UNION LEADERSHIP ARE IN THE TOP 1% OF INCOME EARNERS

UNION LEADERSHIP ARE IN THE TOP 1% OF INCOME EARNERS

Meet the Bosses:  Big Labor’s Top Ten

http://watchdog.org/168323/meet-bosses-big-labors-top-100/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=watchdognewsletter_36

Watchdog.org – Jason Hart – 9/3/2014

Open the link to see the list of 100 top union-dues paid leaders

Union officials lived even higher on the hog in fiscal 2013 than the year before, when 428 union officers and employees were paid more than $250,000 and the top 100 received compensation totaling $52.1 million.

The latest list of the 100 highest-paid union bosses is led by employees of the MLB, NBA, and NFL players’ unions — unsurprising, given the prevalence of seven-figure contracts among the professional athletes they represent.

American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President Randi Weingarten was paid $543,150 last year.

However, dozens of union officers and employees — whose paychecks come from teachers, government workers and blue-collar laborers — are also paid $350,000 or more.


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DEMOCRAT DONOR LIST NOT SO SECRET NOW

Read the Confidential Document Left Behind at the Democracy Alliance Meeting

http://freebeacon.com/politics/jonathan-soros-left-a-confidential-document-at-his-donor-conference/?advD=1248,47631

Free Beacon – Lachlan Markay – 5/5/2014

Lost post that details millionaires and billionaires and how they fund democratic candidates and policies.

Northwoods Patriots - Standing up for Faith, Family, Country

SEIU MILWAUKEE DOWN OVER $1 MILLION IN DUES

(Hint:  Act 10 works!)

Union helps write living wage ordinance that could cost taxpayers millions

http://watchdog.org/123008/union-milwaukee-millions/

Watch Dog – Adam Tobias – 1/10/2014

By Adam Tobias | Wisconsin Reporter

MILWAUKEE, Wis. — Big Labor has helped a Milwaukee County Board member write a union-boosting minimum wage proposal that could cost taxpayers more than $27 million over the next six years.

The “living wage” ordinance also could bankrupt the county’s Department of Family Care, stunt job growth and hinder future development, according to a fiscal analysis by the county’s nonpartisan comptroller’s office.

County Supervisor David Bowen wrote the legislation in collaboration with the Service Employees International Union.

Bowen, endorsed by the SEIU Wisconsin State Council in his 2012 election, worked withlabor  union representatives on about 15 drafts and met with them several times in his office at the county courthouse, County Supervisor James “Luigi” Schmitt confirmed.

“SEIU, they’ve been lockstep with it,” Schmitt told Wisconsin Reporter.

The proposed law would set a living wage of $12.45 per hour for 350 county employees and hundreds of others who work under contract with the county.

The proposal, however, offers contracting firms an exemption from the wage hike, but only if their workers are covered by a collective bargaining agreement between the employer and a bona fide labor union.

“This is obviously an attempt to strengthen unions that have pretty much gone to the wayside,” Supervisor Steve Taylor said. “It’s frustrating that, for their own self-interest, they are going to drive jobs out of Milwaukee County. They are more focused on their own membership and their own power and strength than they are to the average working people of the county.”

The living wage ordinance also could remove close to $27.4 million from the tax levy through 2019, according to a report by Milwaukee County Comptroller Scott Manske.

Annual costs could reach more than $8 million after 2017, the year when the Family Care program’s reserves are expected to run out.

Expenses also will continue to increase as contracts expire and the bidding for new agreements requires compliance with the minimum wage ordinance.

Additionally, the living-wage rate increases, on average, by about 2.5 percent every year.

If a developer chooses to receive financial assistance of more than $1 million from the county, that company and their site’s tenants also would be subject to the minimum wage ordinance.

Manske said the county’s minor role in economic development would then become “non-existent.”

That could lead to the county losing out on an estimated $34.5 million in land sales, $11 million in additional tax revenue and 8,700 new jobs.

“There is no free lunch,” said Chris Edwards, director of tax policy studies at the Cato Institute. “Every dollar of mandated increase in wage is a dollar coming out of somewhere else in the economy. These politicians seem to think money grows on trees and it just doesn’t. There’s no Santa Claus here. All of this has to be paid for.”

