Public Employees Protesting WI Governor

[MARIS61]

An interesting position. You are now on record as stating that any elected official quoting numbers is now not to be believed. Got it.

How did you arrive at that convoluted conclusion?

 

[MARIS61]

Tell that to the church-funded missions who feed homeless people every day.

They're merely recruiting followers through duress. The needy are the only vulnerable people at their disposal.

Insidiously selfish and deceitful, IMO.

 

[MARIS61]

Also, how does a state union worker serve their "country"?

In Sug's case, he may be responsible for inspiring and educating the 60th President or the Doc who cures cancer.

BTW, Wisconsin IS part of America.

How does a private sector "consultant" serve his country?

 

[MARIS61]

Just a total miss, in so many ways.

Another non-post in lieu of a supportable arguement.

 

[maxiep]

This really isn't going where you wanted.

I did have a home I listed and the buyer was fired 3 days before closing. He thought he'd just not tell anyone, even his wife, but the lender of course checked on closing day and cancelled the sale.

And they paid a penalty for not fulfilling their promise to buy (lost their earnest money). And they didn't get to buy the house, and now live in a run down rental.

They didn't get to take back what they had promised (their earnest money). They just had to live a sparser lifestyle.

Employed teachers should not suffer because some taxpayers are struggling. It is the taxpayers who must trim their personal budgets so they can pay the additional taxes required to fulfill the promises they made through their elected reps.

The seller did suffer. He or she held his or her house off the market for the escrow period. He or she had to make at least one extra mortgage payment. He or she didn't get the money for their house when they though they would. Who knows what that buyer could have gotten if that buyer didn't plug up the works for 29-59 days? Perhaps he or she made net money off the escrow, perhaps not. It's an unknown.

But thank you for finally getting to a point where we can have clarity. You believe that employed teachers shouldn't be affected by the economy; the taxpayers have to bear that burden regarless of economic circumstance. I think there are times when the economic reality has to affect those employed by the government. We'll agree to disagree.

 

[PapaG]

They're merely recruiting followers through duress. The needy are the only vulnerable people at their disposal.

Insidiously selfish and deceitful, IMO.

Fair enough, but they are still serving, aren't they? Plus, most of them are paying taxes from private sector income.

I guess I don't understand why you're so upset about this Wisconsin thing, anyhow. You're grandfathered in to any public retirement that you scammed from the rest of us. At least, you are until the state runs out of our money, freeloader.

 

[maxiep]

Nobody died.

The elected governor mismanaged the state and blew wads of money rewarding the uber-wealthy with massive tax cuts and exhorbitant spending bills.

Now he's saying "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain."

I presented a hypothetical and asked you a direct and specific question--regarding the death of a corporation and their reneging on a promise to employ people nine months out--and you dodged it. It's cool. I understand why you did.

 

[maxiep]

Religious organizations, by their very definition, do not serve their country.

We'll agree to disagree on this point.

 

[PapaG]

In Sug's case, he may be responsible for inspiring and educating the 60th President or the Doc who cures cancer.

So may be a private school teacher. According to you and Sug, though, that teacher isn't serving his country.

BTW, Wisconsin IS part of America.

This is a state budgetary issue, though. The President really has no business instigating matters in it, yet there he is, doing what he does.

How does a private sector "consultant" serve his country?

By paying the salaries for the public mooches who claim they are special by "serving" their country.

As I said, the free ride for you leeches is just about over. I can't wait.

 

[maxiep]

In Sug's case, he may be responsible for inspiring and educating the 60th President or the Doc who cures cancer.

BTW, Wisconsin IS part of America.

How does a private sector "consultant" serve his country?

Question: Barack Obama was almost exclusively privately educated (Punahou, Occidental, Columbia, Harvard). Looking back, most of our Presidents were privately educated at some point in their lives. How do you reconcile that fact with your statement about private school teachers not serving while a public school teacher educating someone important has merit?

 

[MARIS61]

Question: Barack Obama was almost exclusively privately educated (Punahou, Occidental, Columbia, Harvard). Looking back, most of our Presidents were privately educated at some point in their lives. How do you reconcile that fact with your statement about private school teachers not serving while a public school teacher educating someone important has merit?

I never made such a statement, nor do I believe it.

Anyone who teaches the truth serves their countrymen.

 

[MARIS61]

But thank you for finally getting to a point where we can have clarity. You believe that employed teachers shouldn't be affected by the economy; the taxpayers have to bear that burden regarless of economic circumstance. I think there are times when the economic reality has to affect those employed by the government. We'll agree to disagree.

No I don't.

They suffer like we all due. They pay higher taxes and higher food costs and higher health, utility, gas costs...

And some lose their jobs.

 

[maxiep]

I never made such a statement, nor do I believe it.

