Teachers in your state are underpaid. The question is by how much, this week in the war on workers

Daily Kos Staff

Friday August 19, 2022 · 3:55 PM PDT

2022/08/19 · 15:55

OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA - FEBRUARY 21: Oakland Unified School District students and teachers carry signs as they picket outside of Oakland Technical High School on February 21, 2019 in Oakland, California. Nearly 3,000 teachers in Oakland have gone on strike and are demanding a 12 percent retroactive raise. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Teachers have earned less than other workers with the same education levels for decades—but it’s getting worse. “On average, teachers earned just 76.5 cents on the dollar compared with what similar college graduates earned working in other professions—and much less than the relative 93.9 cents on the dollar that teachers earned in 1996,” the Economic Policy Institute reports.

A few states have relatively small wage penalties for teachers—Rhode Island, Wyoming, and New Jersey are all below 5%. But five states—Colorado, Oklahoma, Virginia, Arizona, and Alabama—have wage penalties for teachers of more than 30%, and it’s more than 20% in 28 states.

How does your state do?

Teacher shortage=shortage of good pay? The teacher retention crisis is only getting worse and children are suffering for it. Our latest report reveals the pay gap between teachers and similarly educated non-teachers grew to a record 23.5% in 2021. https://t.co/2QCPX6i0J9 pic.twitter.com/gXsIDwGWGB
— Economic Policy Institute (@EconomicPolicy) August 16, 2022

● Minneapolis construction workers fight chronic wage theft, reports Caleb Brennan at The American Prospect.

● Trader Joe’s workers at two stores have unionized—but Trader Joe's just announced it was closing another store where workers were organizing. And the store was its only wine store in New York City!

● California could transform how fast food workers are treated.

● Erik Loomis takes a look back at when we all boycotted a shitty beer.

● New York teacher Liat Olenick writes Why I'm joining the exodus of teachers leaving the classroom.

● Kaiser strike highlights California's mental healthcare crisis.

● Airline unions urge carriers not to resume buybacks when bailout ban ends this fall.

● Steven Greenhouse weighs in on Starbucks' anti-union campaign. One key piece:

Starbucks has begun contract negotiations with baristas at several unionized stores, but union leaders complain that virtually no progress has been made, and they fear that Starbucks could drag out negotiations for two or more years before reaching a first contract. With its double standard on pay increases, Starbucks is effectively telling its unionized workers that they won’t get any raises for two or more years, while its non-union employees received raises this summer. Many anti-union American companies deliberately slow-walk contract talks and deny workers raises during the many months that negotiations drag on. They know that tactic can be very effective in souring workers’ views on unionization.

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Walmart says paying their workers higher wages is paying off.

After giving an hourly wage raise to 565,000 workers last fall, "we've seen labor productivity metrics improve" across stores and warehouses, Walmart's CFO said on the firm's earnings call today.
— More Perfect Union (@MorePerfectUS) August 16, 2022

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Thirty strippers at a club in LA filed for a union election yesterday. They would become the first unionized strip club in the United States since 1996.

They say management at Star Garden has a lax attitude toward protecting them from dangerous behavior from patrons. pic.twitter.com/wJlFJJ8jS7
— Lauren Kaori Gurley (@LaurenKGurley) August 18, 2022

● Shein, TikTok's favorite brand, is very bad in so many ways.

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Teachers in your state are underpaid. The question is by how much, this week in the war on workers

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