Santa would instead visit the homes and offices of officials and members of an SEIU hit hard since Wisconsin in 2011 passed Act 10, Gov. Scott Walker’s signature law that reformed collective bargaining for government employees.

The Milwaukee SEIU reported revenue of $1,878,513 in 2010, $938,478 in 2011 and $780,923 in 2012, according to IRS tax documents.

If all of the approximately 2,400 employees who work for the Family Care program’s Supportive Home Care Employment Services were to join the SEIU, the union could see hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional income every year.

And that’s just one piece of the puzzle. The ordinance also includes contracted food, security, janitorial and clerical services.

While Bowen says the goal is to help Milwaukee County residents move above the federal poverty line, union dues and other contributions would cut deeply into wage increases.

A vote on the living wage law has been delayed until February, Bowen said.

Bowen is trying to get a veto-proof majority of 12 votes to prevent County Executive Chris Abele from blocking the legislation.

“This mandate will cost taxpayers millions of dollars, thousands of jobs and ultimately risk the county’s important safety net services,” Abele said in a December memo to supervisors.

Abele last summer vetoed a development agreement with Hospitality Specialists Inc. on an $8 million extended-stay hotel in Wauwatosa because of a provision forcing the firm to provide starting wages of about $14 an hour.

Hospitality Specialists co-owner Jim Mann told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel the clause would have made the hotel uncompetitive and killed the project.

Contact Adam Tobias at atobias@watchdog.org or follow him on Twitter @Scoop_Tobias

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WISCONSIN TEACHERS FREE TO LEAVE UNION

Quitting government unions made easy, thanks to website

http://watchdog.org/109495/wr-teacher-freedom/

Wisconsin Reporter – Ryan Ekvall – 10/7/2013

The Education Action Group, a conservative education reform organization, and Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, a conservative public interest law firm, sponsor the new website, TeacherFreedom.org.

The site generates an automated letter.

http://www.teacherfreedom.org/opt-out-letter.html

“I object to paying any further union dues, fees, or assessments. I demand that you issue a refund of any prepaid dues to which I am entitled. This letter is also notice that I hereby revoke any agreement in place to automatically deduct union dues, fees, or assessments from my earnings or from any of my accounts or to charge such fees on my credit card.”

“Any further collection of dues or fees from me will violate my rights under Wisconsin law,” concludes the letter.

Teachers can print the letter and send it in to their union representative and employer.

Some 400 unions representing more than 60,000 school district employees will face re-certification elections in November, meaning government union membership in Wisconsin could plunge even further.

New website reminds Wisconsin teahers they are allowed to resign from unions, tells them how to do it

http://eagnews.org/new-website-reminds-wisconsin-teachers-they-can-resign-from-unions-and-tells-them-how-to-do-it/

EAG News.org – Steve Gunn

TeacherFreedom.org, a new website sponsored by Education Action Group and the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, reminds teachers that they don’t have to belong to any branch of WEAC, the American Federation of Teachers or any other teachers union.

As the website says, under Act 10, “union membership is completely voluntary. You cannot legally be fired from your job or be penalized for belonging to a union or refraining from membership.

“Before Act 10, unions could require nonmembers as a contingency of employment to pay agency fees to cover the costs associated with collective bargaining. Since Act 10, nonmembers can no longer be forced to pay agency fees or otherwise be forced to make mandatory contributions to their union.”

Since the law changed, many school districts have been recruiting and negotiating with veteran teachers, with no salary restrictions. School districts are now free to pay whatever they can afford to attract reputable teachers, and teachers are free to accept higher salaries.

Some Wisconsin school administrators have reported offering teachers from other districts raises of $10,000 or more to make the switch.

“I think, over the next few years, a lot of Wisconsin educators will be excited to learn about their increased value on the open market,” Olson said. “Teachers are extremely important professionals, and community school districts are under a lot of pressure from parents to attract the best possible educators.

