Abolish teachers unions

 

To a decent portion of the public, criticism of teachers unions is tantamount to a mortal sin.

After more than a year of pandemic shenanigans, a Politico poll conducted between July 31 and Aug. 2 found that 37% of people had at least a somewhat favorable opinion of teachers unions. For 21%, that opinion was very favorable.

But those who continue to support teachers unions are deeply misguided, clutching a sacred cow that has plagued the country for decades.

As the saying goes, “sacred cows make the best hamburger.” And I’m in the mood to fire up the grill. Teachers unions no longer deserve any reverence and ought to be banned.

They were not always a negative force. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, working conditions for educators were deplorable. All teachers were paid extremely low wages and battled poorly trained administrators. Female teachers had it much worse, and they were often fired if they were or became married.

Unions became a mechanism to fight for much-needed reforms. But that precarious position no longer exists. The American Enterprise Institute’s Andrew Biggs noted that on top of generous retirement packages, teachers earn wages equivalent to both their education level and market demand. This is true even in states where collective bargaining for public education is banned.

Mississippi pays its teachers less than any other state, but the average salary for an educator is roughly equivalent to the state’s median household income. Furthermore, civil rights laws protect the rights of female teachers. To compare the beginning of the 21st century to the beginning of the 20th would be ludicrous.

Today, the teachers unions created to fight the powers that be have become the powers that be. Their escapades against school choice are well-established. But there are more obscure ways in which unions have abused their power for political and financial gain — often at the expense of educators and students alike.

In California, teachers unions manipulated a state-funded peer assistance program to discourage impressionable teachers from opting out of union membership. In New York City, the United Federation of Teachers has a long history of holding the city, and its families, hostage for substantial wage increases without concessions.

The Chicago Teachers Union bullied the city into signing an enormous $1.5 billion package, primarily earmarked to staffing costs, that forced an almost immediate tax hike.

Now consider the COVID-19 pandemic, during which teachers unions listed outrageous and unscientific demands before they would allow schools to resume in-person instruction. The lack of in-person schooling is expected to cause decreases in life expectancy for young children: 0.67 years for boys and 0.45 years for girls.

What good do modern teachers unions serve, then? They do little more than keep children out of school and treat taxpayer money as an unlimited resource.

The blame for this phenomenon should not fall on individual teachers. Most educators are phenomenal people who pursue the profession for noble reasons, and the pressure to join a union can be intense.

But the unions themselves don’t have an interest in students or families. Their sole priorities are raises and benefits for their members. And few can stand in their way.

Nobody should be able to cheat kids and taxpayers like this. No unelected entity should have the power to block much-needed policy changes, such as school choice, mechanisms for firing bad teachers, and merit pay.

Teachers unions once had a vital role in defending the profession, but the time has come to do away with them for good. Throw that on a bun and eat it.

Garion Frankel (@FrankelGarion) is a graduate student at Texas A&M University’s Bush School of Government and Public Service with a concentration in education policy and management. He serves as the policy director for the Texas Federation of College Republicans and a contributor to Young Voices.