Posts tagged Teachers’ Retirement System
ESG Is a Front for Labor
July 24, 2023 // House Republicans have declared July “ESG month,” planning hearings and bills to push back against politicized environmental, social, and governance investing. Yet so far, lawmakers have almost exclusively focused on environmental issues. Republicans should also pay attention to the “S” in ESG, which labor unions are using to advance their agenda at the expense of workers, their own members, and even taxpayers — a problem that President Biden has significantly worsened. The 2023 proxy season, which started in January and ended in June, shows the union campaign in action. Union funds and their allies, such as the New York City Employees’ Retirement System and like-minded investment managers, introduced many ESG-focused shareholder proposals designed to accelerate unionization. Consider Apple, which was targeted by five New York City pension funds, multiple investment managers, and the SEIU Master Trust Pension Plan, among others.
AFT PRESIDENT RANDI WEINGARTEN QUALIFIED FOR PUBLIC PENSION FOR YEARS SPENT OUT OF THE CLASSROOM ON UNION LEAVE
May 17, 2023 // AFT president Randi Weingarten’s teaching experience is very limited. While she describes having worked as a New York City public school teacher for six years, she only worked as a regularly appointed full-time teacher for three years, after having spent three years as a per diem substitute. Documents recently obtained by the Freedom Foundation show that Weingarten has been on union leave from her teaching position for the past quarter century. Additional documents show that the Teacher Retirement System of the City of New York has credited Weingarten with nearly 11-and-a-half years of service credit for time spent out of the classroom on full-time union leave as an officer for the United Federation of Teachers.
AFT president Randi Weingarten scores $15K annual teacher’s pension in deal with union and NYC
May 16, 2023 // “The New York Post has refused to provide us with the supposed analysis this story is based on. Regardless, it’s pure speculation because Ms. Weingarten is not retired,” AFT spokesman Andrew Crook said. “Ms. Weingarten has worked on behalf of UFT members—including teaching in NYC public schools—for nearly 40 years.” Weingarten began serving as a legal counsel at UFT in 1986 before becoming a teacher. Other records obtained by the Freedom Foundation show she worked about two hours a day as a substitute from September 1991 to August 1994, amounting to about a year of service in her retirement account.
What unions aren’t telling Illinois teachers: Your pension is in trouble
November 1, 2021 // Barring reforms, the Teachers’ Retirement System could eventually run out of money and be unable to pay promised benefits to retirees, all while making it more expensive for teachers to live in Illinois.