Confirmed: NJEA Dues Are the Highest in the Nation — by 32% — and NJEA Membership Below 193,000
Posted On09/07/2023 byWe have independent confirmation of our blog post on Tuesday, where we reported that the NJEA raised teachers’ dues to $1,038 a year, the highest in the nation by far and that NJEA membership had fallen to 193,000 in 2021-22. Looks like we were right on both counts. As the graph below shows, at $1,038…Read More
NJEA Hikes Teachers’ Highest-in-the-Nation Dues to $1,038; Estimated Membership Declines to 193,000
Posted On09/06/2023 byWith the start of the new school year, New Jersey teachers’ highest-in-the-nation dues just went 4% higher, from $999 for the 2022-23 school year to $1,038 this year. Perhaps because teachers’ dues were already so very high, the NJEA delegate assembly voted to freeze dues for last year, but no longer. The dues for the…Read More
Michael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman, NJPEC Use Open Record Requests to Intimidate School Boards and Parents
Posted On08/15/2023 byMichael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman and New Jersey Public Education Coalition (NJPEC) are trying to intimidate school boards and parents who dared to opt their kids out of the state’s controversial sex-ed guidelines. Thanks to a friend, Sunlight was sent a copy of an Open Public Records Act (OPRA) request signed by Gottesman individually and…Read More
During the Pandemic, People Left NJ and Took a Record Amount of Wealth with Them, Mostly to Low-Tax, Non-Lockdown Florida
Posted On08/03/2023 byWhen it comes to domestic migration, how did New Jersey fare during the first year of the pandemic? Unfortunately, not well: New Jersey saw a net loss of over 12,000 taxpayers and $3.8 billion of gross income, the largest annual outflow of wealth in its history. This was despite the largest inflow of wealth from…Read More
Strong 2023 Investment Returns But Teachers’ Pension Plan Is Still in Trouble
Posted On08/01/2023 byThe Star-Ledger reports that state pension investments have “raked in huge gains” so far this year, but the structurally unsound state pension system is still in trouble. It is of course good news that stock markets have had strong returns this year and that state pension plan assets have rebounded after a dismal 2022. And…Read More
Michael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman Adds Hypocrisy to His Habitual Mendacity
Posted On07/19/2023 byMendacious Michael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman is at it again. The founder of the New Jersey Public Education Coalition (NJPEC) recently took to the pages of NJEdReport to decry parents ostensibly using their children as “spies” to expose “woke” indoctrination in public school classrooms. Gottesman claims that, by such actions, the “radical right” aims to…Read More
Conflict of Interest: NJEA President Spiller Uses Teachers’ Highest-in-the-Nation Dues for His Own Political Ambitions
Posted On07/14/2023 byLooks like NJEA President/Montclair Mayor Sean Spiller is actively pursuing his personal political ambitions, and he’s happy to use New Jersey teachers’ highest-in-the-nation dues to do it. Perhaps Spiller’s mounting legal troubles in Montclair have spurred him to seek greener pastures for his next campaign for public office. The New Jersey Globe reports that Spiller, “a…Read More
FY2024 Budget: State Spending Up 56% Under Gov. Murphy. What Happens When the Revenue Windfalls Go Away?
Posted On07/07/2023 byOnce again under Gov. Murphy, when it comes to the budget, politics supersedes fiscal responsibility. Murphy and his pals in the legislature sure know how to take care of their friends in an election year. Adding to a continuous string of record budgets, Murphy signed a $54.3 billion FY2024 budget. That’s up over 7% from…Read More
Sweeney Center Warns of “Fiscal Crisis” When Revenue Windfalls Go Away. What Happens with $7 Billion Pension Payments?
Posted On06/30/2023 bySunlight has long warned about New Jersey’s fiscal condition. In particular, we have focused on Gov. Murphy’s decision to accommodate his biggest political supporter, the NJEA, by choosing to make the full required pension payment rather than doing the hard work of reforming the teachers’ pension fund (TPAF), the largest and most distressed of the…Read More
More Mendacity and Bullying from Michael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman
Posted On06/27/2023 byMeet Michael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman, founder of the NJ Public Education Coalition (NJPEC), the group trying to bully school boards into adopting a progressive education agenda. Gottesman got his nickname because he maintained to the Star-Ledger that “right-wing extremist” groups had “hundreds of millions of dollars being donated to them in New Jersey” to…Read More