Striking auto workers lose cash, striking Chicago teachers won't

CHICAGO - As parents and students worry about a possible strike next week, leaders of the teachers union and the Chicago Public Schools met for another round of bargaining.

Workers at General Motors have already lost on average more than $5,000 in wages and benefits as a nearly four-week-long strike continues.

But for striking Chicago teachers, any payday skipped if they shut down schools is usually made up at the end of the school year. About the only thing at risk for striking teachers is the goodwill of parents, many of whom will lose hundreds or thousands of dollars, paying for last-minute childcare and other disruptions.

Union President Jesse Sharkey got a face-to-face warning from a West Side pastor Tuesday.

“We are calling on both parties to stay at the table until the deal is done. And to make sure that we do not have a work stoppage,” said Reverend Marshall Hatch. “It’s not the city. It's not the union. But primarily our interest will be the futures of those children.”

“We don't want there to be a strike. We realize that, if there is, that's a real hardship to everyone who has children in the city of Chicago,” Sharkey said. “We’re interested in trying to figure out what we can do, if that happens, to help.”

Mayor Lori Lightfoot, though, says the union -- which strongly opposed her election -- hasn't made even one serious settlement offer since she became mayor 142 days ago.

“Today's 142. And we still don't have a substantive counter proposal in writing at the bargaining table,” Lightfoot said.

With a teachers union president boasting that a strike would "transform" the labor movement in Chicago and beyond, these contract talks are taking place in an unusual setting.