New study: Teachers are overpaid?

(MoneyWatch) 

COMMENTARY: A new study by the Heritage Foundation found that, contrary to conventional wisdom, teachers are actually overpaid when you compare them with "comparable private sector workers."

They were careful to consider all types of variables, including accounting for the summer vacations that teachers have, and the number of hours actually worked (compared with the hours school is actually in session). They found that people who switched from private employment to teaching took a pay increase, while those who left teaching to work in the private sector took a pay decrease. The researchers concluded:

...on average, public-school teachers receive total compensation that is roughly 50 percent higher than what they would receive in private-sector employment. While salaries are at appropriate levels, fringe benefits push teacher compensation far ahead of what private-sector workers enjoy. Consequently, recruiting more effective teachers for public schools will be much more difficult than simply raising salaries. (Emphasis mine)

It's that last sentence that I find most intriguing. Because school teachers make more money teaching then they do when they leave education, therefore you can't get better teachers by raising salaries.

Hogwash, I say.

Now, while money doesn't actually do a great deal towards motivating people on cognitive tasks, the same studies show that people need a minimum level of money to be willing to participate at all. And what that minimum level is varies from person to person. I, for instance, would need about $150,000 and a guaranteed massage therapist after work in order to teach first grade. Oy. Now, it's true that you couldn't motivate me to be better by offering me $175,000, but I'm not showing up for the $55,000 average Pennsylvania teacher's salary.

Now clearly, you don't want me teaching any first grade class, although I would love to teach (and have done so) at a university level. But there are other people who would be fantastic first grade teachers who would be willing to consider an education career for $100,000 but are not willing to so for $55,000.

And what makes the difference between those people and those who do go into education? Well, the Heritage Foundation looked at people with comparable skills. We have tons of evidence that (and please, don't shoot the messenger) teachers aren't at the top of the pile, academically speaking.

Research over the years has indicated that education majors, who enter college with the lowest average SAT scores, leave with the highest grades. Some of academic evidence documenting easy A's for future teachers goes back more than 50 years!

With all this information, I think the Heritage Foundation drew the wrong conclusion. More money would make a difference in teacher recruitment and retention -- not because current teachers are underpaid according to their current skill set, but because we want people with better skill sets in the classroom. If we want better performance, we shouldn't be looking at people who are similar to current teachers. We should be looking for people who are better. And that will require, among other things, recruiting people who could make more money in the private sector.

[bonadventure100]

"teachers aren't at the top of the pile, academically speaking".

I have to point out that just because you can earn a Phd in a subject doesn't mean you are very good at teaching it. In college most of the professors I had were terrible teachers.

Perhaps the reason the education majors did so well was because they were being taught by expert teachers.

[lsmith21215432]

I completely agree that teachers are overpaid. I work 80+ hours a week year round, no summmers off or spring breaks or christmas breaks, with a similar education level and make about the same as your average teacher. Pay for performance is what it should be about. No guaranteed raises or pensions (what the heck is the word "pension" doing in our 2012 vocabulary?!). You perform, you get paid. I have heard from multiple teacher friends that their "advanced degrees" were very easy to obtain compared with most Master's degrees. No one should have tenure anymore. Live like the rest of us- you perform, you get paid. Teachers work hard, yes- but so do social workers and all other government workers who get paid far less to do an equally difficult job.

It is high time teacher pay is reformed. Or, if that's not going to happen, then pay equally all of the other difficult jobs that aren't paying the same high level that teachers are.

[bd7272]

I teach special ed. So how is my performance going to be graded? "You perform, you get paid" is a very simplistic view. Schools are not a business. "Success" is not easily defined. I have 2 kindergarten students with cognitive impairments. (IQs in the low 80's) They came to me in August knowing NO letters or numbers. Now they know their alphabet, all of their alphabet sounds and their numbers through 20. But they are FAR from being at grade level. To some, this would be considered failure. But ask any kindergarten teacher and they will tell you that this is a great success. So some bureaucrat is going to refuse to give me a raise because I "failed".

Using social workers and other government workers as examples is faulty. They make the same or less than teachers for work that is equally difficult. That doesn't mean teachers should be making less. It means social workers and fireman should be earning MORE.

If teachers are overpaid for such a cushy job, why aren't YOU doing it?

[CPer100]

The bottom line is this....For someone to make $50+K and have your summers off, 2-3 weeks at Xmas, a week for Easter/Spring Break, numerous holidays, and get off by 3pm, it's not a bad gig.

[johnnyplankton]

All you need to know about this survey is that the Heritage Foundation funded it. It's like a headline that says,

CRACK GOOD FOR USERS, ECONOMY - (funded by the Crack Dealers of America).

[RoBoTeq]

I'm not so concerned with the actual pay that public sector teachers receive as I am about the non-working benefits. Teachers should not be receiving pay for when school is not in operation and they are not actually working.

