Out of Sight, Out of Money

There are many things I remember about my beginning days as a teacher. I had no education training, so I was thrown into a classroom of kids without the slightest idea when I was doing. Worse than that, since I was taking over for someone going on sabbatical, the administration of my school decided it would be a great idea to take the worst problem kids in the entire school and dump them on whoever came to fill the vacancy--in this instance, me. By the time I finished my first year, four of my students were in prison, and one had been committed to a mental hospital. And these were eighth graders. How I didn't end up in a mental hospital myself is a mystery.

To top all that off, I wasn't getting paid. I don't know if the situation is better today, but veterans can confirm that it used to take the DOE forever to get people on the payroll. In my case, it took, if I recall correctly, about 3 months for me to get my first paycheck, and longer than that to get the arrears.

I'm sorry to report that things are just as crappy today as they were then. I have been officially retired now for nearly three months, and I have not gotten a pension check yet.

Oh, they warned me this could happen, with a wink and a nod as if they were only covering themselves. I was told that the reality was probably two months, tops, before I got a check as long as everything was in order.

TRS has this wonderful thing they call "advance payments" which they offer people like me to make sure we don't end up licking discarded candy wrappers in the street for nourishment. Even if they can't straighten out your paperwork immediately, they'll send you some money to tide you over.

What they don't tell you is that it takes two months to get an advance payment. And the check I got was for less than a third of what I was owed. And now, another month has passed.

If you want the gruesome numbers, I have received about $2000 of the approximately $12500 I am owed. Supposedly, I will get my first check along with all the back money at some point, but when that will be is anyone's guess.

If you're an in-service member, you got a large check on September 30 that included the retro money for the 1% pay increases over the last two years. As a new retiree, I have not gotten than money, nor has the union provided any clue when retirees will receive theirs.

So far, it seems that if you're a retiree, you're out of sight, out of mind, and pretty much out of money. I've ended my career just the way I started--waiting to get paid.

It's not a crisis for me, luckily. My bills still get paid, and I have plenty of money saved in my TDA (see Chaz's excellent piece on TDA investments, although I advise keeping it all in fixed at 7%, which, IMO, really can't be beat for steady returns and security). But it would be nice, just once, to get what I am owed in a timely way, and it's a bit discouraging to see that things haven't changed much since I started teaching.

And let's not even talk about how we won't be getting our retroactive payments on the new contract in full for another six years.

Setting the Bar Wayyyy Low

A new agreement between the city and the UFT is being touted by Randi Weingarten as a great victory because we didn't give away as much as other unions have. I guess if you set the bar as low as Randi does, this might seem like a great victory. For the rest of us, it's mostly a loss.

Basically, the agreement will establish a new retirement tier for new hires that will force them to pay 4.85% of their salaries into the pension fund for life, instead of the current ten years. In return, they will get to retire at 55/27 instead of the 62 years agreed to by two other city unions. But there are two problems with declaring this a huge victory.

First, Randi gave away the store in 2005, including the peddling of seniority, lengthening the school day, sending us back to the lunchrooms, etc., for the mere promise of support for a 55/25 retirement. Despite all the givebacks, few teachers actually qualified for the 55 year retirement and we ultimately settled for two more years of work for most members. That 57/25 has been retained, but don't ever forget what we gave away to even get it in the first place.

Second, comparing us to other unions makes no sense. Those other unions were under threat of massive layoffs, and we were not. They agreed to the new Tier 5 in exchange for no layoffs. There is absolutely nothing mentioned in this agreement about a no-layoff clause for school workers, so Bloomberg can get out his ax anyway.

Also, we agreed to lower the fixed rate of return on TDAs to 7%, down from 8.25. Allegedly we did this because the pension fund lost a lot of money gambling in the market (and yes, stocks are gambling). Personally, I put all my money in fixed more than a year ago, so people like me will have to subsidize the poor pension decisions of the pension fund. I did a rough calculation in my head, and it seems likely that I will lose at least $15,000 by the time I retire due to this reduction. Good going, Randi!

Of course, in exchange, we got the two days before Labor Day back. What the UFT failed to mention was that they gave away those two days in the first place. If they'd gotten rid of those two days AND 37.5 minutes, there might be reason to celebrate, just a little.

But that darned bar is so low, high fives seem in dubious taste.