VOA常速英语:Teacher Strikes Spread Across the US

Strikes in Oklahoma and Kentucky.After teachers in West Virginia held out for a 5 percent pay raise, receiving it after a nine-day walkout in one of the poorest states in the U.S.This is a very unusual spring for us, for some of my teachers they’re referring to this as the education spring.In Oklahoma, legislators are debating a revenue package aimed at ending its statewide teacher walkout,including two proposals to tax certain internet sales and expand tribal gambling.The teachers are demanding increased education spending, including raises.Kentucky teachers are protesting cuts to their pensions, and in Arizona teachers are asking for a 20 percent pay increase with the threat of a strike on the horizon.“Teachers are a little fed up with the fact that their salaries haven’t been going up,
俄克拉荷马州和肯塔基州教师罢工西弗利亚州的教师要求加薪百分之五，在全美最贫穷的州之一进行为期九天的罢课后，政府接受了加薪请求。这个春天对我们而言太不寻常了，我们的一些老师称之为教育的春天。俄克拉荷马州，为了结束这场教师罢课运动，立法者正在讨论财政计划安排，其中包括对互联网销售和征税和扩大部落博彩业的建议。教师要求增加教育支出，包括加薪。肯塔基州的老师正在抗议他们的养老金被削减了，而亚利桑那州，老师正在要求加薪百分之二十，罢工之势一触即发。迟迟不加薪，教师们有点受够了。
and in most of those states actually spending for schools has actually gone down in real terms since the Great Recession,and so partly teachers are hearing all this news about how the economy is recovering and they actually haven’t seen an increase in their salaries.”Schools are funded primarily at the local and state levels in the US, and Oklahoma and Arizona have experienced serious tax reductions, says Michael Hansen.“So these states, both of these states cut costs significantly in the immediate wake of the recession,and then they’ve cut taxes, so that even though the economies in these states have been recovering, the state is not getting nearly as much as they used to and that creates a budget constraint.
但自从经济大萧条后，很多州在学校上的开支实际上是大幅下降了。所以部分原因是老师们听到的新闻都是经济如何恢复，但是他们却看不到自己的薪水有一点的上调。迈克尔·汉森表示，学校资金主要来自美国当地和州一级，而俄克拉何马州和亚利桑那州都大幅削减过税收。所以这些州，这两个州都因为经济萧条而大幅削减过成本，接着它们削减了税收，所以即便是州内经济形势好转了，也达不到之前的经济水平，这就给财政预算带来了很大的约束。
Lily Eskelsen Garcia says that the argument by state legislators that they have to live within a budget sounds reasonable.“But if you’ve manipulated that budget actually take a whole lot of the money off the table by giving a big tax break to some of the biggest corporations, to oil companies in Oklahoma.And you say no, no, no. We’ll make it so these folks don’t have to pay their taxes that revenue is not in the budget,and they shrug their shoulders like it was magically disappeared, look, this is all we have; this is all you have by design.”
Lily Eskelsen Garcia认为州立法人员说必须要控制预算的说法听起来很合理。“但是，如果你控制了这笔预算，你实际上是从人们手中拿走了这笔钱，给一些大公司、俄克拉荷马州的石油公司大规模减税。然后你说，不不不。我们能做到这点，所以这些人不需要交税，税收也不涵盖在预算里面。他们耸耸肩，就好像这钱凭空蒸发了一样。你看，我们就只有这些。不，是你们设计了这一切。”
For the 2016 to 2017 school year, the National Center for Education Statistics estimated the average national salary for kindergarten to 12th grade teachers to be about 59000 dollars, compared to averages of 46000 dollars in West Virginia, 45000 dollars in Oklahoma, 52000 dollars in Kentucky and 47000 dollars in Arizona.
2016到2017学年，据国家教育统计中心估计，美国幼儿园到12年级教师的平均工资为59000美元。西弗利亚州平均为46000美元，俄克拉荷马州平均为45000美元，肯塔基州平均为52000美元，亚利桑那州为47000美元。
Jill Craig, VOA news, Washington.
美国之音新闻，吉尔·克雷格，华盛顿报道。