Teachers union power isn’t helping students

American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten titled her keynote address at this year’s convention “Building Our Power to Create a Better Future.” But after listening to the speech, one was left to wonder: A better future for whom? Conspicuously absent was any serious discussion of how teachers might educate students better than they do now. Teachers unions might consider how to help students improve their reading and math skills, for example, but they don’t.

The conference heard plenty about what the union was doing for teachers, including helping to secure $78 billion in student loan bailouts unavailable to other college graduates. They also heard about union strikes that secured higher pay in Boston, lower healthcare premiums in San Francisco, and paid parental leave in Chicago.

Weingarten also took the time to bash “the reckless runaway train that private school vouchers are becoming,” although she never explained why giving parents the power to decide where to send their children to school was a bad idea.

What was most striking, however, was how much of the speech had nothing to do with education at all. There were denunciations of the war with Iran, tariffs, and “the climate crisis that threatens all humanity.”

Weingarten ranged even farther afield, addressing virtually every item on the progressive agenda. She attacked wealth inequality, called for a $25 federal minimum wage, denounced Medicaid cuts, and warned of rural hospital closures. She demanded stronger Social Security protections and condemned Immigration and Customs Enforcement tactics as brutal and authoritarian, going so far as to suggest that the Trump administration was “fascist.”

Beyond the rote leftist grievances, the main thrust of Weingarten’s speech was the importance of power and how government unions are fighting to amass as much of it as possible. In addition to the usual calls for canvassing, phone banking, and voter mobilization — all in favor of Democratic Party candidates — Weingarten stressed the importance of union “density” in forcing concessions from government employers. She particularly praised healthcare unions in Oregon and Hawaii for aligning their contract expiration dates to maximize their leverage in the next “battle” with their employers.

Weingarten and her union allies will argue that maximizing union power is essential to creating a better future. But where is the evidence to support that claim? Consider Weingarten’s celebration of the San Francisco teachers union strike, which cost students five days of learning.

Not only had San Francisco teachers already won a raise of nearly 20% under the contract approved in 2023, but the school district is rapidly shrinking as families leave the city and the birthrate plummets.

Is Weingarten’s union going to support school closures and staff reductions to reflect the fact that fewer employees are needed to teach fewer children? Of course not. Government unions famously fight staffing reductions for virtually any reason. No wonder San Francisco Unified faces a $100 million deficit after its last “bargain” with the teachers union.

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Perhaps there would be some justification for the power Weingarten and her unions are amassing if there were evidence that unionization and higher teacher pay improved student performance. But there isn’t. While studies show that unionization increases teacher pay, its effect on student performance is either nonexistent or damaging.

Speeches such as Weingarten’s make clear that teachers unions are chiefly concerned with preserving and expanding their power and that of the Democratic interest groups with which they are allied. Some power is used to secure higher pay, richer benefits, and stronger job protections for government employees. None is directed toward improving student achievement.