“Politicians use the lower number to promote themselves as representing the taxpayer by ?holding the line? on staff costs. Then the multiplier effect of the additional benefits and pensions based on the true salary increases kicks in as well. So when you read ?3 per cent wage increase?, think 5-6 per cent out of your pocket and into theirs. A 70 per cent pension will give them a pension income starting at around $63,000 per year, including CPP.
These levels of income are well above the average worker?s wage in Canada of around $46,000 per year. Not the worker?s pension, mind you, the worker?s wage. These pensions put retired teachers into the top 20 per cent of senior incomes?.”

No wonder, I see a great many retired teachers off jet-setting the world. What name could be given to retired teachers, who begins their new job working for a book publisher, or begin the talk circuit going from one convention to the next convention? 

No wonder there is not any funding left over for the remediation of the 3 Rs, and parents either have to put up with the school or if they have the means, hire the tutors. Making the kind of money, I do think the public education system should be held accountable to the expenses incurred by parents and students relying on private sources for remediation of their education needs, or are no longer being provided by the education system. As well as the time spent by parents dealing with the remediation at home, and time that could have been spent on other family activities, like watching a movie.

Accountability should be force down their collective throats, in return for their high wages and pensions with all the perks. If teachers were held accountable, 95 percent of the students would have high levels in the 3 Rs. But that is a pipe dream, and the next best solution is to offer choice, and have the funding follow the students. At least with choice, I could have located a school or even do it myself, to ensure my child’s low phonemic awareness was corrected, direct instruction in math and not the song and dance of disconnected math curriculum/instruction, that ensured my child to maintain a grade one level throughout the primary grades.

I certainly would not mind be renumerated for my expenses and time spent on the remediation of my child at home, as well as the angst that rained down from the educrats for daring to teach my child at home. No wonder there isn’t any money left over for the education needs of students, as well as toilet paper in the school’s washrooms.

A quick look at http://www.SunshineOnSchools.ca (or click on link in the margin above)
will show how much the pension liability is for school boards as well.  It is included in Future Benefits Payable, which also includes the unused sick leave payable upon retirement.

My pension is $60 000 so what? I deserve every cent of it and then some. I also work part time on top of it. Big Deal.

These arrangements were freely negotiated many years ago. Do you suggest the government reneg? The teachers pay 15% of their incomes to a pension. The OTPP is one of the giant pools of capital in Canada and invests in huge numbers of Canadian business’. They just sold MLSE to Bell and Rogers.

The politics of envy does not make people look good. You had a free choice to be a teacher. You chose not to do it. That was your choice.

It is not the politics of envy, but rather the defensive tactics used by public sector workers justifying their pensions, even though the pensions are work in during negotiations times, and the pensions and the liability all become part of the overall budget into funding education. What is worse, when no one at any level in the public education system, is held accountable for the poor curriculum, and the rest of the poor practices held in esteem by the education system, but play havoc with the actual education of children. Worse still, the thousand of students who are socially promoted from one grade to the next, without ever getting the remediation needed. Oh yes, I forgot, the public education no longer does that one either, and the practice is dumbing it down. If a private school operated the way public schools do, they be out of business a long time ago.

Well said Nancy!

There are several different aspects to this.

The first one is that if public services are paid by the community, then the community has to be able to pay them and that’s the bottom line.

The second aspect is that from a legal point of view a contract agreed to and signed by all parties is upheld and enforceable by law.

Well, we live very unusual and interesting times.
Personally, because they are unsustainable economically I think all the parts of the “social contract” of the ‘60 and ‘70 in the Western World will change dramatically, regardless of whether or not they were backed up by laws, contracts, whatever.
And I do mean everything: retirement programs, health care, education. I think as a society we will have to lower our expectations a bit and learn how to be more frugal because the pie will be smaller.
Hey! I even think that in 20 years houses will start getting smaller again because it won’t be so artificially cheap to heat them up!
Everything and everybody will have to give a little bit, and from what I see and hear around me the have nots, the ones that have trouble putting a roof over their heads and having food on the table start to be more and more the young people and not the older ones. We might do ok, even if not great, but how about them?

They inherit our liabilities setup in the good times, they don’t have good life habits because it was more important for the most of us to feel good about being a parent rather than to prepare them for life, they don’t have jobs to earn a living because we’ve exported the jobs oversees in order to get cheaper shoes and cheaper cars.
Jobs? What jobs? Public service: police, teaching, medicine if one can get in and has an appetite for it, some construction jobs: plummer, electrician and then service jobs: retail and restaurant jobs.
Other than that? Very few. There’s next to nothing manufacturing base left, a lot of the financial industry jobs are in the process of going to India, even jobs like writing go to India. Look at the TDWaterhouse site; about a third of the financial commentaries are written by somebody from India; they are still edited here but a lot of the work is in India.

So how can most of our kids who - on top of coming to age in challenging times - read and write laboriously and think that an assignment due date is just a nice to have not a must, compete?