 

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UNION RE-CERTIFICATION DECLINING

Wisconsin teachers union decertified in latest blow to labor under Walker law

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/09/15/wisconsin-teachers-union-decertified-in-latest-blow-to-labor-under-walker-law/

Fox News – Barnini Chakraborty – 9/15/2013

According to Reuters, elections in 2011 and 2012 -- in which 207 school districts, 39 municipal and six state units participated -- resulted in 32 unions and their affiliates, or about 13 percent, being decertified.

"It seems like the majority of our affiliates in the state aren't seeking re-certification, so I don't think the KEA is an outlier or unique in this," Brey told the paper, adding that certification gives the union scant power over a limited number of issues they'd like a voice in.

“The public at large — and an increasing number of union members — have become wise to the fact labor unions stifle innovation and burden governments and businesses with unsustainable costs and regulations."

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RETIRED TEACHERS ON PENSION ALLOWED TO DOUBLE-DIP

Rent-a-teacher bill passes out of committee

http://watchdog.org/105878/rent-a-teacher-bill-passes-out-of-committee/

Watch Dog – Ryan Ekvall – 9/13/2013

Lawmakers on Thursday unanimously passed a bill out of committee that could reduce aid to rural school districts and make it easier for retired teachers to skirt a new law aimed at reducing “double dipping” — the practice of collecting a public pension and then going back to work for the government.

Retired teachers who receive paychecks from a third-party service, or ‘rent-a-sub’ agency, instead of the school district would bypass a new state law that requires a 75-day separation window before a retiree collecting a public pension check goes back to government work.  The bill also allows two-thirds work — 880 hours per school year for teachers — before pension checks are put on hold.

READER COMMENT:  "The Middleton-Cross Plains Area School District, for example, recorded 11,000 teacher absences last year, about 16 absences per teacher..." Let's see, they work nine months out of the year, get multiple days off for "Planning days", "Early Release days", etc., yet are still absent an average of almost 2 days a month, (or about 10% of the time considering a 20 work-day month). Does anyone else see an issue with attendance here?

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PUBLIC SECTOR UNIONS DOWN - WAY WAY DOWN

Demise:  Wisconsin’s third-largest school district says no thanks to union representation

http://hotair.com/archives/2013/09/12/demise-wisconsins-third-largest-school-district-says-no-thanks-to-union-representation/

HotAir – Mary Katherine Ham – 9/12/2013

Today, teachers in Kenosha, Wis., voted to decertify their union, the Kenosha Education Association, by a margin of nearly two to one. Only 37 percent of the teachers opted to retain the union in an election made possible by the labor reforms enacted under Gov. Scott Walker (R). The result goes to show that when workers have a choice on whether to join a union instead of being forced into one by law, they often choose to vote down the union.

More news and more links on this article

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AFL-CIO AT ODDS WITH OBAMACARE

AFL-CIO nearing formal criticism of ObamaCare

http://thehill.com/blogs/healthwatch/health-reform-implementation/321243-afl-cio-nearing-formal-criticism-of-obamacare

The Hill – Kevin Bogardus – 9/10/2013

LOS ANGELES — Unions, after a contentious and difficult process, are on the cusp of issuing formal criticism of ObamaCare at the AFL-CIO convention.

The AFL-CIO Executive Council is expected to consider a resolution, subject to fierce internal debate, that will call for changes to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) — setting up a potential floor vote this Wednesday before the convention closes. Frustration has grown within labor as the Obama administration has failed to offer a fix to temper union worries over the law.

A copy of the draft resolution, obtained by The Hill, praises aspects of ObamaCare and states that the AFL-CIO supports the law’s goal of providing healthcare coverage for all. But the four-page document lays out a laundry list of complaints against ObamaCare — at times taking aim at the administration.

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WISCONSIN UNION CHANGES ARE LEGAL

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/09/11/federal-judge-rules-wisconsin-union-changes-legal/?test=latestnews#ixzz2edIE072a
Fox News - AP - 9/11/2013

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OBAMACARE IS A LOSS FOR AFL-CIO

Citing ObamaCare, 40,000 Longshoremen quit the AFL-CIO

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/09/01/Citing-Obamacare-40-000-Longshoremen-Quit-the-AFL-CIO

Breitbart – Warner Todd Huston – 9/2/2013

In what is being reported as a surprise move, the 40,000 members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) announced that they have formally ended their association with the AFL-CIO, one of the nation's largest private sector unions. The Longshoremen citied Obamacare and immigration reform as two important causes of their disaffiliation.

