Austerity Measures, Public Sector Workers, Retirements and Deflation: Chicago teachers’ strike enters another week after talks fail – October 28, 2019,

Classes were canceled for about 300,000 students in Chicago for an eighth day on Monday, October 28, 2019, as the teachers’ union and public school district failed over the weekend to resolve a deadlock in contract talks over money. Teachers need their money and who cares if Chicago is broke, it’s not about that, it’s about teachers demanding they get their freaking pay increases.

Chicago public sector, in general, is facing some serious challenges worst of which include their declining population numbers. You see the public sector is financed by taxpayers, and if the number of people the government can tax decreases, so does their income. Another major problem in Chicago is property taxes, property taxes are already high and higher taxes tend to lead to a decline in consumer spending, higher property taxes also hit the commercial real estate sector very hard.

Chicago is still losing population | chicagobusiness.com
The metro area fell below 9.5 million for the first time since 2010. The nation’s two biggest cities, New York and Los Angeles, also slipped last year.

If you’re a firm believer in social security or socialism in general, it’s important to remember that not only is socialism expensive it’s also very hard to micromanage. Furthermore, socialism is more of a fixed economic system often ignores human behavior. If humans have the option to move when times get challenging, they will move. Now, as the revenue for the Public Sector dwindles, it’s only natural that people paying union dues assume that this problem is an easy fix. However the problem is Government, or I should say the Public Sector tends not to put much emphasis on economics and productivity.

The public sector workers tend to not care where the extra money comes from as long as it comes. This, of course, is why, a lot of people reject austerity measures as an option, which is of course what businesses are forced to do when their costs get too high. In the public sector, the hope for the public sector worker is that if they get a pay increase, the money will appear by magic and not be extracted by the Chicago taxpayer in the forms of higher prices for fewer services. This, of course, leads down the road of economic collapse, that when it happens most people won’t know what started it.

I’d like to make clear that even though I’m not a huge fan of Public Sector Unions, I do believe that Private Sector Unions have a right to exist. A union’s job is to represent its client and if its client works for the government the public sector Unions’ job is basically to raise taxes to the public in order to benefit the people who employ it (in this instance the public school teachers).

It should be acknowledged that public sector greed is also greed, I always read about people discussing how greedy the private sector is, well, the public sector is also greedy, and typically for most people, they prefer avoiding public services. Taking a step back however and allowing news media outlets to frame the story from their own perspective, the public may ignore public sector greed as long as the greed of the public sector is framed in a manner that make them appear benevolent as opposed to greedy.

Now, in the article below you’ll be wise to notice how the writer frames their article. The voucher system has long been proposed as a means to solve these problems, but what appears to be happening more and more with technology is parents are homeschooling. In actuality, the cost for schooling has declined and if let’s say Wall Street was allowed to deflate, let’s say the Federal Reserve stopped manipulating the currency, let’s say austerity measures were allowed to be considered, people could retire on their savings accounts again.

But that’s wishful thinking on my part, as it stands now, humanity appears to like paying higher prices. The cost of living doesn’t matter as much as higher pay. If all the prices go up because of government edicts but I get a few extra dollars added onto my pay it’s all worth it many will argue. It just appears to me that humans are going to have to learn things the hard way. God Bless Chicago!

Chicago teachers strike continues after talks fail to break impasse | Reuters.com

Interesting times ahead