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Teachers' salaries ranked by state... Actual salary and Cost of Living Adjusted

I'll just skip to the end...

Megan-1.jpg


Megan Schlosser - 3rd grade teacher in NC.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes. Now what's the tie breaker?
 
Interesting to see a few of the teachers in this thread outright lie or be flat out wrong without checking facts. I pity the kids in your classes if this is the approach you use in managing your classes. Yes teachers complain about pay. Most do. So do people outside of teaching so get over your sanctimonious nonsense. You work for a paycheck just like the rest of us. If you took the time to actually listen rather than bang your drums you would hear things aren't always so great in the outside world. To the teacher calling Woody Allen a pedo that banged his underaged stepdaughter and then married her? Check your sources. He isn't and you should get an F. Not that I know Woody Allen at all but you are a teacher and I would hope you teach your students better research skills.

Funny how performance pay and evaluations just can't possibly work for a group of people that literally grade others for a living.
Interesting that you would start with this, then bring up facts, followed by most teachers complain about pay. Which, you couldn't factually even know.
And speaking anecdotally, I would say is not even close to being true. I'll go out on a limb and say that I talk to more teachers than you do.
 
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Nonsense. Which education degree makes someone an expert in compensation, talent management, legal, or budgets?

Are you suggesting school boards should only include people with a degree in education or simply a rubber stamp for those that do? Your opinion elevates the field of education as something it isn't.
Let me know when you let the military know how to spend our money.
 
Yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes. Now what's the tie breaker?
Interestingly, she worked at the same school as my wife's best friend (no more pics) and we had dinner with her several times. Very nice young lady and by all reports a dedicated teacher. Also a Panthers cheerleader, of course. She got engaged to a guy in Charlotte, I think, and moved down there last year...sadly.
 
Interesting thread. IMO there is a section of Teachers that are overpaid and a section that is underpaid. Just like every other career. On a whole they are probably slightly underpaid. But some of the arguments and insinuations some of the Teachers have made I just have a hard time with.

1. This is more of an insinuation but there seems to be an attitude only teachers put in more then 40 hours at their salaried job.
2. The time off in the Summer is non paid. While technically true it is also disingenuous. If 2 people one with a career in teaching and the other another profession are make the same thing. The teacher is getting the same pay it's just in 10 months instead of 12.
 
Interesting thread. IMO there is a section of Teachers that are overpaid and a section that is underpaid. Just like every other career. On a whole they are probably slightly underpaid. But some of the arguments and insinuations some of the Teachers have made I just have a hard time with.

1. This is more of an insinuation but there seems to be an attitude only teachers put in more then 40 hours at their salaried job.
2. The time off in the Summer is non paid. While technically true it is also disingenuous. If 2 people one with a career in teaching and the other another profession are make the same thing. The teacher is getting the same pay it's just in 10 months instead of 12.
#1: The insinuation is that teachers work 7 hours a day. Teachers only bring this up because of that not because we believe that other's don't. That would be silly. As silly as this whole topic.
#2 No one ever says to any other profession that they should work another job on their vacation time. Just because teachers vacations are longer, people seem to think it's ok to tell them to get another job.
 
I don't like the union at all but he's right. I have yet to see a fair way to evaluate in order to determing performing or underperforming teachers. It depends on schools. When I was at a below poverty level school it would piss me off when our scores would get compared to a school with 99% white students in a small town. I could type for hours on this but am tired of defending what we do. What I know is there are great teachers at struggling schools and crap teachers at "good" schools.

If you have a way to differentiate between teachers who work with a classroom full of nonverbal autistic kids, and show how those kids are or aren't getting positives out of being in that classroom, and teachers who work at a school with over 90% of the students above the poverty level, and how those teachers are doing such an amazing job because the kids are already motivated to learn, please let loose.

There are lots of employers who provide increases based on performance. It's quite doable. No system is perfect, but providing the incentive to increase pay based on performance is a good concept in general, imo. I'm not a fan of the method that links pay to kids' scores on standardized tests. I'd prefer to see the teacher's actual performance evaluated.
 
