Teachers are overpaid.

Great Debates
1

Where I live, beginning teachers get paid about $35,000 a year, and they only work a 6-hour day for 10 months. This is a ludicrous amount for a job that is little more than a glorified babysitter. I say pay these people like a babysitter.

I consulted with the 14 year-old-girl next door, and she gets paid $3 per hour per child when she babysits. Let’s pay the teachers the same. And to be fair, we should give those with more education and experience a little more, so if a teacher has a master’s degree, as about half do, and 10 years experience, lets pay them a premium rate of $5 per hour.

Now let’s figure out what these people should get paid each year. $3 per hour, an average of 30 students per class, 6 hours per day, 180 days per year (or $5 for those with more experience).

Beginning teacher: $3306180=$97,200 per year.
Master’s + 10: $5306180=$162,000 per year.

Wait a minute. Babysitter pay is too good for these people. Hmmm, I wonder what that 35,000 dollars amounts to in hourly wage per student. Let’s see

((35,000/180)/6)/30=$1.08 per child per hour.

I still say teachers are overpaid. Lets lower their salaries to a more reasonable figure, let’s say the $25,000 per year that teachers in some states make.

((25,000/180)/6)/30= 0.77 per hour per child. Ah, now we have a reasonable figure. With some experience and a master's degree, we can generously bump the salary up to .90 or even $1.00, and if they stay with a school for, oh say 20 years, they really deserve a reward. Let’s give these stalwarts $1.10 ($35,640 per year).

Of course, with the drop in salary, we’ll have to lower the standards neeeded to get into this profession. As it is, we unfairly discriminate against C students. I say, let’s recruit them! And let’s do away with the Bachelor’s Degree requirement. We can set up a series of technical schools, and train teachers in 6-months, the way temporary office workers are trained.

The elegant part of this solution is that it saves money and solves the teacher shortage. It’s a win-win situation without a down side!

2

I guess Alex Rodriguez is worth 25 million a year to you huh.

3

oops…I do believe this is sarcasm.

4

You probably should’ve put “A Modest Proposal” in the subject line. If you don’t intend for this to be sarcastic, let us know and I’m sure a mod would be more than happy to send it over to GD.

5

I suspect that the Pit would be a more likely destination, Dignan.

6

Why I found the OP so entertaining.

7

:::Kinsey the teacher starts searching through her students’ backpacks…one of them MUST have a gun which she can use on Number Six if he/she isn’t being sarcastic…:::

8

Ok, I take it back.
I just clicked on Number Six’s profile and under “occupation” it says teacher. I feel your pain.
I’m going to assume the OP was sarcastic.

9

Oh, my, will you ever be able to get your tongue back out of your cheek?

I think that the above is a perfectly reasonable salary profile, unfortunately I don’t think there are enough folks that agree to pass the necessary tax levies.

How about we put webcams in all the classrooms and make it pay per view? :wink:

-Doug

10

The most amusing part to me is the “starting salary around $35,000” part. I’ve been teaching for 8 years now, and I don’t even come close to that. I want to emphasize this: not even CLOSE. I make more money at my summer job. (Not that I’m complaining, though. I wouldn’t trade my job for anything.) :slight_smile:

Granted that the cost of living varies from place to place and from district to district, but still…

11

Six, would you mind if I cut’n’pasted the OP and sent it to my mom, who’s a teacher?

Warning: I predict that by Monday, this thing will land in the inbox of every teacher in the country.

12

I think it’s already in the inbox of every teacher in America. I can’t remember where I’ve seen this before, but I know I’ve read this exact same mock-rant in the last year or two.

And incidentally, I was also wondering where the starting salary for a public school teacher is $35,000. Nome, Alaska?

–sublight, fifth-generation school teacher (since gone on to higher-paying jobs that involve less vomit), who had his finger very close to the flame trigger when he first read the OT.

13

The girl next door must be the cheapest babysitter on the planet.

I charged more than that twelve years ago, and I was one of the least expensive ones in my neighborhood. Asking around, keep hearing prices much, much higher than that.

-amarinth

14

Cudos to the OP’er!!

If only we could flood the school systems with that kind of money…(sigh)…Could you even imagine

15

I was so going to be PO’d at the OP, then I go it
Hehe.

::Gets out calculator to figure out how his pay compared to babysitter’s pay when he was a teacher::

:mad:

Maybe we could just throw money at them? Coincidentally, the last post in that GD thread brings to light the teacher/babysitter comparison.

16

That is a cheap babysitter. Last people I babysat for paid me $5 an hour plus I got fridge raiding rights, sometimes they left me 20 to order in pizza (on top of the money I earned. If I didn’t order in I left it there though. Why be greedy?) The people before that I got $4 an hour, all the pop I could drink and cupboard raiding rights.

The cheapest people I ever had gave me 7 bucks for a nights work and I could only drink water from the tap.

Personally I wish teachers were paid more. My math teacher right now is gonna go back to school and work to be a lawyer. She’s only been a teacher for about a year or two.

17

Here in the NYC burbs (LI) there has been an intersting thing happining. NYC teachers aren’t paid all that well. They complain that they are not nearly getting what a teacher in the 'burbs get and generally make the statement that teachers are underpaid. The burb teachers use the city teachers statement that teachers are underpaid as an excues to get more money which usually works. After only 10 years a teacher can make $80-$90k for a teacher for crying out loud!!! While the city probally tops off at $40-50k.

The above figures may be a little dated. Also it is very hard to become a burb teacher and most positions are politically filled (I know quite a few - none got in on hteir own merits). This leads me to believe that they are grossly overpaid (since there is such a demand) and people who are not the best are getting the jobs (due to mainly political ‘filling’ of jobs).

I say cut the salary so people who want to teach actually can since people looking for easy rides will not be intrested in a job w/ the lower salary.

18

I make no claim to have originated the idea of comparing teachers’ salaries to babysitters’. I had seen a photocopy of something similar, but with no author attributed. I do think my version is an improvement, though :wink: If anyone knows who first came up with the idea, I would be more than happy to give credit where credit is due.

Podkayne, you are welcome to use it as you see fit.

However, the wording and figures used in the OP are entirely mine, and I think I added a new wrinkle: trade schools for teachers. The school district where I work (starting salary roughly $33,000) routinely starts each year with dozens of teachers teaching on an emergency credential. There are literally not enough teachers to fill the vacancies, because people who have the education can almost always get better pay elsewhere. My point? Unless we either lower standards or increase salaries, the situation will get worse.

By the way (can’t help it, it’s the teacher in me) the tone of my post was tongue-in-cheek, not sarcastic. The literary device of an intended meaning that is opposite the stated meaning is irony. Sarcasm is a tone, roughly equivilant to simultaneous anger and contempt. They are often confused because they go together well.

19

I truly hadn’t noticed the resemblance before I read your post, Dignan, but thanks for the compliment. But, hey, if you’re going to steal, I mean emulate, someone’s style, Swift is a pretty good choice.

20

I want to apologize again for my out-of-line comment.

Not that anyone here said it, but…
I get really PO’d when people think teaching Kindergarten is some kind of walk in the park. It’s waaaaay more than babysitting, it is NOT “playing with kids” all day, I am allowed to be physically tired at the end of the day, I am allowed to be mentally drained at the end of the day…
Okay, I’ll stop before this turns into a full-fledged rant.

it’s been one of those weeks…thank God for Spring Break!