The myth of the teacher pay gap? • Hacker News Board

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#141

Post by humanrebar » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:20 PM UTC

SamuelAdams wrote: post #23

Why not just go directly to the source? https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm#25-0000 Secondary School Teachers: annual mean wage: $64,230 If we zoom in on a particular type of teacher, you get ranges: Middle school teachers https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes252022.htm bottom 10% earn 39k or less. bottom 25% earn 46k 50% earn 58k 75% earn 74k 90% earn 93k Based on these metrics, it seems like a fine occupation…

It didn't feel good as a teenager to hear teachers complain about education levels, workload, and salary when my intelligent and hard-working parents made less, worked as much, and had much less employment certainty.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#142

Post by prepend » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:20 PM UTC

SamReidHughes wrote: post #94

TeMPOraL wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's true, and while I also believe teachers should be paid more relative to other occupations, labor market has one thing going for it that makes it hard to replace - it's a very simple process that doesn't require any central coordination.

How much would a 10% teacher pay bump improve educational outcomes?

Teacher pay is not correlated to outcome. The US pays more for its teachers than Finland and other counties with much better outcomes.

I think the challenge is just measuring and comparing education. If we could, reliably, then we’d likely pay tons more for teachers.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#143

Post by jedberg » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:23 PM UTC

spike021 wrote: post #134

jedberg wrote: post #25

You'll notice a lot of people commenting here "my wife is a teacher" (myself included). I think these statistics are missing two very big factors. - In high cost areas like the Silicon Valley, almost every teacher is married to an engineer or is the child of an engineer. That is why they don't need a second job. Because they have a support network. - Teacher quits are low because most of the people who would be great…

>In high cost areas like the Silicon Valley, almost every teacher is married to an engineer or is the child of an engineer. That is why they don't need a second job. Because they have a support network. Huh? My neighbor at my (fortunately extremely low-cost) apartment is single, a teacher, and he barely gets by, especially in summer (if he wants to have "fun money" during summer it means taking a summer school teachi…

I mean my N is about 150 (the number of teachers I know personally regarding their living situation) and all but a few are married to a high earner or are supported by high earning parents. The rest have either been teaching for 30+ years and got lucky enough to buy a house way back then, and one of them is married to a cop and together they make a decent wage because he has a good union.

There's only one that I know that is single and without support, and she lived with me because we rented her a room at 1/2 normal rents until she could afford to buy a condo.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#144

Post by danieltillett » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:23 PM UTC

jonstewart wrote: post #132

The source needs some consideration. From Wikipedia on National Affairs: “National Affairs is a quarterly magazine in the United States about political affairs that was first published in September 2009. Its founding editor, Yuval Levin, and authors are typically considered to be conservative.[1][2] The magazine is published by National Affairs, Inc., which previously published the magazines The National Interest (19…

All this means is we get a conservative spin on the question rather than the usual liberal one. I am yet to find in life a simple, one sided answer to a complex question.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#145

Post by prepend » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:27 PM UTC

jedberg wrote: post #25

You'll notice a lot of people commenting here "my wife is a teacher" (myself included). I think these statistics are missing two very big factors. - In high cost areas like the Silicon Valley, almost every teacher is married to an engineer or is the child of an engineer. That is why they don't need a second job. Because they have a support network. - Teacher quits are low because most of the people who would be great…

There’s actual data on both points you make. These anecdotes and conjectures are not very valuable.

There are high quit rates in other industries that would have the same loss of potentially awesome staff as well. Why do teachers quit so infrequently compared to other professions? Maybe it’s because it is a low risk job with really unusual benefits (2 months fixed leave every summer).

Lots of people work for jobs that they love, it’s not unique to teaching. Comically, love of job drives salary down because it increases supply. If teachers hated their job the salaries would go up because it would decrease supply.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#146

Post by reaperducer » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:37 PM UTC

joe_the_user wrote: post #124

reaperducer wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't politics about seeing a larger picture? No. In fact, there's a saying in politics: "All politics is local."

There may be the saying "all politics is local politics" but this is hardly a proof of the situation. If anything, the worst politics happens through a purely local lens - for example, the refusal of silicon valley cities build housing for workers in the companies around them based on "local concerns".

There was no specification in the OP's comment about whether it's good or bad. But the fact remains that all politics is local.

With the exception of the president, people vote for their local city government, their local county government, their local school board, their local senator, their local representative, and on the macro level (governor), they vote for the person who they think will best help their own, local interests.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#147

Post by nightbrawler » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:37 PM UTC

My wife used to be a teacher and there is something I haven't seen mentioned and that is all the district support staff. Her district had literally hundreds of high paid support staff. Many were older former teachers that either wanted out of the classroom or were moved to a support position instead of being let go, often with a pay raise.

Eliminating all the unnecessary support positions and dividing those salaries amongst teachers could result in a more balanced salary for teachers.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#148

Post by burmer » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:40 PM UTC

IkmoIkmo wrote: post #114

> (2) Annual wages have been calculated by multiplying the hourly mean wage by a "year-round, full-time" hours figure of 2,080 hours; for those occupations where there is not an hourly wage published, the annual wage has been directly calculated from the reported survey data. See, this is where things go wrong. So they've got mean wage figures which are constructed both on a fact (hourly wage) and an assumption (work…

Yes, the truth is if teachers worked their contractual hours schools would fall apart; and teachers will emphasize this point as protest!

The general idea: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Work-to-rule

Some examples, many of which only do "work-to-rule" on certain days, not even on all of the days. https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2018/02/09/west-chicago-teacher... https://www.orlandoweekly.com/Blogs/archives/2018/01/26/oran... https://www.floridatoday.com/story/news/2018/01/04/unhappy-r... https://www.tulsaworld.com/news/local/education/tulsa-public... https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2012/11/...

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#149

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:41 PM UTC

prepend wrote: post #142

SamReidHughes wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much would a 10% teacher pay bump improve educational outcomes?

Teacher pay is not correlated to outcome. The US pays more for its teachers than Finland and other counties with much better outcomes. I think the challenge is just measuring and comparing education. If we could, reliably, then we’d likely pay tons more for teachers.

[deleted]

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#150

Post by jyounker » Wed, Oct 02, 2019, 10:43 PM UTC

IkmoIkmo wrote: post #114

> (2) Annual wages have been calculated by multiplying the hourly mean wage by a "year-round, full-time" hours figure of 2,080 hours; for those occupations where there is not an hourly wage published, the annual wage has been directly calculated from the reported survey data. See, this is where things go wrong. So they've got mean wage figures which are constructed both on a fact (hourly wage) and an assumption (work…

I've never known a decent teacher that puts in less than fifty hours per week, and a typical week is more demanding than all but the most stressful weeks I've worked in software.