It is fairly common knowledge throughout New Jersey that the governor is strongly anti-public education, especially teachers and the teachers’ association. This week he took his feud to new levels with two instances:

• Each year thousands of teachers attend the NJEA convention where one of the keynote speakers is the state commissioner of education who discusses state testing and other issues relevant to teachers. This year the new commissioner refused to attend the convention or talk to rank-and-file teachers, stating in a public letter that she could not do so because teachers were refusing to help out in the state’s budget crisis.

• The governor himself met with a group of students in Trenton where he announced that classes did not have adequate supplies because greedy teachers’ union officials–not because of his budget cuts (which were extensive, especially to suburban schools).

Keep in mind that the “budget crisis” the commissioner is referring to was totally created by the state legislature and governors who refused to fund the public employees’ pension funds (including police, firefighters, teachers, and state employees) for 12 years, in spite of the state Supreme Court ordering them to do so twice during that span. During that period, all teachers paid their share of their pension funding faithfully each year. Now the governor–and many of the citizens of the state who support him–believe that the teachers must be the ones to suffer for the crimes of the legislature with lesser pensions and medical benefits.

All teachers enter their profession knowing they will receive less salaries during their career than workers in private industry, but the “carrot” is that they will receive a guaranteed pension and medical benefits afterwards. Keep in mind that teachers’ pensions are still lower than most college graduates retiring out of industry because those pensions are based on their considerably-lower salaries. With my masters’ degree in mathematics, I earned about half of what a similar person would have earned in industry at my career level, yet somehow the governor would have the public believe that I am both greedy and uncaring.

And to make matters worse, the governor refuses to continue the 1% surcharge on state residents earning more than $300,00 per year. So let’s put this in perspective: the governor’s plans would take $5,000-$6,000 away from each retired teacher’s pension (which is considerably less than $100,000 per teacher), but he refuses to make rich people pay an extra $3,000 which is pocket change for them, and which overall total would make up for much of the missing pension money.

Can we spell hypocrisy in New Jersey?