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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsAre you sick of highly-paid teachers?
The below full-excerpt is reposted with permission:
Teachers' hefty salaries are driving up taxes, and they only work nine or ten months a year! It's time we put things in perspective and pay them for what they do -- babysit!
We can get that for less than minimum wage.
That's right. Let's give them $3.00 an hour and only the hours they worked; not any of that silly planning time, or any time they spend before or after school. That would be $19.50 a day (7:45 to 3:00 PM with 45 min. off for lunch and planning -- that equals 6-1/2 hours).
So each parent should pay $19.50 a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children. Now how many students do they teach in a day...maybe 30? So that's $19.50 x 30 = $585 a day.
However, remember they only work 180 days a year!!! I am not going to pay them for any vacations.
LET'S SEE....
That's $585 X 180= $105,300 per year. (Hold on! My calculator needs new batteries).
What about those special education teachers and the ones with Master's degrees? Well, we could pay them minimum wage ($7.75), and just to be fair, round it off to $8.00 an hour. That would be $8 X 6-1/2 hours X 30 children X 180 days = $280,800 per year.
Wait a minute -- there's something wrong here! There sure is!
The average teacher's salary (nationwide) is $50,000.
$50,000/180 days = $277.77 per day / 30 students = $9.25 / 6.5 hours = $1.42 per hour per student -- a very inexpensive baby-sitter and they even EDUCATE your kids!)
WHAT A DEAL!!!!
Make a teacher smile; repost this to show appreciation for all educators.
Meredith Menden
https://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/02/22/948224/-Are-you-sick-of-highly-paid-teachers?detail=facebook
Blue Owl
(53,791 posts)SheilaT
(23,156 posts)somewhat facetiously suggested she be paid baby-sitting wages by the parents.
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)This was my boss's boss, and he liked to describe himself as the third most conservative person in America (behind his parents). I have several teachers in my family, and I know better. But this highly educated MORON was just sure teachers were all pulling down $300K.
malthaussen
(17,528 posts)bluestateguy
(44,173 posts)but not from his taxpayer funded salary---that was more like $55,000.
No, it's because he wrote a book that sold a lot of copies.
He also picked up a few grand a year grading AP exams and as a consultant to the testing company.
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)He was my Government teacher, and I think he just loved teaching even though he was likely making plenty of money with his restaurants.
bluestateguy
(44,173 posts)He had a big trust fund, and much inherited money. Lived in a very ritzy neighborhood.
He loved teaching and was good at it.
But he too is the exception to the rule.
Odin2005
(53,521 posts)I think one of the problems with the education system right now is that a lot of the people who would make excellent teachers are able to get better paying jobs somewhere else. I know when I was in college the stereotype of education majors, especially elementary education, was of mediocre minds who could not make it elsewhere. That needs to change, and the best way to change it is to pay teachers enough to bring good teaching talent.
Teachers should be PAID as the professionals they are.
(And before somebody flames me, I'm not saying that there are not a lot of very good teachers out there, I was just making a generalization.)
Especially the part about 70k being the minimum pay! Too many good teachers are lost due to being overworked and under appreciated and under paid.
daleanime
(17,796 posts)it would help draw talented students into the teaching, lord knows we need to.
LiberalArkie
(16,033 posts)japple
(10,227 posts)buy for their classrooms won't hurt as badly. I know teachers who spend quite a bit on school supplies, food, and things like kleenex, and cleaning supplies and they don't get reimbursed by the school system. It's still unfair and they should not have to spend their own money, but many teachers do it just because there are so many children in need.
mainstreetonce
(4,178 posts)If you can read this. PAY a teacher
Did you ever try to thank the plumber?
DrBulldog
(841 posts)That's why our children often get the bottom-of-the-barrel types into our classrooms.
Hint: the REST OF THE MODERN WORLD train their teachers and pays their teachers much more than we do.
annabanana
(52,791 posts)actually READ the OP)
Recursion
(56,582 posts)And that average is skewed crazily by Luxemburg.
US teachers make more than their peers in South Korea, Japan, Germany, Switzerland, France, Finland, and the UK.
dsc
(52,486 posts)that South Korean is making way more than I am if you factor in the median income there vs here.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)oberliner
(58,724 posts)Or even maybe too high?
