Jen Kuznicki
Wow, Rahm Emmanuel is willing to completely bankrupt the city of Chicago to end the strike. He is willing to give up the major reforms he planned to a school district that doesn’t even guarantee textbooks on the first day of class for students NOW.
Since 1987, when the city’s teachers last walked out, former Mayor Richard M. Daley got leaders of the Chicago Teachers Union to go along with various reform measures by raising teachers’ pay and improving their retirement benefits. His administration also embarked on an expensive construction program that built new schools and repaired old ones, even as the number of students declined.
To cover the costs, CPS borrowed heavily and siphoned billions of dollars from the teachers’ pension fund. Those moves, compounded by the burst of the dot-com bubble and a severe recession, have thrown the school district into a financial tailspin.
Since 2001, the district has seen its net assets plummet from $1.2 billion to negative $1.2 billion, a decrease of 200 percent.
It’s like they are all fighting about nonexistent funds! Hey everyone, there is no money, (yeah, but we want more!)
“We are a democratic body and therefore we want to ensure all of our members have had the chance to weigh-in on what we were able to win,” CTU President Karen Lewis said in a statement Saturday. “We believe this is a good contract, however, no contract will solve all of the inequities in our District. Our fair contract fight has always been about returning dignity and respect to our members and ensuring resources and a quality school day for our students and their families.”
Karen Lewis admits something here that I don’t think a lot of people get. Inequality is inevitable. No government or authority can give you equality. Just think, the massive amount of taxpayer money on the line, the mayor willing to give concessions just to stop the mob from growing, and Lewis admits, “no contract will solve all of the inequities in our District.”
And do you know why? Because people are fallible, and no matter what your intentions, you can’t make two different individuals the same, nor a handful equal. People are not bits of matter, easily weighed and carefully measured. People are extremely complicated, and it wasn’t too long ago, when we used to applaud our differences and individuality.
The union mentality, as you can see from the video, is about power. But not individual empowerment, union power. Every one of those teachers striking for more tax dollars from people who make less than 50% of what they do now, are giving more money and power to the union bosses. Not the kids or the teachers.
This is all utter insanity.
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