In an August 29 letter to AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, ILWU President Robert McEllrath cited quite a list of grievances as reasons for the disillusion of their affiliation, but prominent among them was the AFL-CIO's support of Obamare.

"We feel the Federation has done a great disservice to the labor movement and all working people by going along to get along," McEllrath wrote in the letter to Trumka.

The Longshoreman leader said, "President Obama ran on a platform that he would not tax medical plans and at the 2009 AFL-CIO Convention, you stated that labor would not stand for a tax on our benefits." But, regardless of that promise, the President has pushed for just such a tax and Trumka and the AFL-CIO bowed to political pressure lining up behind Obama's tax on those plans.

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NEA: DUES UP, MEMBERSHIP DOWN

NEA:  Dues up, membership down

http://www.eagleforum.org/publications/educate/aug13/nea-dues-membership.html

Eagle Forum

 

Full-time union teachers will pay $179 in national dues for the 2013-14 school year. This is in addition to dues paid to their state affiliate; for Ohio Education Association members, state dues are an additional $508. Ohio is not a right-to-work state, so most teachers must join the union. In Virginia, a right-to-work state, fewer than 20% of teachers join the union.

While the NEA is still the largest workers union in the nation, membership is down. Some teachers choose to quit the union as state laws change to allow this. The union is more socially liberal than the majority of teachers and some do not subscribe to the radical union agenda. Union President Dennis Van Roekel still claims three million NEA members, but the modified 2013-14 NEA Strategic Plan and Budget predicts 2,410,200 full-time members.

Of those, 1,685,000 are “active teaching professionals.” The balance is made up of those who do not pay as much in dues as teachers such as education support professionals, staff, substitutes, retired, and student members. Total NEA annual dues amount to over $347 million.

The union Executive Committee received a 3% bonus at a time when other budget areas are being cut. Some union members were unhappy about this. Delegates at the 2013 convention passed New Business Item 47, which demands that union leadership provide justification for any future bonus they receive.

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ARE HIGH TAXES DUE TO HIGH “PUBLIC SERVANT” SALARIES AND PENSION?

Tax avenger takes message to small-town WI

http://watchdog.org/102166/wr-tax-fighter/

Wisconsin Reporter – Ryan Ekvall – 8/21/2013

Please read the entire article because we’re obviously not getting what we’re paying for.

John Granchay, a government retiree and former school board member, confronted Tobin, saying he worked hard for his pension.

EXCUSE ME: John Granchay, a WRS retiree, confronts Tobin on his inflated pension estimates

“I’m still working,” Tobin answered. “I’m going to have to work until I drop to pay your pensions.”

“What did you do for a living that you earned your pension?” Granchay asked.

“I don’t have a pension,” Tobin said. “Don’t you get it? People in the private sector don’t have pensions anymore.”

One state employee brought Tobin’s Shawano-riverfront house property tax records to the meeting to expose what he called the tax-fighter’s “true” motive, an ax-to-grind with the city.

“Our property taxes here went up from $4,000 to $6,700 in one year. The schools went crazy with tax increases.”

Tobin organizes strikes and demonstrations, distributes fliers opposing all referendums to increase property taxes. He takes on politicians and government employees – whom he calls “bloodsuckers” and “special interests,” respectively.

“They don’t like it when we release the salaries. They don’t want folks to know who’s getting the stolen money,” Tobin said. “They expect us to keep working and working and paying and not complaining. They were upset (Monday) night – ‘Oh, you’re complaining, you’re so negative.’ Well, of course I am. (They’re) robbing us blind.”

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UNION ALTERNATIVE FOR WISCONSIN TEACHERS

Education labor group:  We have another way

http://watchdog.org/98348/alternative-to-teachers-unions-looking-to-make-push-in-wi/

Watch Dog – Ryan Ekvall and Kirsten Adshead – 7/29/2013

Lacroix left the classroom in June to take a job as membership director for the Wisconsin branch of the American Association of Educators, which provides liability insurance and professional resources for educators, without collective bargaining and without political lobbying.

