Was it really worth keeping kids in San Francisco home from school for a week — for a 2% raise?
That’s all the United Educators of San Francisco, the union that represents 6,000 teachers in the city, managed to eke out of their pointless strike against the public school district.
They demanded 9%. With two extra training days per year adding another 1% raise, they’ll get a third of what they wanted — just 3%.
That’s not even halfway.
The union is portraying Friday’s agreement as a victory. It is telling members that sending children home for 10 days — they won’t return until midweek — was worth a paltry increase because it showed that the union still has bargaining power.
The union is also touting an agreement by the district to fully fund the teachers’ health benefit program. But that’s not exactly a massive accomplishment — especially given the cost.
The reason the union failed so badly was not because it negotiated poorly.
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It’s because the public knew that the union was bargaining in bad faith.
An independent fact-finding panel that studied the dispute between the teachers and the school board sided with the district over the union.
Even the left-leaning editorial board of The San Francisco Chronicle panned the union.
The Chronicle asked the logical question: Given terrible education results, have the teachers actually earned a raise?
The answer is obvious.
And so is the motive: With an election looming, the union saw an opportunity to flex its political muscle.
They won’t stop with San Francisco. Teachers unions across the state, from Los Angeles to Sacramento, have authorized strike actions against their school districts.
Is it possible that every district is facing the same issues of salary and benefits? Or is the real common theme the fact that 2026 is a crucial election year?
Politicians rely on unions, especially the teachers union, to get out the vote. The union leaders know it, and they want to remind everyone just how powerful they are.
But there’s a new spirit sweeping California — starting in San Francisco.
Voters have had enough of being abused. They have recalled failing public officials — whether prosecutors, or school board members — and installed a reform-minded mayor in Daniel Lurie.
The teachers strike was a test of Lurie’s leadership. He deserves credit for doing all he could to ease the burden of the strike on San Francisco’s working families, who had to scramble to find child care while teachers walked the picket line.
Other leaders across the state should take note: You win when you stand up to abuse.
The unions perform an important service. But they have overstepped their core purpose of representing teachers, and they seem to believe they should exert political power as well.
At best, they represent a narrow set of political interests. They don’t represent teachers well anymore, and they certainly don’t represent the well-being of children.
The San Francisco strike was pointless and never should have happened. Let it be the last, for a long time.
The post As usual, teachers union puts children last appeared first on New York Post.
