Education Week - May 2, 2018 - 16

Teacher Pay Demands
Put States on Hot Seat
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

lower- and middle-income workers. Its analysis found that while
college graduates' average weekly
pay rose by $124 between 1996
and 2015, teachers' pay declined
by $30 over that time when adjusted for inflation.
That's despite the fact that Americans are making and spending at
the highest level since the end of
the Great Recession in 2010. The
reality, experts point out, is that
a lot of that money doesn't land in
states' and districts' coffers.
Since the recession and the ending of emergency federal fiscal aid,
both of which devastated states'
budgets, state politicians have
slashed away at taxes in order to
spur their economies. But as states
seek to meet soaring pension and
health-care costs, schools are ultimately left with less money to go
around.
More than half the nation's states
provided less overall state funding
per student in the 2015 school year
than in the 2008 school year, before
the recession took hold, according
to the Center on Budget and Policy
Priorities, a think tank that focuses on reducing inequality.
The prospect of boosting teacher
pay by just 1 percent-what can
amount to millions of dollars in recurring costs-is out of the picture
for many school districts.
"Teacher pay is often at times in
tension with other things in schools
such as classroom supplies, support

staff, counselors, and keeping class
sizes low as enrollment continues to
climb," said Nicholas Johnson, the
senior vice president for state fiscal
policy at the Center on Budget and
Policy Priorities. "There's just a lot
of tradeoffs you have to consider."

Arizona's Paradox
Arizona is one of seven states that,
in response to voter demands, has cut
income taxes in the last decade, a revenue source schools rely on heavily.
In 2016 alone, the state allowed
$13.7 billion to go uncollected
through a series of income, sales,
and other tax exemptions, deductions, allowances, exclusions, or
credits, according to the state's department of revenue.
At the same time, Arizona has
made among the most dramatic
budget cuts in the nation to its
schools, totaling 14 percent in
the last decade alone. Across the
state, schoolhouses are crumbling,
classroom sizes have bulged, and a
handful of the state's most isolated
districts have gone to just four-day
school weeks, according to teachers,
advocates, and politicians.
The paradox is that Arizona's
economy is in its best condition
in years. Its unemployment rate
stands at 4.9 percent, and the
state's 100 largest corporations
added more than 20,000 jobs last
year alone.
The governor, who is up for reelection this fall, says that now
that the economy is on an upswing,

he will use projected increased
revenue to pay for a 9 percent increase in teacher pay this year
and 5 percent in subsequent years
until teachers in 2020 are paid
on average $58,100. The proposal
would still need to get through the
legislature, which is controlled by
Republicans.
"Our commitment in this budget
proposal is to our teachers," he said
during a press conference earlier
this month. "Our economy has been
growing, we have surplus revenues,
and we're going to put these toward
teacher pay. We'll have to make
other adjustments."
Teachers in Arizona have expressed deep skepticism about Ducey's projections. They worry that
the nation is overdue for another
recession, and argue that the pay
increase doesn't come soon enough.
State Sen. Steve Farley, a candidate in the Democratic gubernato-

FALLING BEHIND
Public school teachers earned 23 percent less than other college
graduates overall in 2015, averaging $1,092 per week, compared
with $1,416. That's according to the Economic Policy Institute,
a think tank that focuses on low- and middle-income workers.
Teachers actually lost ground in recent years when wages were
adjusted for inflation, the analysis found.

rial primary this fall, has proposed
closing several tax loopholes that
he says have left the state in fiscal
shambles.

Searching for Revenue
"There's an emerging consensus
here that we need to invest a significant amount of funding into the
public education system," Farley
said. "This governor and this legislature have chosen repeatedly to
provide corporate loopholes that
have done nothing to help us."
His opponent in the primary,
David Garcia, a college education
professor, says that in addition to
getting rid of some corporate tax
cuts, the state must find a new revenue source. He has proposed the
state levy a new income tax on its
wealthiest 1 percent.
"We've got to be honest with Arizonans," he said. "We're not going

to solve this issue unless we raise
new revenue. We can't shuffle the
deck and get out of this."
State Representative John Kavanagh, a Republican who is the
chairman of the house appropriations committee, describes the
state's economy as having been hit
hard by the recession and slow to
recover. He also in recent days has
expressed skepticism of Ducey's
proposal.
"We don't have the money," he
said when asked about the teachers' demand for a 20 percent pay
increase. In reference to Democratic proposals to find the money
in the state's budget and increase
taxes, Kavanagh said, "They're
calling for increases in education
spending, but they have no plan
to get there. Every year, they roll
out the same, tired, fallacious
rhetoric about billion-dollar tax
loopholes."

2015

1.6K

1979
$1,159.28
$910.71

1.4K

$1,415.73

1.2K

$1,092.35

$1,033.60

0.8K

College graduates

16 | EDUCATION WEEK | May 2, 2018 | www.edweek.org
0

-2%

Public school teachers
Public teachers

All workers

0.6K

$825.41

SOURCE: Economic Policy Institute

http://www.edweek.org

Education Week - May 2, 2018

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