“We’re not another union,” she said. “We’re an alternative to the union.”

Teachers aren’t the only public employees looking for new options in post Act 10 Wisconsin.

Two weeks ago, state corrections officers voted to disband from the Wisconsin State Employees Union for the greener pastures of the Wisconsin Association for Correctional Law Enforcement.

The WACLE now represents close to 5,900 state employees. WACLE cut dues in half from $36 a month under WSEU to about $18 a month.

WACLE interim president Brian Cunningham previously chastised WSEU-AFSME for spending too much money filling lawmaker’s campaign coffers and not enough representing its members. “In the post-Act 10 world, AFSCME has been nowhere to be seen,” Cunningham said.

READER COMMENT:  The website of NEA’s Iowa affiliate says, “The goal of AAE is to weaken the membership strength of NEA and its state and local affiliates, thus reducing the Association’s political power and making it easier to privatize public education.” And this is negative in what way? The NEA exists to serve the desires of its dues-paying membership, along with advocating for every left-wing political movement extant. The actual, productive education of children is NOT among its priorities, and, in fact, the NEA's activities have done significant damage to that mission, all the while demanding that the public from which it extracts its funding continue pouring more into the kitty, even while private sector employees, including those in CBU's, have lost their jobs or experienced substantial reductions in their wages and benefits, due to economic realities. Also, while jailers are definitely public safety employees, in that they have even more personal and expanded contact with arrestees than cops, dispatchers do not similarly qualify.

 

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PUBLIC WORKERS MAKE MORE THAN PRIVATE SECTOR

WI Public sector workers earn nearly $12K more than private sector

http://watchdog.org/94453/wage-gauge-wis-public-sector-earns-nearly-12000-more-than-private-sector/

Wisconsin Reporter – M. D. Kttle – 7/9/2013

Click the link above for the entire article – it compares the public workers vs private workers in surrounding states. 

With federal, state and local governments paying out almost $1.5 trillion in employee compensation in 2012, the pay scale isn’t a trivial fact, Biggs and Richwine wrote.

The U.S. Census’ Survey of Income and Program Participation found the average federal worker shifting to a private sector job accepts a small salary reduction, about 3 percent. On the other side, private sector workers who move into federal jobs on average received a 9 percent pay hike in their first year on the job, “well above the raise other workers get when they switch jobs within the private sector,” Biggs and Richwine noted.

While the BLS wage data includes bonuses, stock options and vacation pay, it doesn’t factor in a big eventual income source in the public sector: The employee pension. Defined benefit plans are the domain of the public sector, and they can mean a lot of income down the road for the public employee.

The Congressional Budget Office, in a wage comparison of private sector and federal employees in similar occupations and with similar experience, found:

• Federal civilian workers with no more than a high school education earned about 21 percent more, on average, than similar workers in the private sector.

• Workers whose highest level of education was a bachelor’s degree earned roughly the same hourly wages, on average, in both the federal government and the private sector.

• Federal workers with a professional degree or doctorate earned about 23 percent less, on average, than their private-sector counterparts.

Factoring in employee benefits, the CBO found:

• Average benefits for federal workers with no more than a high school diploma were 72 percent higher than for their private-sector counterparts.

• Average benefits for federal workers whose education ended in a bachelor’s degree were 46 percent higher than for similar workers in the private sector.

• Workers with a professional degree or doctorate received roughly the same level of average benefits in both sectors.

Marty Beil, executive director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 24, complained that the $90 million total raise for rank-and-file employees is a “token” raise.

“In dollar terms, the average Wisconsin state worker after Act 10 receives total compensation including benefits equal to $81,637 versus $67,068 for a similarly skilled private worker, a difference of $14,569,” according to AEI’s Biggs, the study’s author.

