MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Argentine teachers strike delays school year; four million children remain at home
Almost 60% of Argentina’s school children could not begin the new school year and had to remain at home because of a 48 hours teachers strike following the collapse of salary negotiations. Read full article
Comments
Disclaimer & comment rulesI guess they won't be missing those special lessons on 'Malvinas Argentinas'... they'll probably be missing economics or basic maths.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 10:05 am - Link - Report abuse 0I dont think they teach economics in RGland...... US$686 a month... golly... how do they exist on that....?
Feb 29th, 2012 - 10:17 am - Link - Report abuse 0I guess they must be taking this whole Pink Floyd/ Rogers Waters thing way too seriously - “we don't need no education”
Feb 29th, 2012 - 10:22 am - Link - Report abuse 0$686 was 3000 pesos when this statement was released. Probably it's about 4000 pesos now.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 10:23 am - Link - Report abuse 0I was expecting something more like “Education Minister Alberto Sileoni stated that wage talks were “out of the question” as teachers went on a planned 48-72 hour strike across eight provinces. He also reiterated that 'malvinas argentinas', they all agreed and the strike ended and they all went home content.”
It's not like argentinians to not do brainwashed things really.
I can see the negotations now.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 10:24 am - Link - Report abuse 0Teachers - Give us more money!
Gov - No
Teachers - Give us more money or we stop teaching indoctrinated crap
Gov - No and our history is the real version, the rest of the worlds history is a fabricated lie to keep our country down on its knees.
Teachers - We will go on 48hr strike if no money.
Gov - We will throw you out of planes if we arrest you for striking in breach of our new terror laws.
Lol
@5
Feb 29th, 2012 - 10:35 am - Link - Report abuse 0I see it panning out more like:
Teacher: “I want more money because i'm eating tree bark soup every day”
ARG.gov : “Don't you know about Gaucho Rivero?”
Teacher: “Isn't that the murderer guy?”
ARG.gov : “Fight the british pirates!! malvinas argentinas!!”
Teacher: “Yes, I will go home and eat bark soup to fighting against the british pirates”
They're weak minded fools, but they're fun to laugh at.
Nothing new at all. Anyone who's lived in Argentina would know this is actually the norm not the exception.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 11:07 am - Link - Report abuse 0In fact, I'd be worried if classes suddenly began on schedule and without a strike on any given year. That would be the exception!
@7 I'd be surprised if they actually taught their kids anything other than propaganda about how Argentinians invented everything and own everything in the world, and everyone else is a pirate.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 11:26 am - Link - Report abuse 0Where is our friend Axel who promised every Argentinean was getting a raise every year more than inflation? I guess not this year or the next soon their $2800 pesos is going to be U$300 what then?
Feb 29th, 2012 - 11:36 am - Link - Report abuse 0This from a government who has just given their politicians a 100% pay increase.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 11:49 am - Link - Report abuse 0@9 Axel is thinking of a way to explain this one away using GCSE economics or an increase in some non-financial benefit that they're claiming to give them or some other nonsense.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 11:54 am - Link - Report abuse 011. Well he thinks he is middle class too! You can't even keep yourself clean on U$650 month!
Feb 29th, 2012 - 12:17 pm - Link - Report abuse 0@7 I agree. My friends there say the teachers endlessly strike causing constant disruption to education. SSDD.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 12:22 pm - Link - Report abuse 0@7 Being not-poor and therefore speaking english means that I'm unlikely to be able to keep myself from having to eat my socks for dinner on $650 a month. However, this doesn't mean that I spend all my hours asking the french to negotiate on the land that we lost to them in the last few hundred years.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 12:27 pm - Link - Report abuse 013. If you ever saw their schools you would know why they strike, ceilings collapse, no heat or air, wires sticking out of the walls (in grammar schools!!), dirty, graffiti, peeling paint, no toilet paper in the bathrooms it is a really awful experience for those that can not afford private school.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 01:44 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Actually you can replace the world schools with hospitals and that description would mostly work too.
In situations like this, I always ask.. if you have a reasonable amount of income from commodities such as soy and oil, then why do you have such terrible terrible facilities and infrastructure?
Feb 29th, 2012 - 02:22 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Venezuela (spanish speaking) has more oil than Canada (Mainly English Speaking) and yet Canadians aren't poor, but Venezuelans are. Argentinia (Spanish Speaking) have lots of commodities and have terrible schools, Falkland Islands (english speaking) have a little bit of oil and nice schools.
Doesn't anyone ask the simple question of where the hell is all the money going? Is this why they're not opening their accounts because the money is being spirited away to Switzerland? Why are most spanish speaking countries full of poor people?
