So, apparently third grade teachers get $85,000 a year. Who knew?

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  1. kerryg profile image84
    kerrygposted 13 years ago

    Apparently this delightful little piece of out-of-touch vitriol has been making the rounds of Wall Street:

        "We are Wall Street. It's our job to make money. Whether it's a commodity, stock, bond, or some hypothetical piece of fake paper, it doesn't matter. We would trade baseball cards if it were profitable. I didn't hear America complaining when the market was roaring to 14,000 and everyone's 401k doubled every 3 years. Just like gambling, its not a problem until you lose. I've never heard of anyone going to Gamblers Anonymous because they won too much in Vegas.

        Well now the market crapped out, & even though it has come back somewhat, the government and the average Joes are still looking for a scapegoat. God knows there has to be one for everything. Well, here we are.

        Go ahead and continue to take us down, but you're only going to hurt yourselves. What's going to happen when we can't find jobs on the Street anymore? Guess what: We're going to take yours. We get up at 5am & work till 10pm or later. We're used to not getting up to pee when we have a position. We don't take an hour or more for a lunch break. We don't demand a union. We don't retire at 50 with a pension. We eat what we kill, and when the only thing left to eat is on your dinner plates, we'll eat that.

        For years teachers and other unionized labor have had us fooled. We were too busy working to notice. Do you really think that we are incapable of teaching 3rd graders and doing landscaping? We're going to take your cushy jobs with tenure and 4 months off a year and whine just like you that we are so-o-o-o underpaid for building the youth of America. Say goodbye to your overtime and double time and a half. I'll be hitting grounders to the high school baseball team for $5k extra a summer, thank you very much.

        So now that we're going to be making $85k a year without upside, Joe Mainstreet is going to have his revenge, right? Wrong! Guess what: we're going to stop buying the new 80k car, we aren't going to leave the 35 percent tip at our business dinners anymore. No more free rides on our backs. We're going to landscape our own back yards, wash our cars with a garden hose in our driveways. Our money was your money. You spent it. When our money dries up, so does yours.

        The difference is, you lived off of it, we rejoiced in it. The Obama administration and the Democratic National Committee might get their way and knock us off the top of the pyramid, but it's really going to hurt like hell for them when our fat a**es land directly on the middle class of America and knock them to the bottom.

        We aren't dinosaurs. We are smarter and more vicious than that, and we are going to survive. The question is, now that Obama & his administration are making Joe Mainstreet our food supply…will he? and will they?"


    Source: http://www.thereformedbroker.com/2010/0 … ll-street/

    I actually kind of agree with the first paragraph (though it's just one more reason we need Wall Street reform, in my opinion), but after that it descends quickly into the ludicrous. Do they really think third grade teachers and "Joe Mainstreet" make $85,000 a year?

    Otherwise, my feelings on the matter are best summed up by that raving old socialist Teddy Roosevelt:

    "Too much cannot be said against the men of wealth who sacrifice everything to getting wealth. There is not in the world a more ignoble character than the mere money-getting American, insensible to every duty, regardless of every principle, bent only on amassing a fortune, and putting his fortune only to the basest uses —whether these uses be to speculate in stocks and wreck railroads himself, or to allow his son to lead a life of foolish and expensive idleness and gross debauchery, or to purchase some scoundrel of high social position, foreign or native, for his daughter. Such a man is only the more dangerous if he occasionally does some deed like founding a college or endowing a church, which makes those good people who are also foolish forget his real iniquity. These men are equally careless of the working men, whom they oppress, and of the State, whose existence they imperil. There are not very many of them, but there is a very great number of men who approach more or less closely to the type, and, just in so far as they do so approach, they are curses to the country."

    These guys don't make money, or produce anything of value. They just gamble with other people's money. Yet for some reason, these parasites believe they are the host.

    1. Jane Seaman profile image61
      Jane Seamanposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I just want to know the name of the third grade teacher making $85,000. a year!!!!  I would also like to know his/her location. I don't know of any teacher making that kind of money and I have a couple in my extended circle of family and friends.

    2. Richard VanIngram profile image61
      Richard VanIngramposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      What many business people fail to realize is that the principles that make capitalism possible in the first place are not mere economic principles, but moral ones.

      For example, trustworthiness.  If brokers are untrustworthy because they consistantly lie and misrepresent what they do, risk rises to an unacceptable rate for investors; investors pull the money they would once have invested in actual business ventures and venture capital and move it to "safer" places.  Business suffers for lack of a sure source of capital; the market swings wildly.  Everything becomes unstable all because a handful of powerful people decide that profit is the only thing -- not realizing that ethicality makes stable profit possible.

      For all I care, the moron who wrote this piece you quoted can go on his way and do his John Galt/Ayn Rand strike, perform 60 page maudlin monolgues about his self-importance in the emptiness of his head while tending his back yard, and the rest of us will go on: He can be replaced.  Someone else will step into his place, possibly one better educated about his responsibilities as well as the material benefits of working Wall Street.

  2. Arthur Fontes profile image75
    Arthur Fontesposted 13 years ago

    One thing I find curious about these congressional hearings into Wall street  "Where are the injured parties?".

    If I had lost half of my wealth by what I thought was deceptive practices then I think I might have standing in court.

    How can Congress investigate a crime without evidence and listings of injured parties who are making complaints?

    I am not condemning the hearings.  I am also not a lawyer.  I just have a genuine curiosity why there are not class action law suits?

