Politico: Tar Heel State Tackles Teacher Pay
media mentionMorning Education, June 17, 2014
In North Carolina, teacher pay is so low that educators are turning out for job fairs hosted by other states with the promise of higher salaries elsewhere. And the Tar Heel State ranks near the bottom — at 46th in the country — when it comes to teachers’ salaries. Meg Wiehe, director of state tax policy at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, told Morning Education those issues are at the heart of two proposals coming out of the state legislature. To pay for teacher pay increases, the state senate proposed asking teachers to give up their tenure rights, asking state residents to voluntarily return their state tax refunds and firing teaching assistants to save money. The state house’s idea would pay for increases through extra state lottery revenue generated by increased spending on lottery advertising. Both chambers will try to come to a compromise in the coming days with the start of the fiscal year looming on July 1.
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