The median HOUSEHOLD incomes in Ridgewood are $138,000… teachers work for 10 months a year with tenure in many cases, so if you annualize teacher pay for 12 months work, they get paid paid the same as an entire household at the median in Ridgewood, i.e. $118,000 for 10 months = $136,000 for 12 months, with the added safety of tenured job security. Add in:
1) taxpayer subsidized $28,000 annual family “platinum” health benefit plan, which is much better than the average private sector employer plan (equivalent to “bronze”), and has much lower premiums, $5-10 co-pays, and covers up to 96% of all billable costs; as well as,
2) defined benefit pension plans for life which TPAF members contribute less than 7.5% of their annual wages towards (still!) and start drawing at an average age of 62 in NJ which can be worth over $2 million if the retiree lives to average US lifespan; and,
3) sick leave which gets carried over year after year instead of the “use it or lose it” sick leave offered by private sector employers
It becomes very clear that teachers have a MUCH better deal than the median Ridgewood household, which pays much higher health plan co-pays and deductibles for less health benefit coverage (on average, private sector plans only cover 84% of medical expenses), loses unused sick leave that cannot be carried over, runs the risk of job loss, and contributes up to 16% of their annual wages towards defined contribution pension plans, i.e. 401(k) plans. Combined teacher benefits are already too high even for well qualified, experienced, certified, professionals… which, by the way, is not what we got from the REA in the 2015/16 academic year. We got petulant, greedy, bad faith, so-called professionals who let our kids and schools down in a multitude of ways, from recommendation letters, to after school programs and activities, to community outreach. Notice the lack of signs supporting teachers in Ridgewood; we’ve had enough.