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People who want their pay performance based also have direct control over the outcomes of their efforts.
No, not most of the time. They have a level of control, but often their pay depends on how effective they are at increasing the performance of other people.
 
Interesting that you would start with this, then bring up facts, followed by most teachers complain about pay. Which, you couldn't factually even know.
And speaking anecdotally, I would say is not even close to being true. I'll go out on a limb and say that I talk to more teachers than you do.

What a ridiculous argument.
 
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There are lots of employers who provide increases based on performance. It's quite doable. No system is perfect, but providing the incentive to increase pay based on performance is a good concept in general, imo. I'm not a fan of the method that links pay to kids' scores on standardized tests. I'd prefer to see the teacher's actual performance evaluated.

Not if the metric for "success" isn't based on what the teacher did. God, how thick is your skull??? There is no magic wand that can get Fortnight until 5AM Jimmy or 7 week absent Jenny or Both parents are heroin addicts Samantha to do well in school. Yet, that's who you want to base teacher salaries on.
 
No, not most of the time. They have a level of control, but often their pay depends on how effective they are at increasing the performance of other people.

LOL, wtf ever dude. Ok, now make those people they are increasing performance with 6, 10, or 16 years old. For extra credit, make half of them only get 1 meal a day (the one the school provides) and have no parental support.
 
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L O fuqing L.

If you’re making over 50,000 as a year in Iowa, you’re not rich by any means but you certainly ain’t poor. Teachers like to bitch about “not getting paid enough” but I’d bet there are thousands to would take that salary in a heartbeat.

Teachers are the most whinny group of ppl in America. If you don’t think you get paid enough, find a new job.

Uh, hello. Farmers? Duh, o_O
 
1. This is more of an insinuation but there seems to be an attitude only teachers put in more then 40 hours at their salaried job.
In my experience, that's more a response to those who think the job is 8-3 with three months off. I worked in the real world before becoming a teacher. I had a crew that went into a building at 8am on Friday trying to get the furniture set up for the next day move of a major banking HQ. We walked out of the building at 11am on Saturday as people were moving in...but everybody had a place to work. Twenty-seven straight hours on the job. My crew got overtime but I didn't. I'm fully aware that there are salaried positions where the hours exceed 40/week. That includes teaching.
2. The time off in the Summer is non paid. While technically true it is also disingenuous. If 2 people one with a career in teaching and the other another profession are make the same thing. The teacher is getting the same pay it's just in 10 months instead of 12.
It's also "technically true" that I put in easily 50-52 hours/week at a minimum with planning and the clubs I coach. My wife (no pic) puts in more hours than me. So in that ten months we work not only the equivalent of a 12 month/40 hours a week load but hundreds of hours over that. That doesn't include whatever summer training or club activities we're responsible for that's on our time.

Three weeks of my summer will be dedicated to this and the two training weeks - if the past is any indicator - will be 60 hour weeks (at UMBC - Go Retrievers!). When I take my STEM team to their national competition, I'm on 24/7 until we get home. There is no such thing - for teachers here, at least - as a 9-month academic year. It doesn't exist. We work 10 months and pack those ten full. Many of us then volunteer our time or are mandated to carry out school functions during our "time off". I'm not posting ANY of this to suggest that teachers work harder than anyone else...but teachers easily work just as hard as anyone else whether it's for 10 or 12 months.

The "teachers have it easy" rhetoric is one line in the attack on the system of public education that helped build this country. It's an attempt to take money from those who need it and use it to line the pockets of private companies that - shocker - are never held to the same standards as the public schools they claim to outperform.
 
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I don't like the union at all but he's right. I have yet to see a fair way to evaluate in order to determing performing or underperforming teachers. It depends on schools. When I was at a below poverty level school it would piss me off when our scores would get compared to a school with 99% white students in a small town. I could type for hours on this but am tired of defending what we do. What I know is there are great teachers at struggling schools and crap teachers at "good" schools.

