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Thousands of Education Jobs Will Be Lost in State Budget, VEA Estimates

VEA's Division of Government Relations and Research estimates the following job losses as a consequence of the House and Senate Budget proposals as of February 24, 2010:

VEA assumes that 85% of the local school board budgets are allocated for personnel, so we backed out 15%.

We assume that localities will not be able to make up for the loss of state funding.

We used state support for an SOQ teaching position as the proxy for a position ($33,000). This figure was provided by Senate Finance Committee staff.

A considerable number of K-12 educators, from assistant superintendents to cafeteria workers stand to lose their jobs as a consequence of actual and proposed budget cuts.

We use the direct aid entitlement amount for 2008-2009 as the base year (the major recession driven cuts have occurred since).

House
Direct Aid 08-09 = $6,311.0 million
Direct Aid 11-12 = $5,447.4 million
House Cuts = $863.6 million

$863.6 -$129.5 (15%)= $734.1 x 33 = 24,225.3 K-12 jobs lost as a consequence of the House budget

Senate
Direct Aid 08-09 = $6,311.0
Direct Aid 11-12 = $5,742.3
Senate Cuts = $568.7 million

$568.7 - $85.3 (15%) = $483.4 x 33 = 15,952.2 K-12 jobs lost as a consequence of the Senate budget

Two Notes

1. We know that the $365 million in federal funds used to partially backfill $600 million in cuts to the FY10 appropriation are gone, but the cuts remain, so the consequent job losses from these cuts were, in large part, delayed until the next school year.

2. We know that policymakers may try to control which positions are cut on the local level.  For example, Governor Kaine, as he championed the cut in funding for support-staff asserted that these cuts would not have an impact on the classroom.  Such a stand ignores the essential role that support-staff play in supporting instruction.  Further, such a stand ignores the fact direct aid is fungible on the local level - school boards make the personnel decisions guided by what is in the best interest of children.  Consequently, Kaine's policy led to 1,326 teachers losing their jobs.

Per-Pupil Funding Slips

View a chart documenting the decline in state-supported per-pupil spending. It compares the 2009 budget and the 2010, 2011, and 2012 budgets as they were introduced, approved, or pending in the House and Senate.