    1. alternate poet profile image67
      alternate poetposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      As far as I can see it is the same issue as when many company pensions were taken by the company when they got short of cash - then they went broke, got bailed out and were then given loopholes to escape paying it back.  I think we had Maggie Thatcher to thank for that bit of double dealing as part of her campaign to crush the unions and shift everything back to her little band of cronies!

  3. profile image0
    kimberlyslyricsposted 13 years ago

    They deserve even more big_smile

  4. MikeNV profile image66
    MikeNVposted 13 years ago

    "What's going to happen when we can't find jobs on the Street anymore? Guess what: We're going to take yours. We get up at 5am & work till 10pm or later."

    That's some comical logic.  There is a TV show on Sunday nights where CEO's go secretly into their companies and try to do the jobs of the people working there.  It's quite funny. Most simply can't do even the menial tasks.

    So for all these people defending ripping off the American Worker... I say get your mower and get to work.  My lawn needs trimming.  And you can do it at 5AM or 10PM.  Makes no difference to me.  But if you don't do it right I'll dock your pay!

  5. Arthur Fontes profile image75
    Arthur Fontesposted 13 years ago

    From:    http://www.employmentspot.com/employmen … -by-state/


    The most recent report included a list of teacher salaries by state. The state with the highest average teacher salary was Connecticut, at $57,760. California was a very close second, where the average teacher salary is $57,604. New Jersey teachers make approximately $56,635 per year. Rounding out the top five were Illinois and Rhode Island, with the average teacher salary at $56,494 and $56,432, respectively. The state with the lowest average teacher salary was South Dakota, at $34,039.

    Plus Benefits Health Insurance pension etc.

    57700 + Benefits  And many teachers take on second jobs in the summer.  All in all it is reasonable that a teacher could earn 80000 plus for a year.

    1. Doug Hughes profile image61
      Doug Hughesposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Arthur - If you run across any part-time jobs that pay $30,000 in the 2 months teachers are on summer vacation, send it my way.

      The cost of living in CA is why I'm not there anymore. The cost of an entry-level home in Santa Clara is in the $400,000 range.  I won't speak to Connecticut since I haven't lived there, but snarking at salary without considering the cost-of-living is misleading.

      1. Arthur Fontes profile image75
        Arthur Fontesposted 13 years agoin reply to this



        Doug I know teachers in my line of work also.  If you want to make 30K or more in a summer come on down to Cape Cod and show off some bartending skills.  Get in the right lounge on Martha's Vineyard for the summer and let me know how you make out.

        I know teachers who are in many other lines of work.  The teaching job provides the insurance and stability for retirement.  Otherwise some of these folks would not do it at all.

        It takes a special personality to be able to deal with a roomful of children and I for one could not do it.  I am not diminishing the teaching profession.

    2. JON EWALL profile image61
      JON EWALLposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Jane Seaman
      Check this out.
      The average PAY IN THE PRIVATE SECTOR is $50,000+ $9,000 in fringe benefits = $59,000
      The average pay in the PUBLIC SECTOR is $70,000+ $40,000 in fringe benefits = $110,000
      The private sector unemployment is 9.7%+,the public sector unemployment is 3%. Something is wrong with the equations, can you agree.

      Government is growing at a rapid pace, the private sector is going broke.
      In your report , can you get the amount of pension  and social security dollars paid by employer ( public ), healthcare, insurance, vacations sick day  benefits and other fringe benefits cost should be  included when you quote the gross  income of any person

      Keeping in mind that the teachers pay is for approximately 9 months. In consideration, divide the full payment amount  by 9 to get a monthly average than multiply that number by 12 to arrive at the average monthly pay amount.

      The burden to keep the pension funds within government requires is what is causing cities, towns and states to go broke. The public sector relies on tax income, if income is down, layoffs or salaries need to be cut to provide basic services.
      The government has not done anything to support private sector businesses  that President Barak Obama  promised. Congress calls extending unemployment benefits a job bill. they don't get it, people need jobs and all congress does is spend money with a false premise that they are saving jobs. the money is actually going to states to pay for public employees pay and benefits.
      There is a major problem in Washington that must be corrected in the next election.

  6. fetty profile image64
    fettyposted 13 years ago

    Twenty-four years ago, I gave up tenure to adopt. I was not concerned because I knew I was a great teacher and I loved to teach and always had fabulous results with my students. This was a major mistake.  After teaching for 12 years I earned $22,000 a year. We used to make a $300 per year pay increase if we were lucky or $30 per month. Governor Keane (R) gave the new teachers coming out of college a starting pay of $18,500. No one b... Our unions spent years putting extra $$ into the steps of the experienced , older staff to make things fair. Our new governor (R) has already demanded teachers to take a pay-freeze this year. He wants them to pay into their medical costs and he has written into law new ways to pay less of the pensions for the current 2010 retirees. He also wants retirees to pay a 1.5% increase towards their medical premiums.  A new teacher in New Jersey starts out making about $43,000 to 47,000 a year after earning a 4 year degree. Some verizon employees who install telephone lines make a starting salary of $40,000 with company paid benefits and hold a high school degree. Teachers , who are worth their salt spend part of the summer taking advance courses or work at non-profits or just help disadvantage children for free. Many fathers work two and three jobs to support their families if the wives stay home.

  7. fetty profile image64
    fettyposted 13 years ago

    In the state of New Jersey , the past 16 years , each parties governor has balanced the states budget on the backs of the pension. ( This now includes firemen, policemen and the teachers ). Our previous governor made a huge payment to the plan and was not reelected. I guess it's OK to be lied to when your working for a low salary and are required to have this money taken out of your pay each year or you will lose your job. I agree with Richard's conclusion, though.

 
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