If you have a way to differentiate between teachers who work with a classroom full of nonverbal autistic kids, and show how those kids are or aren't getting positives out of being in that classroom, and teachers who work at a school with over 90% of the students above the poverty level, and how those teachers are doing such an amazing job because the kids are already motivated to learn, please let loose.

There are lots of employers who provide increases based on performance. It's quite doable. No system is perfect, but providing the incentive to increase pay based on performance is a good concept in general, imo. I'm not a fan of the method that links pay to kids' scores on standardized tests. I'd prefer to see the teacher's actual performance evaluated.

What do you mean actual performance? If you mean walk throughs, professional development, and formal evaluations then it's already being done.
 
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Great...you're the head of a group of 30. Your pay depends on their performance...but not on what you train them to do. They get a multiple-choice test once a year that may or may not reflect what you trained them to do. And you don't get input or access to that test until the day it's administered. What's on it...no f'n idea. If you're training them to work in a machine shop, there might be a question asking who invented the lathe (Henry Maudslay invented the metal lathe, btw). Their performance on THAT test determines your pay...perhaps even your continued employment.

Oh...and you don't get to pick your team...you get the first 30 people who walk in the door and ask for a job. Furthermore, you can't fire them for poor performance and replace them. And at the end of your year, you lose them all...good and bad...and get a new 30 and it starts all over again. But now you know some of what's on the test...so even though it doesn't help them learn to operate the machinery, you spend time teaching them the histories of the various machines and less time teaching them how the machines actually operate. And for that, you'll be criticized because you're "teaching to the test"...you know, the test that determines your pay.

You want to "embrace" that model?
Teacher bashers will never understand this.
 
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In my experience, that's more a response to those who think the job is 8-3 with three months off. I worked in the real world before becoming a teacher. I had a crew that went into a building at 8am on Friday trying to get the furniture set up for the next day move of a major banking HQ. We walked out of the building at 11am on Saturday as people were moving in...but everybody had a place to work. Twenty-seven straight hours on the job. My crew got overtime but I didn't. I'm fully aware that there are salaried positions where the hours exceed 40/week. That includes teaching.
It's also "technically true" that I put in easily 50-52 hours/week at a minimum with planning and the clubs I coach. My wife (no pic) puts in more hours than me. So in that ten months we work not only the equivalent of a 12 month/40 hours a week load but hundreds of hours over that. That doesn't include whatever summer training or club activities we're responsible for that's on our time.

Three weeks of my summer will be dedicated to this and the two training weeks - if the past is any indicator - will be 60 hour weeks (at UMBC - Go Retrievers!). When I take my STEM team to their national competition, I'm on 24/7 until we get home. There is no such thing - for teachers here, at least - as a 9-month academic year. It doesn't exist. We work 10 months and pack those ten full. Many of us then volunteer our time or are mandated to carry out school functions during our "time off". I'm not posting ANY of this to suggest that teachers work harder than anyone else...but teachers easily work just as hard as anyone else whether it's for 10 or 12 months.

The "teachers have it easy" rhetoric is one line in the attack on the system of public education that helped build this country. It's an attempt to take money from those who need it and use it to line the pockets of private companies that - shocker - are never held to the same standards as the public schools they claim to outperform.


If you work so relentlessly, then how were you ever able to find the time to post on HROT 44,000 times? :)
 
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And that is utterly meaningless. Are you saying the current model for "evaluating" teacher performance is idiotic? Welcome to the club. Would you like to propose an alternative? Have at it.
It's no point. A few years ago, my school, the highest scoring school in the district had a 5th grade reading score of 93%. The next year our 5th grade reading score went to 91% - different group of 50 5th graders, and in our Red, Yellow, Green school rating we were placed on Yellow because we didn't show improvement. There was a lot of common sense there...
 
Not if the metric for "success" isn't based on what the teacher did. God, how thick is your skull??? There is no magic wand that can get Fortnight until 5AM Jimmy or 7 week absent Jenny or Both parents are heroin addicts Samantha to do well in school. Yet, that's who you want to base teacher salaries on.

You seem to have your own theme running in your head and you just respond to it, not what others say. Where did I talk about paying teachers based on student achievement?
 
