Republican lawmakers insist on bigger, more immediate pay hike for teachers

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Republican lawmakers are working to line up the votes for a budget deal that would give teachers more than the 0.4 percent raise offered in January by Gov. Doug Ducey.

The package would provide an across-the-board raise of one percent this coming year, with another one percent over the next two years. That gets to the same two percent raise the governor had offered, but which Ducey wants to phase in over five years.

Senate Majority Leader Kimberly Yee said Ducey’s proposal, sketched out in his State of the State speech, is not going over well among members of the GOP caucus.

“We want a round number,” she told Capitol Media Services.

That 0.4 percent hike on the average $45,477 salary reported by the National Education Association (and which is near the bottom of the nation) translates out to $181 a year for the average teacher, or about a dollar a day for the typical school year. And that’s before taxes.

By contrast, a 1 percent increase is $455 a year, with the promise of an additional amount phased in over the following year or two.