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DEMOCRATS AND UNIONS CAUSED DETROIT’S DOWNFALL

AMERICAN HISTORY HAPPENED IN DETROIT, MICHIGAN

Working man’s blues:  What democrats and unions have done to Detroit

http://washingtonexaminer.com/sean-higgins-what-democrats-and-unions-have-done-to-detroit/article/2533313

Washington Examiner – Sean Higgins – 7/21/2013

To the first African-American mayor of a major U.S. city, equating the police with criminals was a way of telling his overwhelmingly black constituency that he understood their concerns about police brutality and civil rights.

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To the city's white residents, it was a message that he placed those concerns above public safety and civil order. White flight, which began in the late '60s, accelerated.

In 1970, Detroit's population was 1.5 million. Forty-four percent was African-American, 54 percent was white. By 1990, the city's population had fallen to slightly more than 1 million, with African-Americans accounting for 78 percent and whites only 20 percent.

The population shift under Young cemented the Democratic Party's lock on the city. The labor organizer-turned-Democratic lawmaker would serve five terms, stepping down in 1993 at age 74 as his health worsened.

Detroit is now the most dangerous big city in America, according to FBI statistics, with a crime rate five times the national average.

The city's economy crumbled, too. Unemployment was 7.2 percent in 1970 but soared to 19.7 percent by 1990. Today it is a staggering 18.6 percent, far above the national rate of 7.6 percent.

What sets Detroit apart is that for five decades, sadly, only two hands were on Detroit's steering wheel -- those of Big Labor and the Democratic Party -- and they drove the city into the ditch. To understand why this happened, it's necessary to go back to a spring day in 1941.

 

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TEACHERS UNIONS - 20TH CENTURY MODEL IN THE 21ST CENTURY

Teachers’ unions hold American children hostage

http://lastresistance.com/2332/teachers-unions-hold-american-children-hostage/

Last Resistance – Frank Camp – 7/14/2013

There is a definite difference between private sector unions and public sector unions. Many people don’t recognize the difference, or even know that there is a difference at all. On one hand, you have a group of workers forming a union in order to balance out the power of their superiors. They band together so that they can make legitimate demands, without fear of personal reprisal. The superior will do what they can to limit the cost of the demands made, while attempting to keep the workers happy. It’s a balancing act.

On the other hand, you have government employees, whose ultimate superior is an elected official. The public union makes demands of the state, and the political leader, which are not counterbalanced by the restraint of good business practices. The elected official gives the unions whatever they want in exchange for their votes on Election Day. This cycle is unbroken—so long as a Liberal is in office—and our taxes continue to rise so that politicians can appease the unions and buy votes. It’s criminal.

The teachers’ union is a perfect example of corruption. First, teachers have no choice but to join the union; which is unsettling to begin with. Second, the union does nothing to better educate children. Rather than trying to innovate, so that our education system could improve, the union simply does what is best for itself. Union bosses blast anyone who would dare to mention vouchers–or any programs that would improve education—and continue to suck more money from the taxpayers.

Like Scott Walker said, the unions are operating within an archaic framework.

Public sector unions are killing our country. Like a parasite that depends on the survival of its host, public sector unions are keeping us alive just enough to take advantage of us.  I want to thrive. But in order to thrive, we must eliminate the public sector unions; especially the teachers’ union.

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IS INSOLVENCY IN DETROIT’S FUTURE?

IS INSOLVENCY IN DETROIT’S FUTURE?

Detroit emergency manager says city ‘clearly insolvent’

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/13/us-usa-detroit-emergencymanager-idUSBRE94C0YD20130513

Reuters – Nick Carey and Steve Neavling – 5/13/2013

"The City of Detroit continues to incur expenditures in excess of revenues despite cost reductions and proceeds from long‐term debt issuances," Orr wrote. "In other words, Detroit spends more than it takes in - it is clearly insolvent on a cash flow basis."

Legal experts indicated the declaration of insolvency is important because the city cannot make a bankruptcy filing without an official declaration of insolvency.

Pension payments to city workers are one of the largest drains on the city's finances. Detroit will make $31 million in pension payments this year, but will defer another $108 million. The city also has $5.7 billion in unfunded retiree benefit obligations, more than previous estimates, the report found.