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You seem to have your own theme running in your head and you just respond to it, not what others say. Where did I talk about paying teachers based on student achievement?

Nor did I. When I talked about performance pay for the teachers they all made the assumption it was going to be metrics based on how their students performed on tests. That is the last thing our kids need to have happen. Huge conflict of interest with teachers being more concerned about prepping them for a test to put more money in their pockets instead of actually teaching them.

Probably not the teachers fault they are so short sighted on this. They have been taught to use tests to evaluate their students so they assume the only way they can be evaluate for their performance is by test results.
 
You seem to have your own theme running in your head and you just respond to it, not what others say. Where did I talk about paying teachers based on student achievement?

Nor did I. When I talked about performance pay for the teachers they all made the assumption it was going to be metrics based on how their students performed on tests. That is the last thing our kids need to have happen. Huge conflict of interest with teachers being more concerned about prepping them for a test to put more money in their pockets instead of actually teaching them.

Probably not the teachers fault they are so short sighted on this. They have been taught to use tests to evaluate their students so they assume the only way they can be evaluate for their performance is by a test.

What would you suggest then? Because if you're talking about evaluations that's already happening. On a weekly basis. Teachers who are struggling are put on a performance plan for a year.
 
Nor did I. When I talked about performance pay for the teachers they all made the assumption it was going to be metrics based on how their students performed on tests. That is the last thing our kids need to have happen. Huge conflict of interest with teachers being more concerned about prepping them for a test to put more money in their pockets instead of actually teaching them.

Probably not the teachers fault they are so short sighted on this. They have been taught to use tests to evaluate their students so they assume the only way they can be evaluate for their performance is by test results.
Still waiting for an evaluation system that makes sense from whiners about teachers who apparently know more about education than people in education.

The bottom line is...lawyers know who bad lawyers are. Plumbers know who bad plumbers are. Teachers know who bad teachers are. I also think that administrators get rid of more bad teachers than people realize. Good administrators will launch bad teachers and these "powerful" unions people are bitching about can't do a damn thing about it. Just throwing that out there.
 
You seem to have your own theme running in your head and you just respond to it, not what others say. Where did I talk about paying teachers based on student achievement?

Over the last decade or more "Performance Pay" means paying teachers based on how students perform on tests. In some cases, it is the only determining factor. Although, it is a terrible system so many states are getting rid of it.

Now, do you want to evaluate teachers based on what they've done to meet the needs of their students? Do you want to evaluate them based on the methodologies they've employed in their classrooms? Do you want to evaluate them based on how they've adapted to changing demographics? Do you want teachers evaluated by administrators whose job it is to evaluate teachers (just like it is the job of every other administrator in other jobs-among other things)? Now we're on the same page of what an effective teacher evaluation system looks like. At least, that's how I want to be evaluated. Just don't penalize teachers for things completely out of their control.
 
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Nor did I. When I talked about performance pay for the teachers they all made the assumption it was going to be metrics based on how their students performed on tests. That is the last thing our kids need to have happen. Huge conflict of interest with teachers being more concerned about prepping them for a test to put more money in their pockets instead of actually teaching them.

Probably not the teachers fault they are so short sighted on this. They have been taught to use tests to evaluate their students so they assume the only way they can be evaluate for their performance is by test results.

As I have said in the other post, performance pay is the term used by so-called reformers to get pay based on student test results into schools.
 
Still waiting for an evaluation system that makes sense from whiners about teachers who apparently know more about education than people in education.

The bottom line is...lawyers know who bad lawyers are. Plumbers know who bad plumbers are. Teachers know who bad teachers are. I also think that administrators get rid of more bad teachers than people realize. Good administrators will launch bad teachers and these "powerful" unions people are bitching about can't do a damn thing about it. Just throwing that out there.

This is correct. Most bad teachers never last long enough to actually get fired. Administrators just refuse to renew their contract and let them go.
 
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The echo chamber of those in education is really amazing to see in this thread.

I have been a teacher. It has been amusing to watch you all make the usual arguments and deflections all the while wrapping yourselves in sanctimonious faux professionalism.

