Open Illinois.org

A high number of Chicago area school teachers earned at least $100,000 last year, the Chicago Tribune reports. In areas like Highland Park and Deerfield, nearly half of the teachers brought home six-figure salaries. But the high salaries don’t necessarily come from school districts breaking even:

Districts used taxpayer dollars to pay $100,000 salaries even as they struggled with red ink. A third of districts with unusually high concentrations of teachers making six figure – at least 10 percent of teachers – posted operating deficits in 2008-2009, according to state financial data.

Some feel that the teachers unions should compromise in order “to help contain spending in a a bad economy.” However, many teachers feel that the salaries are more than justified:

Teachers used to be considered a “cheap commodity,” said Thomas Ludovice, a biology and chemistry teacher at Hinsdale Central High School and a local teachers union vice president. Decades ago, he recalls teachers being paid close to the poverty line and scrambling to work summer jobs to make ends meet.

…National Education Association Bill Raabe said more teachers should be making $100,000. “If we’re really going to attract people into the profession and do the kind of work we expect, we’re going to have to pay them.”

Jack Roeser of the Family Taxpayers Foundation disagrees. He says that given the amount of time teachers work during the year, teachers are overpaid. Tom Johnson, President of the Taxpayers’ Federation of Illinois, shares the same view: “Obviously, we want top-quality professionals teaching the students of future generations….but in these economically troubled times, how can you justify any kind of compensation adjustments going anywhere but downward?”

If school districts were transparent and posted salary information online, this news wouldn’t come as such a shock to many of the taxpayers on the hook for these salaries. Furthermore, it would allow for taxpayers in these communities to voice their opinions in the bargaining process of the salaries.

To read the whole article, click here.