@ 15. I have visited a number of state schools and they are as you describe. One in particular I remember thinking I would not house a dog in it, let alone send a child there. Obviously, the fee-paying schools are quite different, as are the church schools.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 03:36 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I was once invited to a film club presentation at a state school in Buenos Aires and it took two hours to get the equipment working in order to show two, five minute films the students had worked hard on producing. It was a good effort but what struck me as poor was that the 'Professor' knew absolutely nothing about films. One piece was a scene from a very well-known film and he didn't even know who wrote the script or what the film was about. But he did dress like a trendy film school professor and flirt with the students which, I suppose, is the main thing.
@ 7 you are a Malvinist, right? You're so stupid, really. But why would you care when you don't live in Argentina? Who cares if children don't go to school, right? You f*cking scum. It's the norm, of course it is the norm, because you are corrupt people, and you will never change. Losers.
Feb 29th, 2012 - 04:47 pm - Link - Report abuse 0This is for Think, who from Denmark tells us how great Cristina de Kirchner is. Are you happy, *rse?
Argentine teachers are some of the lowest paid in Latin America in absolute terms, payed less than in countries like Paraguay, Peru, El Salvador, and Ecuador, yet almost all other countries in the region have substantially lower GDP per capitas. Why this is I'm not sure.
Mar 01st, 2012 - 02:04 am - Link - Report abuse 0It's one of the few countries were teachers get payed less than the average salary.
As for salaries, for the most part a salary in Argentina is in real terms 1/3 that of one in Europe. Obviously much room for improvement, but also must be remembered that many salaried people in Argentina like teachers don't pay mortgages, have health-care free, and price for products in general is lower. The listed salaries in other parts of the world are before such expenditures which eat probably half of that coveted 3000 pound or 5000 dollar salary.
@19 Does the government pay their mortgages? If so what would their total 'package ' be worth?
Mar 01st, 2012 - 08:16 am - Link - Report abuse 0@19 the price for products isn't lower, they're all in Chile buying products. What's all this hogwash that you're spouting?
Mar 01st, 2012 - 08:41 am - Link - Report abuse 0I suspect they're paid a lot less that 1/3 of what a European teacher is paid, so trying to make it out like Argentina pays people a lot is just nonsense.
You forgot about them having all their savings plundered by high inflation.
Many people in Argentina have their homes payed off. No mortgage.
Mar 01st, 2012 - 05:09 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Is greekyoghurt a moron?? People don't buy food in Chile. This guy is really a pathetic person. It's one thing to be a troll, it's another to waste your entire day doing so. And then he tirades on the work ethic of others. Go back to work and stop wasting your boss's bandwith and productivity!!
@22 No one is talking about food. Argies probably have to grow food in their gardens, it's a good way to get around inflation.
Mar 01st, 2012 - 08:00 pm - Link - Report abuse 0“Many people in Argentina have their homes payed off. No mortgage.” urm.. what is that supposed to mean? Houses are free? People are so wealthy that they can pay off houses straight away? The company owns the house? or massive inflation has effectively paid off their mortgages?? You're basically saying nothing.
Not sure how Mortgages work in Argentina, but I'm pretty sure the interest rate on debt is going to be pretty high given the government's base rate is going to be massive.
@22 I don't see how that works... so how does a young teacher on that money buy a house in the first place?
Mar 01st, 2012 - 08:17 pm - Link - Report abuse 0@23 You have to live a long way from the centre of BA to have the luxury of a garden.
The present generation in Argentina probably has a mortgage, but in the past mortages were rare in Argentina. Most people saved a few pesos, found a small piece of land and started building their own house, brick by brick. It worked for an amazing amount of people in Argentina over the years.
Mar 01st, 2012 - 11:43 pm - Link - Report abuse 0How can you run an education system with this stuff taking place? No wonder things are so backward!!
Mar 02nd, 2012 - 12:31 am - Link - Report abuse 0@25 That was pretty much the way where I live. Buy the land and then either build yourself or get a builder to build the design you want. Now big land companies buy the land and put the houses they think you should have on them........usually fugly great things. So newlyweds typically start lfe together with a big mortgage.
Mar 02nd, 2012 - 01:32 am - Link - Report abuse 0On the pay rates quoted in this article I fail to see how the Argentine teachers could ever afford a home...
Today it was a shame. Our president slandered teachers by saying that we cannot expect to have a huge raise in the salaries because we have 3-month-holidays and we work 4 hours. That is absolutely crap- Most of the teachers work in two schools because they cannot live withU$s 500 per month. Cristina bullies England, the mayor of BA and the teachers.
Mar 02nd, 2012 - 01:55 am - Link - Report abuse 0I think what they mean by not having mortgages is that young adults generally have to live with their parents indefinitely - hence the need for so many Telos, so they can get some privacy. Loans are very hard to get in Argentina, I am reliably informed. It used to be that young Argentines would go to work in Europe for 2 or 3 years to save enough to get on the property ladder. I don't know if they can still do that.
Mar 02nd, 2012 - 05:00 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Weathier parents buy their offspring homes but most seem to rent or stay living at home forever; or until their parents expire.
Commenting for this story is now closed.
If you have a Facebook account, become a fan and comment on our Facebook Page!