New York is the only city in the country where teachers are guaranteed pay for life even when their school closes and they are put out of a permanent job. In Chicago, teachers get a year to find a new job. In Washington, D.C., highly rated teachers get a year or a buyout option, while low-rated teachers are dismissed.

The employment guarantee costs New York's DOE more than $100 million a year in salary and benefits for teachers who don't have permanent teaching jobs, the agency says. Those teachers go into what the DOE calls the Absent Teacher Reserve pool, where they can be called up to work in schools as substitutes or do other jobs. The DOE says the average teacher in the ATR pool earns $82,000 a year, and some make more than $100,000. Some teachers have been in the pool since 2006.

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Of the nearly 1,800 teachers in the ATR pool, 59% had not applied for any jobs through the DOE's job-recruitment system nor attended any of the job fairs, the DOE said. There are currently about 1,200 job openings in the system and significant restrictions on schools' abilities to hire teachers from outside of the system, giving ATR teachers and other current instructors first shot at job openings.

As Bess pointed out, the beauty of the site is that women have to pay — and, one would hope, engage in some sort of oil-enhanced wrestling match — for the opportunity to even send an email to Harvard guys. That’s right, throughout mammalian evolution, the males have battled for the right to access females; but I guess once you go to Harvard, you can tell Darwin to suck on your prestige.

Q: What's the result of the Wild Oats merger?

A: The end result is that it's been great. Our Wild Oats same-store sales were up like 16% in the second quarter.

Q: Would you do that merger again?

A: No. We'll never do another merger that requires FTC approval. It was the worst experience of Whole Foods' corporate life. All my e-mails were examined by the FTC. The $30 million in legal fees. ... For what? To prove we weren't a monopoly? Everyone knows we're not....

The Mets enter Tuesday's game in Atlanta with a 65-66 record. They have not been more than a game away from .500 since July 31, when they were 53-51.

The streak of 27 straight games remaining within a game of .500 is the third-longest streak in major league history, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.