To catch up on pension and health benefits to retirees, the city would need to spend $339 million, about a third of its fiscal 2013 revenues, Orr estimated. Orr said a city task force was reviewing actuarial assumptions Detroit uses to estimate its obligations.

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CHEATING TEACHERS RECEIVE BONUSES WHILE STUDENTS FAIL

35 educators indicted in Altanta

http://www.eagleforum.org/publications/educate/apr13/35-educators-indicted-in-atlanta.html

Eagle Forum – Education Reporter  April 2013

Cheating educators were highly motivated since at schools that met 70% of their annual target every employee received a bonus, as low as a few hundred dollars to over a thousand.

The prosecutor denounced “the crimes that have been committed against the children of the city of Atlanta.” Remedial assistance for students in need was not given because altered test scores showed they were doing well. Anecdotal evidence of students who were cheated out of an education was provided in the AJC. A mother who had concerns because her daughter received the lowest score on one reading examination, but later exceeded reading standards on the state achievement test, met with Superintendent Hall who assured her that her daughter “tested well.” The student is now in 9th grade, but “reads at a 5th grade level.”

The mantra in Atlanta under Hall’s reign was “No exceptions and no excuses.” The justice system should apply that same standard to those convicted of cheating students for personal gain. It is also hoped that all states will seek out and prosecute cheating by educators as seriously as Georgia is doing.
(Atlanta Journal Constitution, 03-29-2013)

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PUBLIC SECTOR UNION MEMBERSHIP DOWN

Wisconsin public sector unions report drastic membership declines

http://washingtonexaminer.com/wisconsin-public-sector-unions-report-drastic-membership-declines/article/2526421?custom_click=rss&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

The Examiner – Sean Higgins - 4/5/2013

According a Labor Department filing made last week, membership at Wisconsin’s American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 40 — one of AFSCME’s four branches in the state — has gone from the 31,730 it reported in 2011, to 29,777 in 2012, to just 20,488 now. That’s a drop of more than 11,000 — about a third — in just two years. The council represents city and county employees outside of Milwaukee County and child care workers across Wisconsin.

Labor Department filings also show that Wisconsin’s AFSCME Council 48, which represents city and county workers in Milwaukee County, went from 9,043 members in 2011, to 6,046 in 2012, to just 3,498 now.

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SHOULD BULLY TEACHERS RECEIVE ‘SENSITIVITY’ TRAINING?

Courageous Benji Backer joins Megyn Kelly to tlak about Liberal Bulling Teachers

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ss3tSSXRAXc

4/5/2013

Teen torn apart by teachers for being conservative fights back!

http://lastresistance.com/1840/teen-torn-apart-by-teachers-for-being-conservative-fights-back/

Last Resistance – Frank Cam- - 4/5/2013

something the media never mentions is bullying against Conservative teens. It happens often in college, where Secularism rules; but more and more incidents are occurring in high schools, with teachers intimidating and ridiculing Conservative students.

According to FOX News:  “Fifteen-year-old Benji Backer says he was bullied for his conservative political beliefs, but by his teachers, not fellow students…he was picked on so badly for his support of Governor Romney and Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker that he had to switch schools…Benji recalled an incident during which his English teacher in Appleton, Wisconsin, berated him in front of the entire class, telling him that small business owners take off Fridays and summers, making claims that he worked harder than Benji’s father, and saying that as a teacher, he didn’t make enough money to provide for his family.”

“Fifteen-year-old Benji Backer says he was bullied for his conservative political beliefs, but by his teachers, not fellow students…he was picked on so badly for his support of Governor Romney and Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker that he had to switch schools…Benji recalled an incident during which his English teacher in Appleton, Wisconsin, berated him in front of the entire class, telling him that small business owners take off Fridays and summers, making claims that he worked harder than Benji’s father, and saying that as a teacher, he didn’t make enough money to provide for his family.”

This is one example of the Liberal definition of tolerance. Those on the Left, unwilling to accept that anyone could possibly think differently than they, simply can’t compute a difference of opinion. The only reaction Liberals have when they encounter opposing views is to ridicule, and tear apart. Liberals aren’t wired to understand differing views; so they become scared and irrational.

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