Education
Free Market Friday: Opportunity to save teachers and taxpayers
August 5, 2016
Jonathan Small
The condition of take-home pay for teachers in Oklahoma is dire.
If one doesn’t believe so, all a person has to do is look at recent polling that shows 97 percent of Oklahomans believe teachers deserve a raise.
Even more telling, at a time when Oklahoma’s economy is in recession, Oklahomans are so rightfully concerned that good teachers will be forced to leave the classroom that 62 percent are willing to further damage Oklahoma’s economy by raising their own sales tax to the highest in the country.
Yes, it’s true that there is more than $8.2 billion of revenue in our K-12 public school system.
Yes, it’s true that from FY-2008 to FY-2015 local funding grew by nearly $600 million but very little made it to teacher salaries.
Yes, it’s true that suburban schools have parents and teachers who report that they can’t fund classroom essentials yet announcements of NFL-grade turf and small-college-style athletic improvements are made.