Recursion
(56,582 posts)That's what really determines that.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Due in part to the salaries but also to the less the optimal working conditions in many cases.
A highly educated person who would make a great teacher probably has more attractive options.
Perhaps a higher salary would help draw some of those folks to the profession.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)AFAIK American schools are doing pretty well by historical standards; I don't see a big need to change much.
I'd like much less of an emphasis on testing, of course, but that's not a pay issue per se (except that that frustration leads to attrition)
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Only 1 in 4 high school students graduate college-ready in the 4 core subjects of English, Reading, Math and Science.
https://www.dosomething.org/us/facts/11-facts-about-education-america
Personally, it seems from what I have read that public schools are really in bad shape and that attracting better teachers would help improve the situation.
As the above link claims, teacher quality is one of the most significant factors related to student achievement. I tend to agree.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)What are the sources for your chart?
Recursion
(56,582 posts)Here's one that includes those above us, too. Note Luxemburg.
It's pretty clear we're just slightly above the OECD average.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Thank you for that. Each of those must draw on the same source, as it appears whoever compiled the info found US teachers are getting $53,758 per year.
From what I've seen, the agenda from the Davos crowd is undemocratic. From last year's confab:
By: DSWright
FireDogLake.com, Wednesday January 21, 2015
While there may be confusion among some in the US as to how the American political system operates, it is apparently taken for granted by participants at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland that politics in America is based on bribery and corruption.
In an interview at Davos with Bloomberg News related to growing concerns about rising wealth inequality and its corruption influence on American politics economist and NYU business professor Nouriel Roubini stated as a matter of fact that it would be hard for the US to overcome wealth inequality because the US political system was based on legalized corruption which meant rich people having more resources to bribe politicians with would generally prevail.
Tom Keene, Bloomberg: How big is the plutocracy effect in 2015?
Nouriel Roubini: Its significant because we are in a democracy where it supposedly has to be one man, one vote, but the reality is that those who are billionaires, those that have economic and financial power can affect legislation on taxation of capital gains, of carried interest by having that political power.
In the US we have a system of legalized corruption if you think about it. K Street and the lobbying affect legislation with the money they give the politician and therefore those who have financial resources have a greater impact on the political system than those who have less. So its not a true democracy, its a plutocracy.
This is not news to anyone paying attention. In fact, Princeton University produced an exhaustive study that made headlines demonstrating that the wealthy ultimately determine legislative outcomes in the US Congress. Add to that an experiment the progressive group CREDO and UC Berkeley ran where they offered meetings to representatives with either actual constituents or non-constituent donors with the representatives overwhelmingly choosing the donors and you certainly have a picture of a cynical system run on cash.
CONTINUED w/links...
http://news.firedoglake.com/2015/01/21/taken-for-granted-at-davos-that-us-government-run-on-legalized-corruption/#at_pco=cfd-1.0&at_ab=-&at_pos=7&at_tot=8&at_si=54c5412562e4586b
Wonder if they have a way of giving an empirical measurement to what people don't know?
Rex
(65,616 posts)Sad how little most make.
wilt the stilt
(4,528 posts)The real problem with education is we do underpay teachers and have for many years. Everyone complains that education has gone down. The hidden problem is back in the day women only had 3 options teacher,secretary and nurse. As soon as women entered the workforce education went down.
We were not getting good talent anymore because the top people were going to higher paying jobs. For about 40 years we have been getting substandard talent. We have to pay competitive wages with business and flush out the mediocre talent we now have in the schools.
We also have to have a longer school year. 180 days is just not enough.
certainot
(9,090 posts)1200 radio stations for 25 years, along with any other anti-public education andti-teacher anti-union lies the think tanks feed the carnival barkers.
the absurd thing about that whole defund and privatize effort that has been so successful is that it probably wouldn't be possible without the help of these 90 major universities.
madville
(7,447 posts)Salary range is 37k-60k with defined step raises for a K-12 teacher here in this county and it's among the lowest in the state. It's a poor rural county though, median household income is around $25,000, so that salary goes much farther as far as housing and taxes than in a more expensive city.
In a large city 100 miles away from here the salary range is 39-66k, property taxes are 3x as much and housing is at least double so it's a lower standard of living on a higher pay scale.
JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)Read the OP.
