We all deserve to be paid fairly
To the editor:
I enjoyed the “Downtown View” in Feb. 11’s The Back Bay Sun, but disagree with the section on the highly compensated MBTA workers. If I recall correctly, the two highest paid workers made over $200,000 and $300,000 in one year with overtime and some other payments; their base salaries were each above $100,000.
I agree that even custodial workers, especially with overtime, deserve to be well paid. But these numbers go far beyond that concept. I am an educator, and know many master teachers who make far less than $100,000. They are well paid (though I wish perhaps they were better paid); custodial workers with fewer credentials, even if longer hours, don’t deserve more than such experienced teachers. It’s not just that teachers have more status (they really don’t). It’s that they put more training into their profession, probably with many years of expensive graduate school. And they are responsible for training our youth, which has to be one of the most precious commodities we have.
I hope Taylor makes a reasonable salary as a journalist. If you learned that the person who worked at the car wash down the street made twice your salary, how would you feel, even if he or she had longer hours? We all deserve to be paid fairly for our work, but some work deserves a higher salary than others, and these off-the-chart MBTA salaries use our public funds in ways that should be better allocated.
Jim Berkman
Dartmouth Street