Teachers union boss Randi Weingarten, who regularly calls on state governments to pay public-school teachers more, makes more than half a million dollars per year, which is more than nine times the average teacher’s salary.
In 2019, Weingarten, the head of the American Federation of Teachers, received a salary of $489,844 along with $74,392 in bonus compensation, according to the AFT’s Internal Revenue Service Form 990 from that year.
Meanwhile, the average public high school teacher makes about $62,870 as of May 2020, and the average preschool, elementary or middle school public school teacher makes $58,550.
Weingarten’s pay has continued to increase significantly over the past several years. Between 2010 and 2011, her salary jumped to $407,323 while public-school teachers were making, on average, $44,000 per year.
“It’s always about the union. It’s never about the teachers or students,” elementary school teacher Tracie Happel said at the time.
“When you’re a teacher, you know you will not always be able to have the money for renovations on a house or go away on vacation, but it’s a tough pill to swallow when you can’t do those things when the people who are supposed to represent us get paid more and more every year,” Happel said.
Weingarten has come under fire in recent weeks for claiming Republicans are “bullying” public-school teachers by criticizing Critical Race Theory.
“There are legislators, mostly from the Republican Party, who are currently bullying teachers and trying to stop us from teaching kids honest history,” Weingarten said at a recent event.
“Look, maybe they are just trying to raise the temperature on race relations because of the next election,” she continued.
She also claimed earlier this year that public-school teachers who worked from home for the majority of the coronavirus pandemic had too much on their plates.
“Teachers are tired; they are exhausted,” she said. “We have to find a way to repair and nourish them as well as families in terms of attracting and retaining our teaching force.”
