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Why strong teachers unions are death on public education

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In the latest sign that powerful teachers unions make for weak schools, a study out of the left-leaning Progressive Policy Institute shows that states where the American Federation of Teachers or National Education Association wield great power overwhelmingly score worse in student literacy than ones where the unions have less sway.

The reason’s obvious: Unions prioritize their own political power and their members’ privileges, not the children’s needs; that’s not their job.

And when government-employee unions have too much power, the public suffers.

Thus eight of the 10 states with the worst student literacy scores are blue ones with strong teachers’ unions.

Yes, other factors matter, too: Five Republican states and one swing state have relatively poor literacy scores; four Democratic states are among the 23 top-performing.

But the union factor is huge.

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