Dec-04
01
State Workers Benifits
By
Average Salaries and Benifits in Other States State workers
State workers are paid more. Here is a comparision.
———-Public-Sector———Private-Sector
NY ——- $46,270 ————– $47,659
MN ——- $43,526 ————– $36,778
MI ——- $41,390 ————– $37,556
WI ——- $39,657 ————– $31,180
ND ——- $30,011 ————– $25,324
U.S.—— $37,814 ————– $36,157
1. Add in state paid health care at rock bottom co-pays
2. Add in average 35+ days paid time off
3. And throw out accountability
It is worse at the local school district level.
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I don’t know about teachers but as an ed asst. who makes just $10.50 per hour (when schools out, I also do not get paid), I work for my insurance benefits. I also pay more than half of my paycheck for them as well. I work very hard and endure quite a bit of both verbal and physical “challenges” and have been hurt many times at school because of these “challenges”. I do this because I love helping the children and because of reality. I need insurance and I need to be home with my children when they are out of school. However, I could not justify what I deal with without at least the insurance. I paid less out of each check at my previous job but yes, my benefits were slightly less (not alot, but slightly and I made alot more money). I have no problem if insurance benefits change but you would need to compensate assistants more if you were to get anyone to take these jobs. Believe me, most feel this way and many work just to get the benefits as I do.
I am all for spending less, Hudson School Distrtict spends WAAAAAY too much and it goes who knows where, but you cannot group everything into once nice little pile. You need to look at everything and I wanted to make sure to point this out. I am sure many don’t know how much ed asst’s have to deal with and how little they get in return. Just pointing this out….
Thanks Ebaybabee, I don’t think anyone is advocating anything other than what is fair. I work for a large national company, but still pay in excess of 220 dollars a month for coverage. This coverage includes 20 dollar co-pays and 15 dollar subscriptions. Anything related to mental health is capped at 2000 a year with $50 copays. Anything outside the system may be covered if an emergency by only 70% and if not an emergency, not at all. This is probably typical of most national companies. I know that in Minneosta, the average state worker only pays $56 dollars for coverage with next to nothing for a co-pay. I don’t know exactly what it is in Wisconsin for an average state worker but from what I understand, the school district has a pretty cushy plan. I don’t know the specifics but compared to the general private sector, it’s a Cadillac plan.
Cadillac is the correct term. The teachers currently pay 5% of a $15,000 plan with NO copay or deductible. That’s $750 per year, period. I understand that our friend Mr. Muchlinski has had lots of problems with his neck this year. I can guarantee you that he paid nothing other than his $750 premium for the entire year. I am self-employed and $5000 deductibles on each person. My wife just had an MRI and it cost us $1300 out of pocket. This is in addition to the hefty premiums that we pay. What the admin. is pointing to might be found in this week’s paper. There is a complete listing of the salaries of all of the non-hourly workers in the county. That is an amazing list.
I don’t think that the admin. is picking on hourly workers like ebaybaybee. It’s the people like Ron Bernth and Cathy Shimon that are eating up the money. Believe me when I say there is ALOT of FAT in the school’s budget!
Thanks SS. No I am not picking on the hourly workers. $750 a year!!! No co-pays, no deductables! We ought to put out for bid the next health care contract and then allow the taxpayers to choose the ‘GOLD’, ‘SILVER’, or ‘BRONZE’, or ‘ALUMINUM’.
Thanks, was not sure and wanted to clarify some points. I can tell you that I pay approx. $355 or more from each paycheck depending on what I am being paid that period. This is well above what I used to pay at my previous job. We do have a $2000 cap per year on mental health as other insurances do. I also pay anywhere from $5-$25 per perscription (please note that for perscriptions that can be given for 3 months, I am only allowed one month). Beyond that, it is good in that I have a $200 family deductable which has literally saved my family. This would be the part I would see as the extra bonus. Dental is your typical 80/20 plan with a $1000 cap per year and $1500 for ortho (50% coverage). Again, I would be fine with my previous type of plan at my old job but we would need pay compensation. If anyone looked at what ed asst’s do and what they endure working with some of the hardest to work with students, I am sure many would agree.
Thanks much for letting me pass the word on and I LOVE this website!!!!
Ebaybabee understands where the waste is, and it’s not with her. We appreciate the work that you do at the district. However, at the same time you are working your butt off for your 10.50 an hour people like Ron Bernth are wasting money as fast as we can give it to him. He wouldn’t know a day of hard work if it came up and bit him in his A…..
Amen….not to mention the almost $500,000 Wisconsin gave back in Federal funds last year for the schools, that they never spent….yet we need a tax increase and MORE spending when they can’t spend what they have???!!! I would like to know where the $11,000+ per student goes…in detail…no generalizations. To me, that amount is unbeleivable. Special Ed does use more $ per student I am sure, but I have a REAL hard time seeing where that would make the huge difference up between public and private school spending per student. Take a look at the private schools around here and then take a look at the more recently built public schools. They contain so much wasted space that we are heating and cooling (at taxpayer expense) all for “looks”. That is one area of waste I do definately see. When I was a child, my schools were built for use, not looks and we used student artwork to make the place look nice….:-) Just an observation…
The new schools and renovation at Willow River are certainly prime examples of wasted space. Just the foyer at Willow River cost $1 million. The cost difference between private and public schools is astounding. Trinity’s total cost per student is approximately $3500. The total cost for the public schools in town is approximately $11,000. Supporters of the public schools continually say that this difference is because of special education. That is a false argument, and they know it.
While special education is an enormous cost, it is only part of the problem. Special education does however need to be closely looked at. What the parents of these kids need to be asking themselves is would they cough up the $8500 a year to provide those services to their kids? While I agree that there are children that require this type of work/cost, there are a number of kids lopped into SE that might need a little tutoring or some better discipline. SE has become a jobs program for people like Nancy Sweet and she has incentives to label more kids with this tag. Why? Because the district doesn’t have to report this cost to the local taxpayers and it’s picked up by the “state” (aka you and me). When you figure the cost per student against the total student population, the cost is around $1500 per student($6.8 million divided by 4700 kids).
This brings us down to $9500 per student in the district. This is the comparison cost that we should look at. So why does it cost $6000 per kid more to educate a kid in the public school system? That’s the $64,000 question! Overhead, overhead, overhead!!!! Plus the pay and benefit package for the teachers is INCREDIBLE. This is the reason why people are up in arms. Because when the tax force says that we need to spend more money, what they are really saying is that $11,000 per kids is not enough! I say VOTE NO!