Larry Snow
In his Champion News.net column today former Huntley School Board member Larry Snow throws a spotlight on how public pensions can have million dollar payouts.
“It takes little math skills to figure out it takes more than a million dollars to buy a $75,000 payment every year for the rest of your life at age 60,” he writes. “
“If you prefer an online calculator there’s one at www.immediateannuities.com. It shows you need about $1.2 million if you are a 60 year old female living in Illinois.”
Yet, he notes, Democrats love to denigrate millionaires.
Snow notes that teacher pensions increase 3% a year. He doesn’t note that other public employee pensions, including mine, get the same annual bump.
Snow accurately notes that the 3% compounds every year.
Then he returns to the theme of previous columns:
“Teachers in Illinois contribute far less into their pensions than regular workers do into Social Security. Democrats also call this ‘fair.’”
Yesterday, he showed “how two-thirds of all teachers in the bottom-half-performing school districts pay zero to little into their pensions.”
He asks,
“How is it ‘fair’ for Illinois teachers to contribute into their pensions less than retail workers and construction workers have to pay into Social Security, but get pensions that are many times higher?”
Another anomaly that Snow points to is the ability to educators to qualify for a pension in a state other than Illinois and, then, to come to work in Illinois, where they qualify for a second public pension.
The people who work in construction, retail and factory workers are getting hosed having to pay 100% for teachers pensions in so many districts.
It helps explain why the sales tax is so high, so teachers can vote to siphon off enormous amounts of “state aid” dollars. State aid in education is a euphemism for a money pool for teachers to drain.
Why should we respect teachers who are so selfishly greedy they won’t pay 5 percent of what it costs their entire pension?
Here’s hoping there’s a Republican in Springfield who has a spine to propose legislation that prevents this kind of teachers unions abuse.
I finally figured out what Larry’s tag-line on his Champion articles “thought protagonist” means… He’s a hero in his own mind (i.e. suffers from delusions of grandeur)
Why is Snow targeting teachers only and not all the other people who receive pensions such as you Cal? Ultimately, this article is as much about you as teachers isn’t it?
There’s been a lot of national publicity about teachers in Wisconsin not paying anything into their pensions.
Someone was going to connect the dots and check what is really going on in Illinois. You can’t find any Democrats or “educators” disclosing what Snow figured out.
Most of Illinois’ pension money goes to paying teachers, unless you have some other factual sources showing differently.
It’s always humorous to hear or read liberals say or write “targeting” when information comes out on how teachers and unions are taking advantage of other people.
It’s always humorous to hear people label individuals as “this” or “that”. I was merely asking a question about why Larry Snow is so interested in teachers specifically when there are many who collect taxpayer funded pensions. I didn’t think that was a liberal or conservative question but merely a question.
For what it’s worth, I don’t consider myself a liberal, conservative, or otherwise since I’m not eligible to vote. I’m just a curious person who is trying to wrap my head around the politics of America.
Watching government union members and officials defend their greed at the public trough would be amusing – if they were not killing the golden goose in the process.
Government unions have privileges that ordinary citizens do not have.
They have guaranteed annual increases, irregardless of their performance and the low level of inflation during the last several years. You will not that seniors are NOT getting COLA’s for 2011 as they did not get for 2010. In that time, teachers got *2* pay raises. Teachers and other public employees get “tenure” that prohibits them from being fired, absent major misconduct. And not even then.
The NY Post documents incidents of union members in NY state being caught committing serious crimes, such as sexual abuse of the mentally ill, and having the unions come to their defense.
Begin quote:
In 2009 alone, the Times reported, there were 13,000 allegations of abuse in state-operated and licensed homes — with fewer than 5 percent referred, as required by law, to the police. Blame the state Office for People with Developmental Disabilities, for sure.
But blame also the Civil Services Employees Association, the powerful union that regularly sabotages efforts to discipline even the worst offenders. And proudly so.
“That’s our job,” boasted CSEA honcho Ross Hanna, “even when we know the person is guilty.”
