Tag: Social Security

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Latest Edu-Reads

Mike Antonucci asks, if teachers unions are bargaining “for the common good,” what are the elected mayors and school boards on the other side of the table bargaining for?

A new paper finds that, “Social Security is the most equal form of retirement wealth and the most important source for most minority households,” and yet 40 percent of public school employees lack Social Security benefits.

“Just like an unpaid credit card balance that grows over time, the longer states delay paying off [their pension debt], the bigger the debt price tag becomes, consuming an ever-greater share of the finite pool of public dollars available for teachers and students.” Marguerite Roza quantifies the extent of that debt for California, Illinois, Louisiana, South Carolina, Texas, and Vermont.

Julie Squire takes the high ground is glad to welcome Cory Booker back into the charter school tent (where he had been for most of his career!).

Speaking of zingers, Mike Petrilli notes that Montgomery County leaders talk a good game on equity, and yet the district, “doesn’t offer a single extra penny to teachers assigned to the district’s toughest schools — those serving large proportions of kids living in poverty who often come to school with unmet needs and below grade-level proficiency.”

Here’s an interesting report by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York on household debt and credit. Two big takeaways: At least in the last 15 years, student loan debt delinquency rates are higher and much less volatile than other types of debt:

Two, delinquency rates are tied to age. Per the first graph, that’s largely tied to student loans, but older Americans have the lowest delinquency rates while the youngest adults have much higher rates of default:

 

–Guest post by Chad Aldeman

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New Report: Teachers Without Social Security Benefits

I have a new report out this morning looking at the 5 million public-sector workers who lack Social Security benefits, including about 1.2 million teachers.

Federal law requires that states either enroll their public-sector workers in Social Security or cover them in a “qualified” retirement plan. In practice, however, I find that the rule leaves many short- and medium-term teachers with inadequate retirement benefits. For example, a new teacher in California would have to work 24 years in the teacher pension plan (CalSTRS) before qualifying for a pension that was at least as generous as Social Security. That is, many teachers in these states are not collecting Social Security benefits OR a building toward a decent pension benefit.

In the report, I calculate the break-even points for each of the 15 states– Alaska, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Missouri, Nevada, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Texas–plus DC without universal coverage for teachers.

Read the full report here, or read my column for The 74 to dive deeper into the California example and what causes it.

–Guest post by Chad Aldeman

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Latest Edu-Reads

Carrie Hahnel has a new piece up at TeacherPensions.org looking at California Governor Gavin Newsom’s proposal to spend $850 million to “buy down” school district contribution rates. Hahnel finds that districts with fewer low-income, English learner, and foster youth students will receive more of a benefit, mainly because those districts can afford to pay their teachers higher salaries.

Speaking of pensions, I have a new piece out this week on teachers and other public servants who lack Social Security coverage. Specifically, I write about two special rules Congress created to deal with workers who split their working careers in and out of Social Security. Those two provisions–the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Government Pension Offset–are wildly unpopular, but I argue they help preserve the Social Security program’s progressive benefit formula.

A big new study looks at what happened after England got rid of its national teacher pay schedule. The authors conclude that, “These results provide clear evidence that public sector pay scales have a negative impact on productivity. Once schools have the freedom to set salaries, schools in high competition areas experience significant gains in student achievement. The gains in student performance were largest in schools that were the most restrained by national pay scales, those in high wage labor markets with high proportions of disadvantaged students.”

David Deming writes that, “The advantage for STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) majors fades steadily after their first jobs, and by age 40 the earnings of people who majored in fields like social science or history have caught up.”

Bellwether’s Gwen Baker argues we need technology-driven learning tools designed to meet students where they are AND whole-course curriculum that assumes students are already performing at grade-level.

The actress Geena Davis is behind an effort to hold television networks accountable for producing children’s content with equal representation of males and females. In my opinion, the online version of the story has an unnecessarily provocative headline, whereas the print version went with the more neutral, “How Geena Davis is making children’s tv more equal with the help of tech.” Either way, it’s a good story.

–Guest post by Chad Aldeman  

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Latest Edu-reads

Today is the 84th anniversary of the Social Security Act. Most people don’t know that the original Act excluded state and local government workers, and it was only later that states were allowed to opt in. Even today, there are still 15 states plus the District of Columbia that do not provide teachers with Social Security coverage. That has implications and consequences for about 1.2 million teachers, not to mention their spouses and children and the plan itself. Read more here.

How can we reconfigure schools and re-design teacher staffing roles to “extend the reach” of great teachers? That’s the subject of my new interview with Stephanie Dean. We talk about her work at Opportunity Culture and how they are working with school districts to identify multi-classroom teacher leaders, build teacher leadership capacity, and ensure more students have access to great teaching. They’re up to 25 districts in 9 states, growing rapidly, and showing some positive results. Read it here.

For Chalkbeat, Matt Barnum writes about four new studies all finding evidence that more money boosts educational outcomes, particularly for low-income students.

“Mortality rates in comparable rich countries have continued their pre-millennial fall at the rates that used to characterize the US. In contrast to the US, mortality rates in Europe are falling for those with low levels of educational attainment, and are doing so more rapidly than mortality rates for those with higher levels of education.” That is from an older Brookings piece (from 2017), but it was new to me. The graphs starting on page 45 are especially interesting.

As I’ve noted before, there are more Americans who have dropped out of college than who have dropped out of high school. David Kirp talks about his new book, The College Dropout Scandal, and what we can do about it, with Scott Jaschik.

Elizabeth Warren as a teacher.

–Guest post by Chad Aldeman