CHICAGO (Feb. 1, 2016) – Chicago Teachers Union executives announced this afternoon that they have rejected a proposed contract for Chicago Public Schools teachers. While the union said the contract did not offer enough to teachers and asked for too many concessions, education and school finance experts at the nonpartisan Illinois Policy Institute said the contract offered to CTU was already more than taxpayers in the city can afford. Ted Dabrowski, vice president of policy at the Illinois Policy Institute, has published an article highlighting five reasons Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and the CTU need to go back to the table and agree to deeper concessions in the next contract.

1. Chicago Public Schools teachers already are the highest-paid of any teachers in the nation’s 10 largest school districts. The average CPS teacher will collect $2.4 million in lifetime earnings, according to the National Council on Teacher Quality
2. The average career teacher in CPS collects more than $2 million in lifetime pension benefits.
3. The amount of pension benefits accrued by CPS teachers has increased by 400 percent since 1987. Put simply, the amount of pension benefits promised to teachers has increased at a rate of 6.1 percent each year over the past three decades – more than twice the rate of inflation.
4. CPS does not have any money available for pay raises for teachers; in fact, it cannot afford its current pension and salary obligations and has been struggling to borrow money to make good on the district’s debts and expenses.
5. Chicagoans can’t afford more tax increases to pay for teacher salaries and pensions; Chicago residents already pay more in taxes and fees than residents in any other major Illinois city.

Ted Dabrowski, vice president of policy at the Illinois Policy Institute, issued the following statement in reaction to news that the CTU has rejected the latest contract proposal:

“There has been a lot of eagerness for the Chicago Teachers Union and Chicago Public Schools to ‘strike a deal,’ but it’s good news that the union rejected this contract. Based on news reports, it sounded like yet another labor contract that city taxpayers cannot afford, and which would not put the interests of students ahead of the interests of the union. Chicago teachers are already the highest-paid of the top 10 largest school districts in the nation. The reality is that Chicago Public Schools is broke and what it needs in the next contract are deep and serious concessions from the union. Union and political leaders are compromising the future of Chicago students by refusing to reform Chicago Public Schools’ budget and the city’s education system.”

Other data points::

• Chicago Public Schools has 30,654 active workers and 32,540 retired workers. This means that there are more people collecting retirement benefits from CPS than active workers paying into the teachers’ retirement fund.

• The Chicago Teachers’ Pension Fund has accrued more than $9 billion in debt since 1999.

• The Chicago Teachers’ Pension Fund has 52 cents in available funds for every dollar promised in benefits.

Additional information is available here: https://www.illinoispolicy.org/5-reasons-why-chicago-cant-afford-to-get-steamrolled-by-another-ctu-contract/

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