An even larger concern is what teachers are allowed to teach and what they are required to teach. Social values should not be taught in public schools, as social values differ from family to family. Public schools have become more Socialist recruitment facilities then they are educational centers. The result is what we have witnessed with the so called Occupy movement.

Government, using tax dollars from every working American, is teaching Socialist ideals such as organized union labor and government social programming. This is not what education should be. I don't condone government spending one cent of my tax dollars on teachers who have to or want to teach Socialist values to young Americans. Otherwise, no matter how much they are paid, good teachers will never earn what they are worth.

[Inugomontoya]

Once we see "socialism" in the context of any reply that doesn't have to do with Sweden or North Korea, we know the writer is someone with perverted, unAmerican values. I don't want my kids exposed to perverts like her and am happy to pay good public school teachers with my tax dollars to prevent them from becoming this twisted.
Pay for private sector teachers is about $35,000 in 2010(aggregate average, not just starting out). In public schools, it is ~$42,000, but students may be more unruly, class size larger, etc. The criminally weird like the writer do not begrudge soldiers extra pay for extra hard duty.
Average STARTING pay for all BS degrees is ~$50,000, so the always untruthful Heritage Foundation has again had to pervert the truth to support their false and pernicious ideology.

[kucinich]

This is typical of the falsehood-laden crap that Heritage tries to pass off as "research."

Their motives in concluding that public school teachers are overpaid--relative to their private sector counterparts--are twofold. First, they want to discredit public sector unions. Given that private sector unions have been all-but-decimated during the past 30 years, corporate-funded shills like Heritage are now setting their sights on destroying public sector unions. Second, they want to privatize public education so that rapacious business types (e.g., Romney) can garner yet another mountain of public subsidies by converting public schools into private schools.

To those at Heritage, it's a sin for a person to earn a living wage with decent benefits and a reasonable degree of job security. Their version of nirvana would be a return to 19th century working conditions. These guys are nothing more than well-paid ****** for the 1% and are anything but serious, objective scholars. Their so-called research is pure poison.

[edtroha1]

Exactly. These "researchers" at the Heritage are funded by the Koch Brothers, ultra-wealthy Republicans whose goal is to rid our country of middle class workers.....like teachers. Take their findings with a HUGE grain of salt.

[misterken100]

After 6 years of teaching math and science in high school and community college, I returned for an advanced degree and continued in a non-educational field at more than twice my original salary. My level of responsibility was significantly greater, but had I stayed in teaching another 5 years I have no doubt I would have been doing more curriculum design, textbook writing, and committee work at the State and Federal level comparable to what I was doing in the private sector, but without a comparable increase in pay. Teachers may or may not be underpaid for what they do, but they definitely are underpaid for what we'd like them to do.

[BFNZ]

Interesting... Teachers in New Zealand are paid absolute rubbish.
Those that word hard do so off their own backs and depending onthe school they work for do not get so much as a Christmas card from their school.
I cannot believe the comment above - pay teachers as much as they want and look after them.
Teachers should be paid competitively, and most of them do it for the kids. Or you will end up like New Zeland where we can't get enough teachers because the pay and conditions are too rubbish. My sister in law had 30 6-year-olds last year, 3 of which had behavioural problems (think punching the teacher, other students, and the teacher enduring abuse from their parents) and no teacher-aide. She works hours just as long as I, longer when reports are due, and she's paid barely any more than I am.

[Sharkster]

It is public knowledge (at least in my state) exactly what a teacher is paid. Not one teacher I know (count 3), makes 1/2 of my salary as a non-teacher. The research likely does not take into account the continued education costs pushed onto teachers, nor the fact that many (all three in my case) stay well past standard hours grading and planning. This type of research, with such flawed conclusions could serve to further undermine one of this countries only 'saving grace' assets, education.

Keep these words in mind when considering how "overpaid" teachers are, and then take it upon yourself to really investigate exactly how much teachers actually make (it is freely available information) and then reconsider your stance.

"The strength of the United States is not the gold at Fort Knox or the weapons of mass destruction that we have, but the sum total of the education and the character of our people." Claiborne Pell

[SuzanneLucas]

Keep in mind that comparing to your salary isn't appropriate unless you have a similar skill set to teachers. That's what they compared.

And as for working long hours, everyone I know who doesn't teach works long hours as well. Educators don't have the market cornered on long hours.

[sfklein]

I agree with Sharkster: Flawed from beginning to end... nowhere mentioned are the hours of endless government-mandated paperwork (ensuring that no chile is left behind...) that have absolutely nothing to due with the actual process of teaching. No study - particularly when conducted by a Conservative think-tank- can draw anything resembling an articulate comparison between teaching and the private sector

[jdgalt]

The system certainly did a much better job of educating kids (its proper purpose) 40 years ago, before the teachers' unions got control of it, than it does today. There's a lesson to be learned there, and it's not one the teachers are willing to tell us about.

[bonadventure100]

I believe the lesson is that if a child is failing remove him/her from the educational system. Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to make a decent living these days without graduating from highschool.