Anyone who teaches the truth serves their countrymen.

http://sportstwo.com/threads/178965...-WI-Governor?p=2541217&viewfull=1#post2541217

How does a private sector "consultant" serve his country?

As an aside, who decides what the "truth" is?

 

[PapaG]

No I don't.

They suffer like we all due. They pay higher taxes and higher food costs and higher health, utility, gas costs...

And some lose their jobs.

Well, they're not really paying the taxes, since it all comes from taxed money to begin with. Plus, they then just negotiate higher wages to offset the taxes. It's a great scam. Capone would be proud...

 

[PapaG]

I forgot the best part, where the taxpayer-funded wages then get an amount garnished by the public unions for "dues", which then go back to the Democratic Party in the form of donations.

It really is a brilliant scam. Too bad people are catching on to it.

 

[maxiep]

No I don't.

They suffer like we all due. They pay higher taxes and higher food costs and higher health, utility, gas costs...

And some lose their jobs.

They have their jobs and benefits not maintained while others who they ask to pay that compensation are losing both. You can't get blood from a stone, no matter how much people protest.

 

[MARIS61]

http://sportstwo.com/threads/178965...-WI-Governor?p=2541217&viewfull=1#post2541217

How does a private sector "consultant" serve his country?


As an aside, who decides what the "truth" is?

I was asking PapaG how he serves his country in his business as a consultant. I made no reference to teachers.

The truth is.

No decision necessary.

Oh, I forgot.

It's fine and dandy to lie in your real world.

 

[MARIS61]

Well, they're not really paying the taxes, since it all comes from taxed money to begin with. Plus, they then just negotiate higher wages to offset the taxes. It's a great scam. Capone would be proud...

Takes two to negotiate.

If they out-negotiated the state's hired guns at the bargaining table, more power to them.

I think it's more likely that a lot of people are under-compensated for their efforts due to the dearth of unions since Reagan crushed them and rather than confront THAT issue they'd rather blame who they have been told to hate.

It's called shooting one's self in the foot.

 

[MARIS61]

They have their jobs and benefits not maintained while others who they ask to pay that compensation are losing both. You can't get blood from a stone, no matter how much people protest.

They're not asking. They were promised.

The taxpayers asked them to teach their children and offered certain benefits, not the other way around.

 

[maxiep]

I was asking PapaG how he serves his country in his business as a consultant. I made no reference to teachers.

The truth is.

No decision necessary.

Oh, I forgot.

It's fine and dandy to lie in your real world.

You can continue to obsfucate and to try to bait me, but I'm not interested in mindless bickering at the edges of this debate. It's simply better to say we have differing opinions about public unions and the burden taxpayers should have to bear. We simply have to agree to disagree.

 

[maxiep]

They're not asking. They were promised.

The taxpayers asked them to teach their children and offered certain benefits, not the other way around.

The deal has to change. The people can't afford the promises politicians have made. You're free to contribute any or all of your salary to the Wisconsin treasury if you wish.

 

[maxiep]

Takes two to negotiate.

If they out-negotiated the state's hired guns at the bargaining table, more power to them.

I think it's more likely that a lot of people are under-compensated for their efforts due to the dearth of unions since Reagan crushed them and rather than confront THAT issue they'd rather blame who they have been told to hate.

It's called shooting one's self in the foot.

And once again, you've hit upon the salient issue: The two people negotiating were on the same side of the table. The policitians that negotiated that deal and the teachers' union were in bed together.

 

[PapaG]

And once again, you've hit upon the salient issue: The two people negotiating were on the same side of the table. The policitians that negotiated that deal and the teachers' union were in bed together.

I was going to point this out yet again, but MARIS seems incapable of understanding the absurdity of public unions "negotiating" with the very Democratic majorities to which they give millions of dollars in donations. Now that the GOP is in the WI majority, and with a GOP governor, the bribes to the Dems are worthless as a negotiating chip.

Luckily, it appears that the majority of the private sector is waking up to this scam, and putting an end to it.

 

[PapaG]

Walker from this morning talks about collective bargaining.

[video=youtube;KgOmpIR7Uns]

 

[maxiep]

Minka once again slapped down.

 

[PapaG]

SEIU! SEIU!

