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

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#201

Post by analog31 » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:11 AM UTC

rconti wrote: post #89

shantly wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> From quit rates, to pay, to conditions, and beyond, but ignores the obvious which is that private pay and private conditions are largely pinned to be just above public salaries and conditions Most of the private schools around here pay a lot worse than the public schools, especially if you factor in total comp w/ benefits. We have a tiny number with high enough tuition that they might pay well (but I wouldn't count…

Yeah, I'm not in education, but I was surprised to 'learn' that private schools generally pay less than their public counterparts -- and I've continued to understand that to be the case, but I'd love more information on the matter to correct any misunderstandings I might have.

Less competitive, at least in my state. The higher paying public school districts have a lot of applicants, who are often more senior and have either higher degree levels, or degrees related to the subject they would be teaching. The parochial schools are seen as being somewhat of a stepping stone for new teachers or those who are trying to get a foothold in a desirable location.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#202

Post by humanrebar » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:16 AM UTC

claudeganon wrote: post #191

humanrebar wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many master's professions insist on local monopolies for their employers? Other than predisposed ideological beliefs, it doesn't make sense for teachers' unions to be as against school competition as they are, at least with respect to employing exemplary educators.

Teacher’s unions don’t opposes “school competition.” They oppose school privatization, which is largely a predatory scheme with wildly misaligned incentives. We don’t need a repeat of all the problems with the US healthcare system in education. Conflating performance with unions is bunk anyways. Japan’s teachers are heavily, heavily unionized, historically far more militant than teachers in the US, and they’re consis…

In what ways do teachers' unions campaign to give agency to students' families and career choice to in-demand faculty?

Seems like the incentives are mostly oriented around getting teachers to stay in one place and grind out another year of experience, round of continuing education, and extra degrees whether they are wise or not.

Otherwise, why don't teachers just quit schools with poor safety records, working conditions, pay, equipment funding, and uncompensated overtime? Because no district really has to worry about being held accountable like that.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#203

Post by OBLIQUE_PILLAR » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:25 AM UTC

National Affairs dot com is published by the extreme right wing think tank The Claremont Institute, started by the man who came up with Barry Goldwater's line "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice."

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

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Post by usefulcat » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:30 AM UTC

jedberg wrote: post #157

prepend wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 tha…

There is no data on how many people don't choose to teach because of the perception of low wage and poor working conditions. I'm not even sure how you would measure that. I also can't think of another profession that has the same reputation. Most jobs have a reputation of either poor working conditions or low pay, or if they have both, are unskilled or low skilled positions. Teaching is the only job I can think of wi…

Perhaps teaching jobs tend to be easier to get compared to other "high skill" jobs?

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#205

Post by OBLIQUE_PILLAR » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:31 AM UTC

DougPhillips88 wrote: post #169

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole "article" is propaganda by a neocon think tank. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Enterprise_Institute

And this contradicts their data... how, exactly?

Any paper put out by an extremely ideological think tank is going to present statistics in the most biased way possible, to try to prove their point.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#206

Post by XorNot » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:31 AM UTC

patrickthebold wrote: post #95

crumpets wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>how society decides salaries. It seems pretty arbitrary from my perspective. Society doesn't "decide". It's a decided by the labor market. Nobody wants to pay programmers six figures. It's a myth that we think teachers are less important than programmers because they make less on average. There is just a larger supply of qualified teachers willing to work at lower prices. Wait until you find out how little art histo…

I'm not sure how much that holds with the government running public schools and the primary stakeholders being children. For example if you didn't really care the much about building a software project, but had to do it, you could probably find some 'developers' who would do the work for the same salary that teachers work at. I'm not sure how the outcome would compare to that of public schools.

You're describing every project where its been outsourced to a foreign contracting firm for bottom-dollar really.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#207

Post by XorNot » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:32 AM UTC

darawk wrote: post #194

mcguire wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. It's one of the biggest advantages of teaching. But you still can't pay for groceries with time off.

You can't pay for groceries with health insurance either but you still have to include fringe benefits when calculating total compensation.

Well, in other first-world countries you don't.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#208

Post by harry8 » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:34 AM UTC

DougPhillips88 wrote: post #169

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole "article" is propaganda by a neocon think tank. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Enterprise_Institute

And this contradicts their data... how, exactly?

It's additional data that is definitely worth knowing.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

#209

Post by darawk » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:43 AM UTC

XorNot wrote: post #207

darawk wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't pay for groceries with health insurance either but you still have to include fringe benefits when calculating total compensation.

Well, in other first-world countries you don't.

I'm not sure what your point is. You have to include fringe benefits generally when calculating total compensation. Whether or not that happens to include healthcare is pretty immaterial.

Re: The myth of the teacher pay gap?

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Post by minikites » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 1:46 AM UTC

musicale wrote: post #200

egh wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

google "work to rule"

I'm somewhat baffled as to why "work to rule" is considered a sort of strike or protest. If two parties have already agreed that one will perform a certain amount of work and another will pay a certain amount of money, it is unreasonable for either side to demand more than what the other side agreed to. A contract becomes meaningless if one side can arbitrarily adjust the terms.

The massive power imbalance between employer and employee is the main factor here and the driving motivation for labor unions.