Current Event #2: Wages in New York

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg plans to demand that teachers take smaller raises in their upcoming contracts, or else he and the city will be forced to cut 2,500 jobs from the teaching force. This contradicts with wages in the 19th and 20th century because during those times people were fighting to give laborers more money as many of them feel they deserved more money. Now, due to the recession, people are asking for teachers to relinquish money so that they don't have cut jobs from hard working civilians. This is a very important issue because the mayor is asking teachers to give money back from their all ready underpaid salaries to help them keep other teachers in a job. This sacrifice for teachers may not be possible as the fact that many teachers salaries as so low that they have to live on meats end and cannot afford to give up any extra money they will be receiving. I feel bad for the teachers, but i feel that they must give up these extra raises to ensure it will not be them whose contract is terminated. This is directly opposite of what used to happen because in the 19th and 20th century with the economy on the rise, more jobs were available and people were only asking for the money they deserved so that they could feed their family, and now they may have to give back money that they use to feed their family. I hope that they can find another way to let the teachers keep the money and not have to cut jobs, especially in these hard times.