Anyway .. back to the topic.

Laws eventually follow the realities of their societies. If it becomes impossible or profoundly unfair to meet contracts agreed upon in different times, one way or the other they will get changed.

To me, the more important issue is that pay - and for the record I think teaching is an important job and should be paid well - is not linked to performance, that pay is not linked to competence.

Europe, what you have stated is logic at work, and more than likely the eventually scenario outcome at the end. Public education exists with a social contract between the schools and the public to educate.. It is the social contract that is under going changes by the stakeholders within the education system, and as a result, students are far less prepared to take on young adulthood and the world.

It will be up to the public to change the social contract focus, and as social contract theory predicts, it is the public, the majority that will take the reins from the public education system, change the focus to preparing students with a solid foundation underneath them and than hand back the reins to the public education system.

Over the years, the public has allow the public education system to make changes to the social contract, without seeking consultation to the public. It has now reach the point, the social contract is at odds between the public and the education system, and it is a matter of time when the public will take back the reins.

And you are correct to state,(an assumption of the last few lines of your post),  the teachers will be highly value, but the bureaucracy of the education system will be the target of the public. The target, so they will no longer have free rein over the social contract.

So 2012, will be interesting because the shift is starting to happen in all aspects of society. In education, inclusion, math and reading curriculum are some of the topics being discussed by the public on the web and in the homes. In the last six months, there has been a blossom of blogs, opinions expressed by the Canadian public, compared to 9 years or so. Expressing the same thoughts, as I did 9 years or so in seeking help for my child, and an education system that was unwilling to meet the simple request of remediation of the 3 Rs. The public education system is unwilling, because they no longer have to ensure a foundation of the 3 Rs.

The public is becoming aware, and I suspect 2012 to be a gathering of the public in larger numbers, with like-minded thoughts, that I had over 9 years ago.

I’M ALLOWING THIS COMMENT IN BECAUSE IT SO ELOQUENTLY CONVEYS THE PROBLEM. MALKIN

Sadly once again inflated numbers that are completely out too lunch. Average ontario Teacher pension collected last year, $38500, gee only off by $24500. To reach 70% pension you would have to work 35 years. Average is 26 years. Off by 9 years. So once again complete crap being spewed. At least get your numbers correct. All easily found on their pension website. Something your crap fill article couldn’t even research before spewing the crap again.

How Jayson weaves the web, to reflect low pension numbers.

On the OTPP web site, Teachers’ At A Glance.

“Statistics

178,000 teachers in elementary and secondary schools in Ontario
117,000 pensioners ? includes survivor pensions
Plan originally created in 1917
One of Canada?s largest payrolls, paying $4.5 billion in pension benefits annually “
http://www.otpp.com/wps/wcm/connect/otpp_en/Home/Corporate+Info/Teachers+at+a+Glance/

The two numbers of 4.5 billion divides neatly by the 117,000 to produce the pension salary of 38,500 (rounded off).

Doug, states he receives a $60,000 teacher pension. It is reflective of the last 5 years of salaries, where most teachers in Ontario are earning well above the $80,000 + mark.to received a pension of $60,000 plus.

Note further down the page, ” Contributions

Average 11% of earnings in 2011
The Ontario government and designated private schools and organizations match the teachers? contributions “

I shall assume that the government picks up the other 89 percent of total contributions . But as I discovered, the average is in and around 10 percent for public sector workers, compared to the working stiffs in the private sector. The public sector went on strike in part, for trying to raise their contributions from 6 % to close to 10 percent.

“Workers in private industry would need to put aside more than a third of their take home pay to match the gold plated pensions enjoyed by public sector workers, a study has shown.”

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2009669/Great-pensions-divide-Private-sector-staff-pay-match-state-worker-benefits.html#ixzz1iL7C52cN

The public sector pensions are indeed gold plated, and have always enjoyed the protection from economic turmoil, as well as government protecting their investment in workers, who for the most part are highly skilled, and cannot be replace easily.

I am sure the book Pension Ponzi covers it, but why do public sector workers and their gold-plated pensions defend their pensions and benefits, by discounting and dismissing the real figures, including the ones on the OTTP site, and have us look at the voodoo numbers of averages, and dismissed all other numbers that do not represent the magic number of $38,500. The $38,500 represents a number found in the non-sector sector, where pension plans are available, providing the worker has worked well over the 30 year mark, putting an average of 25 to 30 % of their earnings yearly.

Nancy so now OTPP is lying on their website? As for Doug he would of worked approx 34 years to get this starting pension and has been putting appox 10% of his salary for the past 34 years into his pension pool. Their pension is well managed over the past 20+ years with an average return of 10%. Again avg pension is approx $38500 for teachers so many are below $38500 to offset the higher earned pensions for those whom worked more than 30+ years. Again avg years worked is 26, so once again many worked less than 26 to off set Doug’s 34 years in the avg numbers. And as for health benefits, find me a private company with 500 + employees that does not have health benefits in Ontario. P.S no health benefits for ontario teachers in retirement. Just their invested salary contribution to their pension is returned.

