to govt for the answers? You'll always be let down, you know...
If govt didn't GIVE money to selected groups, there would BE no special interest groups. Sweden also has extremely high rates of alcoholism and suicide; I know, I used to live only about 450 miles from it. The problem is so bad they even have an insurance co. specially for teetotallers: Ansvar.
If you have an idea or concept, you develop it, and are able to get folks to pay you for it, you are said to be CAPITALIZING on it, not socializing on it
emily matthews (Wed Apr 01 09:39:37 2009)
Emily, the politicians are given campaign cash specifically so they will spend government money. That's why I favor public funding of campaigns. Get the bribes out of the system and spending will go down.
Jack Lohman (Wed Apr 01 10:26:13 2009)
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