Need a degree in education to have a reasonable opinion on teaching and educators? Give me a break. Seriously. You are not surgeons .

I believe in merit pay for the simple reason that it allows rewards to flow to the people doing the best. If you as a profession can assign an evaluation to students with very real consequences to those students as a result you too can be evaluated. And yes the public has a right to have an opinion and oversight.

Remember this simple fact. Every major shift in education has been resisted by educators all too ready to proclaim their expertise and superiority as the front line all the while excluding black kids or poor kids or those with disabilities. Don't think so? Go read about the diagnosis of special needs students and proponderance of minority student with the label. Pretty damning and yes it is almost certainly happening in your school while you point the finger at everyone but yourselves. Now cross reference the rates of diagnosis within states that have a bounty system for special education. Funny how across the board those rates of diagnosis go up as a school district makes more money.

The truth is we have great teachers but like any other profession most are average. They should be respected as any professional but the idea that educators are above reproach is ridiculous. When you while about teaching to the test because that is how your school or you get evaluated you leave out a pretty big thing. Why it happened. It happened because you as a profession absolutely refused to police your own and simply dismissed entire parts of the population. The very people in fact that public education is meant to serve the most. The poor and disenfranchised. The kids that don't have parents that care. The ones even on this thread many of you whine about.

Jesus get over yourselves.
 
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Nor did I. When I talked about performance pay for the teachers they all made the assumption it was going to be metrics based on how their students performed on tests. That is the last thing our kids need to have happen. Huge conflict of interest with teachers being more concerned about prepping them for a test to put more money in their pockets instead of actually teaching them.

Probably not the teachers fault they are so short sighted on this. They have been taught to use tests to evaluate their students so they assume the only way they can be evaluate for their performance is by test results.
You really don't know what you're talking about, you know. I mean you really really don't know what you're talking about. But let's play along...give us your teacher evaluation protocol. How would you do it?
 
You really don't know what you're talking about, you know. I mean you really really don't know what you're talking about. But let's play along...give us your teacher evaluation protocol. How would you do it?

Yea I really do know what I'm talking about. As far a the topic of performance programs I think you are the one who is in the dark. Compensation (including performance programs) is something I have both formal training and professional experience doing. Do you?

There is NO reason teachers can't have a portion of their salary (8-10%) tied to their performance. If bad teachers are already being evaluated and eventually culled by not renewing contracts such as Bio suggests, then wouldn't it make sense to develop a program to proactively reward the good teachers and try to assist the mediocre to become better teachers? Might salvage a few of those teachers and help prevent kids having to experience a bad teacher waiting to be culled.

Teaching is no different than nearly any job. They can be put into a performance pay program.
 
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Yea I really do know what I'm talking about. As far a the topic of performance programs I think you are the one who is in the dark. Compensation (including performance programs) is something I have both formal training and professional experience doing. Do you?

There is NO reason teachers can't have a portion of their salary (8-10%) tied to their performance. If bad teachers are already being evaluated and eventually culled by not renewing contracts such as Bio suggests, then wouldn't it make sense to develop a program to proactively reward the good teachers and try to assist the mediocre to become better teachers? Might salvage a few of those teachers and help prevent kids having to experience a bad teacher waiting to be culled.

Teaching is no different than nearly any job. They can be put into a performance pay program.

Um....this is exactly what exists, at least in Illinois. Teachers are evaluated and if they are marked as unsatisfactory or needs improvement they are put on a remediation plan with specific goals to show improvement. If that doesn't happen the teacher is let go. The key is the tool used to evaluate. In Illinois, that is a version of the Danielson model which is...ok. Although, individual districts can modify it as needed. There is no tenure anymore either. Teacher rating is the first item looked at for cutting teachers in a rift situation.
 
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Um....this is exactly what exists, at least in Illinois. Teachers are evaluated and if they are marked as unsatisfactory or needs improvement they are put on a remediation plan with specific goals to show improvement. If that doesn't happen the teacher is let go. The key is the tool used to evaluate. In Illinois, that is a version of the Danielson model which is...ok. Although, individual districts can modify it as needed. There is no tenure anymore either. Teacher rating is the first item looked at for cutting teachers in a rift situation.