And the union does that job well.
Firings for cause are rare, no matter how egregious the offense.
End quote:
Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/editorials/protection_racket_CpiEsgG06Sx7bpgEEoNXeP#ixzz1GnLICM7V
I doubt it’s any different in Illinois. BUt the point is that merely being incompetent is not grounds for termination – and it should be.
Retired union members get automatic 3% increases in their pensions every year, irrespective of inflation. None of the private sector employees have ever offered me a pension with an *automatic* annual increase, despite the performance of the national economy.
The unions and their supporters had better get this through their greedy heads: Illinois can’t afford it any more. And they had better get used to the facts of life.
Since the question was asked by Not A Grafton Resident, why only target teachers?
First Teachers are part of the STATE pension system TRS and as has been earlier documented generally pay nothing into their own pension funds. Everything is on the school district to pay both the employee and employer contribution.
The employees of the County, City, Township are in IMRF (Illnois Municipal Retirement Fund) IMRF is not a STATE pension and the employees all must pay into their own retirement much like a 401K. In the case of the Police and fire they are in individual ‘downstate pension plans’ also NOT STATE retirements and pay between 7.5 and 9,5% of their gross pay into the fund and the municipality pays an equal amount. The monies are professionally managed and the fund pays the retirement annuity. Back to the STATE funds. Since Teachers do not contribute, the taxpayers pay 100%. To pour gas on the fire, the Illinois legislature has not funded the pensions and in fact USED,Borrowed,Stole the money for other purposes. SO what ended up occurring is that the retired employees are getting paid directly from the taxpayers.
If Larry Snow reads this blog I hope he educates himself to differentiate between the local retirements and STATE retirements.
Justin, was Snow writing about teachers pensions or did you read something else into what he was saying?
Do you think it’s fair for police officers to pay for their own pensions but so many teachers don’t contribute a dime of their own salary?
I was actually responding to another poster but since you asked the question, which I believe was rhetorical; I think ALL public employees should pay for their pensions. Teachers unfairly rape the system and have played the POOR UNDERPAID TEACHER line to death. The day of the under paid teacher is gone, at least in Illinois. School Boards really need to grow some stones and force teachers to pay locally. That is part of the local contract and the School Boards seem to play give away.
A bigger issue is the morons that run State government that have allowed these pension funds to run dry. In the hypothetical world, these pensions would be sustained BUT the politicians see this pool of money and can’t keep their hands off.
Anyone with one iota of investment knowledge should understand that the basic concepts of investments are allowing them to grow. How many of us wish we had put more money into investments when we were young?
Teachers get paid more than many police officers, fire fighters, and solders that are in Iraq and Afghanistan that risk their lives daily; do you think we have a problem with a 9 month/year position…YES!
Cal, you’re a pistol!
Consider the source. Snow is a man who chose NOT to buy MANDATORY auto insurance. Nuff said! He’s a great example of a watchdog.
Small point here. Most districts DO NOT pay their teacher’s pension contributions. Only a few of the wealthy high school districts do that. I am a teacher and I am required to pay roughly 10 percent of my salary into this failing system.
Dear “the corrector”, You are in need of a correction. Your “only a few” is a big fat fib. Two-thirds of all of the teachers in the bottom half of school districts is far from “only a few.”
Maybe your pants on fire is covered by your union’s “pants on fire” insurance plan.
Your union scam of “only a few” has been publicly exposed as untruthful.
You may want to know… or should I call you Larry? Do us all a favor and go away
Sounds like jacksprat doesn’t like union propaganda talking points shown for what they really are.
My, my …….. liberals are thin skinned about supporting public unions when facts come out showing greed, selfishness and more greed.
It is the WTF in their winning the future.
Jack Sprat doesn’t like people spewing misleading half-truths and trying to baffle the public with numbers. Jack Sprat never has, and that’s why Jack Sprat and his like minded parents and taxpayers who paid attention to the issues voted Larry Snow out of District 158