You get what you pay for

NJ Governor Christie has told a teacher, upset at his scapegoating of the teachers, to find another job if she doesn't think she is being paid enough. Yes, because having Joe the plumber teach our children, in lieu of someone qualified, is such a great bargain. You pay for what you get and, having grown up in NYC with teachers and an education inferior to what I saw my cousins in the NJ suburbs get, I know what a difference a good teacher makes. While some students are motivated to succeed on their own, many are not. I know too many bright guys spending their days loading sodas onto trucks (not that there is anything wrong with that) who could have been so much more. I pay high taxes, in part, because I expect good schools and that includes good teachers.

NJ has 21 counties and almost 600 school districts. Each district as their own superintendent, some of whom make more than the Governor, plus assistant superintendents, who also make a pretty penny, and their staffs. In my town we have one school system for grades K-8 and another for high school (though that is regional with 5 other towns). Start consolidating the districts, perhaps to the county level, K-12, and we'll have money to pay a nice chunk of the teachers being laid off (who are probably at the bottom of the pay scale since it will probably be the newbies being laid off). But we, don't hear anything like this from the Governor as he continues to bash individual contributors. Why?

And before anyone thinks I'm letting the union off scott free, calm down. I'm not familiar with the union benefits, but if their contracts are anything like other school systems, which, for example, mandate to the minute how much teachers should spend on X, Y & Z (I know many teachers voluntarily spend more time), then there is plenty of fat to cut out at the next bargaining session. And the unions can really help themselves by not being so tone deaf and falling into the Governor's trap. I imagine the responses would have been less vicious if the unions had responded with a plan where the lower paid teachers still received some raise while those in the upper portions of the pay scale foregoed theirs (and a 1.5% co-pay for health care is nothing).