I did not state that the OTTP is lying, nor did I ever made any inferences in my last post that there are lying.

I merely pointed out the inconsistencies of your argument, by pointing out the numbers of the OTTP that states otherwise.

To use the argument based on the simple average, to imply that the majority of retired teachers are only receiving the lower amount of 38,500 is a tactic used among the bean counters of the public service to glossed over the gold-plated pensions. This is on top of, the percentages of the 178,000 pensioned teachers, that are not made public on the OTTP site. So either you know, there is a lot more pensioned teachers heading in their 85th year of living or more, who are more than likely receiving the lower pensions or you know the real numbers, and you will not divulge them, because it puts an end to your arguments.

The teachers who have retired in the last 20 years or so, is part of the gravy train, and Doug is probably right the current pensioners nothing will change for them. But in the on going world wide economic crisis, public sector wages and pensions, and where unions are found, the gravy train is coming to a halt. In the last few days, much discussion on the financial and economic pages of the news, that the public sector cannot be sustain under the current structure and gold-plated pensions.

As Malkin has stated:
“The total compensation may reach 5-6 per cent even though the announced ?contract settlement? was for only 3 per cent. Politicians use the lower number to promote themselves as representing the taxpayer by ?holding the line? on staff costs. Then the multiplier effect of the additional benefits and pensions based on the true salary increases kicks in as well. So when you read ?3 per cent wage increase?, think 5-6 per cent out of your pocket and into theirs. A 70 per cent pension will give them a pension income starting at around $63,000 per year, including CPP.
These levels of income are well above the average worker?s wage in Canada of around $46,000 per year. Not the worker?s pension, mind you, the worker?s wage. These pensions put retired teachers into the top 20 per cent of senior incomes?.”

As well as the new chatter on the entire work force within the public sector, who are now the new middle class, and have manage to drive the blue-collar workers of the private sector down to working class. And there is lots of chatter about it, in every facet, and more importantly, for public sector unions to obtain maximum power and sway, the public sector unions would like to see further fragmentation of the private sector wages and pensions, as well as the private unions,having less political sway than what they have now. 

Now I am just repeating what I have read in the last few days, but Europe is the prefect example, and in 2012, it could be the North American public sector under going changes that reflects the reality and financial constraints of today, and not some misty eye version of a public sector union calling the shots on salaries and pensions.

By the way, health benefits for teachers, they received the discount for health premiums, unlike the private sector, where only a minority receives a discount, as well as discounts on home, auto insurance, and other products/services to where the private sector receives no discounts besides the regular discounts available to all if they qualified, or await for a sale to take advantage. Lot of commercials on TV, telling the public sector workers and the retired public sector workers come to us and we will provide a discount for your troubles. I don’t see any commercials telling the iron steel workers, offering any discounts, or for that matter any other private sector industry.

Working in the public sector, lowly clerk to the ones that commands salaries of well over $200,000 certainly are taken care of by the governments of the day, thanks largely to public tax dollars, and seeing the public purse as the golden egg that keeps on giving.

Just to make my point for the private sector workers and the financial constraints that they are under, compare to the public sector workers.

“Once adjusted for inflation, wages actually fell during the past year, which robbed heavily indebted households of the spending power to bolster an economy that is running out of steam and about to be hit by a massive round of federal and provincial government spending cuts.

?Forget the body count as it is wage growth that matters far more,? says Scotia Capital economist Derek Holt. ?The fact that real wages are going nowhere for the average of millions of already-employed workers matters far more than the minor monthly gyrations in the jobs tally.?

http://www.ipolitics.ca/2012/01/02/forget-the-body-count-economist-says-as-wage-weakness-weighs-on-2012/

It is rather hard to take, when the public sector workers and their unions, make it look like, they are in the same situation as the private sector workers. And for the year 2012, the public sector is looking for hefty increases in their salaries.

Just to point out the obvious, which I don’t think anyone has, the Pension Ponzi figures include CPP payouts - which don’t of course appear on the OTPP web-site.

Nancy/Malkin…current pensionable OTPP rate is approaching 65 percent for the highest five salaried years (so my peers tell me!). And…FYI… a surviving OTPP spouse receives a top-up on benefits to bring that person’s deductible to 0 if services rendered. My mother is now in this position since 2009, when she received a cash payout on my dad’s pension,when he passed, as well as absorbing his benefit package to compliment her own OTPP plan. However, her pension is somewhat higher than Dad received, despite her not being in the system quite as long as he…on many years sabbatical to raise us kids!!

A number of respondents commented on your math.My comment concerns your statement..‘at around $63,000 a year.including C.P.P.” I believe the earliest you can collect C.P.P. is at age 60.Hence the knowledge gap!