Pay for performance offers a positive incentive for those teachers doing a good job. It offers a combination of positive reinforcement and negative instead of just the negative. End result should be a better situation for the students.
 
Pay for performance offers a positive incentive for those teachers doing a good job. It offers a combination of positive reinforcement and negative instead of just the negative. End result should be a better situation for the students.

I don't disagree as long as the metric used to determine "performance" is dependent on what the teacher is doing and in control of and not how well a student happens to do on a particular test taken on some random day.
 
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Do they still allow teachers to 'move on' when there has been an issue at a school?

I'm not sure exactly what you mean but generally speaking, yes, unless the issue was something illegal. Of course, that is assuming the teacher can get a job somewhere else. Evaluation scores follow a teacher where ever they go.
 
Over the last decade or more "Performance Pay" means paying teachers based on how students perform on tests. In some cases, it is the only determining factor. Although, it is a terrible system so many states are getting rid of it.

Now, do you want to evaluate teachers based on what they've done to meet the needs of their students? Do you want to evaluate them based on the methodologies they've employed in their classrooms? Do you want to evaluate them based on how they've adapted to changing demographics? Do you want teachers evaluated by administrators whose job it is to evaluate teachers (just like it is the job of every other administrator in other jobs-among other things)? Now we're on the same page of what an effective teacher evaluation system looks like. At least, that's how I want to be evaluated. Just don't penalize teachers for things completely out of their control.

I've said earlier what I want. I (intentionally) did not lay it out in detail to avoid nitpicking. I see that didn't deter you.
 
I've said earlier what I want. I (intentionally) did not lay it out in detail to avoid nitpicking. I see that didn't deter you.

You wondered why when you said performance pay everyone automatically assumed you were thinking that teachers should be paid based on how students performed on a test. I explained why. So, you probably should have been more specific then if you weren't using the widely accepted definition of the term.
 
Yea I really do know what I'm talking about. As far a the topic of performance programs I think you are the one who is in the dark. Compensation (including performance programs) is something I have both formal training and professional experience doing. Do you?
Actually, no you don't. I've never once said you can't effectively evaluate teachers just as you can anyone else. As far as I know, nobody has said that. You can copy and paste those who have if you wish.
There is NO reason teachers can't have a portion of their salary (8-10%) tied to their performance. If bad teachers are already being evaluated and eventually culled by not renewing contracts such as Bio suggests, then wouldn't it make sense to develop a program to proactively reward the good teachers and try to assist the mediocre to become better teachers? Might salvage a few of those teachers and help prevent kids having to experience a bad teacher waiting to be culled.

Teaching is no different than nearly any job. They can be put into a performance pay program.
Everywhere I know of teachers are evaluated based on the performance of their students on high-stakes tests. Here in NC, teachers are judged on a color scale from red to blue with blue denoting teachers whose students exceeded their projected growth on...what?...high stakes testing. Feel free to present models OTHER state school systems are using where teachers are monitored by other metrics. Better yet, with your extensive "formal training and professional experience" why don't you design a program that adequately and fairly monitors and scores teachers on all the things they're responsible for.

BTW, you have to pay for it. With no extra money. So what do you plan on cutting to implement it? That must be part of your plan. Let's see it. From a professional.

Another BTW...NC once had a performance based compensation system. How about them apples? When NC led the nation in implementing high-stakes testing they paired it with a bonus system. It was based on test scores so it sucked but it existed. Schools adjusted and started doing very well on the tests. They kept making the tests "harder" and NC teachers kept rising to the "challenge". The bonus system was scrapped. You know why? It cost the state too much money.The tests stayed, of course. Testing companies made too much money off of them to allow them to be tossed. Pearson makes nearly $5B/year off it's US high-stakes tests and other school related activities. Funny what expensive lobbying and large campaign contributions can get you, huh?

You really don't know what you're talking about.
 
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