CounterPunch Exclusives

CounterPunch Exclusives

LA Teachers Strike: What Anti-Union Critics Don’t Understand

For years California teachers unions have sought to coordinate the expirations of our contracts and unite to strengthen our bargaining position. California teachers unions’ “We Can’t Wait” campaign has united 32 California union locals comprising 80,000 educators to fight for shared demands, including fully-staffed schools, smaller class sizes, and better wages and benefits. Conservative media are harshly condemning us for this–proof alone that our strategy is the correct one.

In “Teachers Hold California Children Hostage…Punishing Children”, the Wall Street Journal editorial board calls California teachers unions “among the most destructive actors in American political life,” citing unions’ unjust “collective bargaining haul”. The editorial board of the California Post, West coast counterpart to the New York Post–both owned by News Corp–denounces teacher union “abuse” because “teachers unions across the state, from Los Angeles to Sacramento, have authorized strike actions against their school districts”.

In the New York Post, teacher union opponent Corey DeAngelis accuses United Educators of San Francisco of “hold[ing] everyone hostage”. The San Francisco Chronicle Editorial Board generously allows that “the educators who instruct San Francisco’s children should not have to commute from three counties away to do so” but nonetheless accuses USEF–which until this year had not struck in 47 years, of “forgo[ing] long-term stability for a short-term win” and of striking “in defiance” of budget “truth[s]”.

Writing for the conservative Southern California News Group publications, union critic Larry Sand is unhappy that “currently, new teachers in Los Angeles earn $68,896 a year”. He criticizes United Teachers Los Angeles–which has set a strike date of April 14–for its “warped agenda”.

The subtext of this vilification is critics’ belief that California teachers do a poor job and thus don’t deserve a raise.

Sand lectures, “Are children in Los Angeles being properly educated? Hardly.”........

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