Heres what I just e-mailed to talk@cfax1070. What do you bet it gets completely ignored? - BC teachers are the second lowest paid in the country, higher paid only than teachers in Prince Edward Island (Canada’s POOREST province). PEI teachers are about to enter into contract negotiations, a process which will put them ahead of BC teachers and leave BC teachers, yes, THE LOWEST paid in the country. People like to point out that teachers receive a generous (that is, professional) salary, above the average for the communities in which they live, and conclude on that basis that they don’t deserve a substantial raise (that is, one that would allow BC’s teachers to avoid being dead last in the country) but should settle for the same as all the other public sector unions have been bullied and railroaded into accepting. “They already make better money than so many other people…” Let’s remember that teachers go to university for only two years less than medical doctors - and make a fraction of what a medical doctor makes. In any case, this line of reasoning, resting on the point that teachers’ incomes compare favourably to those of many others, ignores the fact that the comparison set for professional salaries is counterparts in similar jurisdictions. Thus, BC teachers compare their salaries to teachers in Alberta and Ontario and, yes, Prince Edward Island, not to provincial office workers or community support workers in here in BC. This is the way it’s done. Regardless of whether the union-busting Christy Clark Socreds want to recognize this or not, this is the established practice, and it has been recognized by the legal system. When I lived in Nova Scotia a few years ago, federal civil servants in Halifax (who, like university professors, which is what I was at the time) were routinely paid about 25 % less than their counterparts doing the same work in central and western Canada. In academia, this is referred to as “the Maritime discount,” and it applies not just to Nova Scotia but to all three Maritime provinces. Halifax federal civil servants succeeded through litigation in having their employer ordered to pay them the same as their co-workers in Ottawa, regardless of the (irrelevant) fact that they already made well above the average for the community they lived in. People need to get over the fact that teachers are well paid. They go to university for almost as long as medical doctors do, and look what medical doctors get paid.
Posted on: Mon, 01 Sep 2014 18:40:49 +0000
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