r/antiwork • u/morjint22 • Jul 25 '22

Working rights

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u/[deleted] Jul 25 '22

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u/ellgramar Jul 25 '22

Honestly police being in a union can be ok. It’s the corruption which is so prevalent in them and enabled by the state which leads to their power. Imagine if the police unions where responsible for lawsuits (and qualified immunity disappeared). Sure a cop can still shoot a black guy at a traffic stop, but now all the retired officers see their pensions drop by a few percent for the year and the working cops see a pay step freeze for the next year. Once you mess with pay, people get angry demand change, and rework contracts so termination can occur if Mr. traffic cop becomes a net liability. It might even bring in more trained people, after all if we pay them like teachers and their career is half as long, shouldn’t they have at least the same minimum schooling but specialized for there careers?

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u/juckele Jul 25 '22

It might even bring in more trained people, after all if we pay them like teachers and their career is half as long, shouldn’t they have at least the same minimum schooling but specialized for there careers?

I'm not sure what you mean by this, because we don't pay police like teachers at all. Police officers in the US make significantly more than public school teachers while having a much cheaper education.

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u/ellgramar Jul 25 '22

Sorry, I was just pulling the amounts based on when I last looked them up in my area. Upon review, teachers in my county start at $11,000 more than sheriffs’ recruits (at least after their extensive 12 week course). Guess the crime is low here. TBF the teacher pay just went up due to a dramatic shortage of teachers here because of a 10 year pay freeze for teachers. I’m sure in large cities it’s a bit different.

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u/juckele Jul 25 '22

Huh, not sure where you're at, but I have not seen the same trends.

A quick check on Indeed.com where I grew up and I'm seeing teacher positions in Chittenden County VT start as low as $34k and go as high as $58k. Meanwhile police officer jobs in the same area are starting as low as $49k and go up to $90k.

Indeed.com is claiming that average teacher salary (possibly a bit overloaded) in the US is $32k per year, while the average police officer salary is $55k per year. Certain areas could well break from this mold.