Originally Posted by
Synnen
And when the police, the fire department, the state patrol, the prison keepers, the teachers, the universities, the emergency road crews, the plow drivers, the bus drivers, the cafeterias, etc, all go to hell and go private sector because that's where the good people are, do you REALLY think it will cost the taxpayer less in the long run?
Because if you force it all to go private sector, then you're forcing demand to go up, causing the supply to charge more. Yeah, there will be some chaff that you get rid of, but there will also be some gems that you'll never be able to hire at private sector wages.
Here's something I don't know if you know: In order to teach at a regionally accredited university, you have to have a degree one HIGHER than the degree you are teaching. So if you teach bachelor's level courses, you need to have a master's degree. There ARE exceptions to this, but not as many anymore as you would think.
We've been trying to hire (at our proprietary school, so private sector) two department chairs for some time now--one for a year, and one for 6 months. The qualified applicant must have a master's in business (for one program) and a master's in IT (for the other program) and must have experience in an educational environment. In the "private sector", those are 6-figure incomes pretty much right after you get your degree.
Because we're a proprietary school, and cannot provide the benefits OR salary of a state school---we can't fill the position. I don't know what they pay, but it's a good deal less than $100k. And our benefits are CRAP.
So that means that our students suffer because we simply can't compete with the "private sector", and we ARE the private sector! But with Washington closely watching proprietary schools, we certainly can't raise tuition (like a private school could) and we can't get subsidized to make sure our students are getting what they need (like a public university).
If you put public schools into that sort of economic environment, and you're going to have a shortage of state workers in general, and of teachers in particular. Teachers are paid for crap most of the time anyway--so why in the HELL would anyone become one if they didn't get some of the benefits the state currently provides? I know SEVERAL people that will quit their jobs if they lose collective bargaining, because they can make more money doing something else with their degree.