[video=youtube;DQj-xBH30-I]

 

[mook]

Some interesting analysis of the impact of unions on teaching:
http://studentactivism.net/2011/02/...s-wisconsin-out-ranking-the-non-union-states/

As I posted yesterday, the tweets going around comparing Wisconsin’s SAT/ACT scores to five states where teachers have no right to unionize are based on bad data — it’s not true that Wisconsin’s SAT/ACT ranking is second in the nation, and that Texas, Virginia, Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina are all clustered at the bottom of the pile. The chart that says otherwise is based on outdated statistics and improper statistical analysis.
So what’s the truth? What would good data tell us about this question?
Well, it turns out that that’s kind of a complicated question. I can answer it, but you’ll have to bear with me for more than 140 characters.
It’s hard to measure SAT/ACT performance, because different numbers of students take the tests in every state, and comparing the strongest students from one state with a much bigger sample from another doesn’t tell us much that’s interesting. A 2000 study in the Harvard Educational Review, in fact, found that 85% of the difference in states’ performance on those tests is due to variation in participation rates.
Having said that, though, it’s clear from the numbers in my last post that once you’ve controlled for participation Wisconsin remains near the top of the country on SAT/ACT scores, Virginia is near the middle, and the rest of the no-union states from the tweet are near the bottom. High school graduation rates — the subject of another popular Wisconsin tweet meme in recent days — tell a similar story. It’s not as dramatic as best vs. worst, but it’s still dramatic.
Wisconsin does well on a third measure of student performance, too. Its scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) in 2009 were above the national average in three of four measures (fourth grade math and eighth grade math and reading) and at the national average in the other (fourth grade reading). Of the ten states in the US without teachers’ unions, only one — Virginia — had NAEP results above the national average, and four — Arizona, Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi — were in the bottom quintile. (One scholar, in fact, found that the states with the strongest teachers unions tended to out-perform states with weaker unions too.)

There's much more there if you want to read. Pretty interesting stuff.

There was also a really interesting interview last night on Charlie Rose with Wendy Kopp:
http://www.charlierose.com/guest/view/6389

She pointed out that only around 1% of teachers in both union and non-union states ever get fired. And that studies show union organization boosts teacher salaries only about 6-7%. So it's not like if we eviscerate teachers unions it'll suddenly make our public education system better or drastically cheaper.

Her bigger point, which I really get, is that it takes leadership within the school to really turn things around. A smart, hard-driving leader running the school has been the one recurring theme found in pretty much every public or private school success story.

So maybe rather than focusing on union/non-union stuff and how easy or not easy it is to fire a bad teacher, we focus on how we build that leadership talent in the schools. I don't think it happens by expanding union rights, but I also don't think it happens by portraying teachers as parasites and leeches.

 

[PtldPlatypus]

Her bigger point, which I really get, is that it takes leadership within the school to really turn things around. A smart, hard-driving leader running the school has been the one recurring theme found in pretty much every public or private school success story.

So maybe rather than focusing on union/non-union stuff and how easy or not easy it is to fire a bad teacher, we focus on how we build that leadership talent in the schools. I don't think it happens by expanding union rights, but I also don't think it happens by portraying teachers as parasites and leeches.

So my question to you would be--do we need to make the school leadership positions (principal, superintendant, other?) more desirable, or better clarify what type of person/focus should fill those roles, or do we need better oversight of those positions, or what else should change to drive toward that goal of building leadership talent in schools?

Personally, I have no idea; I'm just curious what you think.

 

[blazerboy30]

Some interesting analysis of the impact of unions on teaching:
http://studentactivism.net/2011/02/...s-wisconsin-out-ranking-the-non-union-states/
There's much more there if you want to read. Pretty interesting stuff.

There was also a really interesting interview last night on Charlie Rose with Wendy Kopp:
http://www.charlierose.com/guest/view/6389

She pointed out that only around 1% of teachers in both union and non-union states ever get fired. And that studies show union organization boosts teacher salaries only about 6-7%. So it's not like if we eviscerate teachers unions it'll suddenly make our public education system better or drastically cheaper.

I don't believe that the actually salaries are the biggest problem, although that 6-7% is what is being asked for here, so that actually is a pretty significant difference. The biggest problem and disparity is the guaranteed PERs and benefits that put the incredible costs on the state.

 

[mook]

So my question to you would be--do we need to make the school leadership positions (principal, superintendant, other?) more desirable, or better clarify what type of person/focus should fill those roles, or do we need better oversight of those positions, or what else should change to drive toward that goal of building leadership talent in schools?

Personally, I have no idea; I'm just curious what you think.

Well, I don't have any special wisdom on this topic. My gut always told me to way overpay the teachers and eliminate/underpay admin positions whenever possible. But this Kopp lady says the research doesn't in anyway support my gut.

She comes with the same mindset I approach most things:
1. Ignore your gut instincts
2. Benchmark performers within the system, and also the system itself against other systems in other countries/markets/etc
3. Establish which ones perform the highest at whatever goal you want to achieve
4. Use those high performers as models to improve the overall system

It's a great business strategy and a great personal growth strategy. And it's the same strategy I'd apply to health care, immigration, and pretty much every other public policy.

She seems to say you start by attracting the highest quality administrators (principals, etc) to the schools, empower them, put up some basic metrics (which we have thanks to No Child Left Behind), and get out of their way. That's what's been proven to work. I'm for that.