And then think.
What would happen if for-profit companies delivered education to our children the way they do healthcare to all of us?
Think how high education costs would rise if we had a number of companies with highly paid executives and lots of private bureaucracy and profit standing between our children and their teachers.
What if every school had to handle the billing processes of a number of different insurance companies? How much additional staff would that add, how much additional money would it cost to support for-profit schools to deal with the number of students that our socialist public schools instruct?
And the idea that private schools are necessarily better than public ones is baloney. My daughter attended public Magnet schools, was in a college study group with girls who had attended expensive private schools. They were studying chemistry. Guess who had the best high school chemistry teacher? Guess who got the best grade and generally got the best grades in college? You guessed it.
Public education paid for by all of us is the most cost-efficient, effective education.
And guess what? My children who attended public schools got the bonus of attending schools with children from different backgrounds, different races, ethnicities, languages -- a perfect preparation for working in the real world.
If we move to single payer, we will insure everyone and save money per insured. There is no way that single payer will cost us per insured person what our current insurance costs.
What may add to the expense is insuring everyone. But even that will not add as much as we might think. And what kind of person thinks that some people should go without health insurance?
I'd hate to think what kind of person that would be. But when you say that we cannot have single payer insurance, that is effectively what you mean and what you are saying and the kind of person you are.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)The greedheads are out of control. Unlike in the fable, the goose that laid the golden eggs is public education. Like the fable, once dead, the crooks' goose gets cooked, too.
This post is someone's attempt to make funny faces at a restaurant to see how many looks they would get from others.
It worked, CONGRATULATION!
smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)money into the salaries of people who actually CONTRIBUTE to society. Teachers are woefully underpaid if you ask me.
californiabernin
(421 posts)n/t
Jenny_92808
(1,342 posts)who think teachers should be paid minimum wage.
annabanana
(52,791 posts)They are paid WAY BELOW minimum now..
johnp3907
(3,818 posts)They must've had bad, overpaid teachers.
😜
Elmer S. E. Dump
(5,751 posts)Yupster
(14,308 posts)water treatment plant worker or a traffic engineer.
You could make $ 3 an hour for everyone in the city who gets water from your plant or $ 3 an hour for every car who stops at your stoplights and stop signs.
Rex
(65,616 posts)Many times just the opposite, a lot of volunteering from those three groups SANS pay.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)I consider that highly paid, personally.
Note that I'm not claiming they don't deserve it, just that that is 3 times the median income in that city. Which is "highly paid".
Rex
(65,616 posts)Your two in a million example is not very impressive.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)I can't imagine anyone who doesn't genuinely love to teach being a teacher these days.
And a good teacher is worth his or her weight in gold.
pampango
(24,692 posts)the list goes on and on. They all either raise my taxes or the cost of the goods I buy.
Thank God for CEO's who do their best to make by life bearable and do not ask for more money while they do it.
avebury
(11,031 posts)that existing education dollars is not being used wisely to begin with. Okahoma needs to work on consolidating school systems to reduce Administrative and utility costs. There are around 537 School Districts of which around 60% or more are in communities with populations less then 3,000. I recently did some research on it in order to do a reply to a local new article on the push for a penny increase in the sales tax. I am at home and don't have the link to the website I used readily available.
The State of OKlahoma could hand over every penny of state revenue to Education and they would still not be happy. There is no amount of money that will ever make them happy. The reality of life is that a state only has X amount of money to cover what needs to me covered. Every entity has to learn to manage their budget wisely. Consolidating school districts would make more funds available for the classroom.
State pension funds is a sore subject here as well. It is a fact that the teachers are draining their fund at a faster rate then the rate that state employees draw on their retirement fund. Every year or so the state legislature will talk about combining the two finds and, as you can imagine, the reaction of state employees is HELL NO! We don't want the teachers anywhere near our retirement fund. I think what has prevented it from happening so far is the fact that the State Legislators' retirement is part of our retirement fund. Combining the funds would hurt their retirement as much as ours.
TBF
(33,357 posts)I have yet to meet a teacher who is paid what they are worth. Thankless job, low pay, and now trying to break their unions.
K&R for the post.
AwakeAtLast
(14,210 posts)And I just cracked 50K
DirkGently
(12,151 posts)... oh wait ...