Gov. Christie proposes freezing teacher pay

By far the largest component of our escalating property tax bill is the school tax. And a major factor in the school tax is teacher and administrator salaries, which rise on average more than 4% each and every year.

Meanwhile New Jersey is facing a cataclysmic budget deficit, now estimated to be in excess of $10 billion dollars. Goveronr Christie has called for a salary freeze at all levels of state government. And since he believes that all public employees should actually mean all public employees he's calling for that freeze to extend to K-12 education, county, and municipal governments too.

Hey, we're all in this together, right? Taxpayers are getting squeezed, folks are losing their jobs (and their homes), investments are in free fall. The only growth industry in New Jersey is government, so it's high time for them to feel some pain too.

Uh, not according to the NJEA. They're like Tony Soprano coming around to collect his vig. They don't care what trouble we're having, their standard line is "F-U, pay me".

A spokesman for the New Jersey Education Association, which represents 200,000 teachers statewide, called the pay-freeze proposal "a direct violation of collective bargaining." Most districts are in the middle of current contracts, said spokesman Steve Wollmer.

Well Mr. Wollmer, it's either a pay freeze or massive layoffs. You make the call.

Posted at 10:42 by Chris Wysocki   [/nj_politics]   Comments | Perm Link |
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