Teachers?

Accountants and engineers get paid more simply because they are more qualified. DUH!

Paul

God help us if teachers actually had to perform their tasks.

Not to nitpick, but isn't that three months off?

As you've pointed out, teachers earn a pretty good wage and they have a powerful union to keep things good for them. I would love to have three months off each year.

P

Wanna have fun???? Get a calculator (and a calendar) and see how well the teachers do math. hehehehe

I'd Fisk the hell out of this but I have said enough. You do the math. The American Federation of TEACHERS won't look too good.

P

More recently a lot of IT people, engineers etc.. have had to take less skilled positions due to layoffs and downsizing. Unions, like the teachers unions tend to throw this model out of kilter.

Forget Paul's $64K figure. Forget the $52K teachers would get paid if they worked a 12 month year, according to the AFT. In fact, forget the $44K the average teacher makes now. I'd like to get that $30,719 the average starting teacher makes.

What, you thought I just helped myself to what people put in the collection plate?

Of course, here I'll trot out my standard disclaimer that these numbers are absolutely useless, as they combine numbers for teachers in Calif and NY and other high cost-of-living areas with the rest of the country. I can honestly say that a teacher in the districts my wife has worked in would have had to teach for about 20 years to reach $44K a year.

And, oh, Paul. Accountants and engineers don't face the prospect of being shot or assaulted by an unhappy customer very often, either. Accountants and engineers don't usually have to make sure their customers take their medications so they don't start screaming at them while they're working on the design for the latest project. And accountants don't usually show up to work with 24 people demanding to have their taxes done at the same time. Accountants and engineers don't usually have to deal with a co-worker falling off a swing and fracturing his arm in three places, or not showing up with his receipts and expecting you to take care of it.

"Accountants and engineers get paid more simply because they are more qualified. DUH!"

Duh, then let's round up some of those highly "qualified" accountants and engineers and throw them in the classroom with some elementary school kids. Or better yet, get them to take care of their own kid all day - home school 'em.

I swear, the more I read idiotic comments like these, the more I sound like a freakin' teacher union rep., but I don't think you have much grounding in reality for these assumptions, especially the short work hours.

And my offer still stands: Any of you who think teachers have it so great with the short days and three months off, be my guest. There are plenty of (mostly inner-city) classroom positions available for you out there.

It's hilarious that you folks don't believe there's a market operating in teacher hiring. In Texas, at least, wealthy school districts can pay more for teachers, and have "standard of living" perks as well (like low crime, new facilities, highly motivated administrators). These districts often attract the highest quality candidates. Inner city districts do not have hundreds of highly qualified teacher candidates beating on the doors to teach. Why do you think that is? Isn't that a market?

As for Bryan, every job has its difficulties. And there are some teachers who are in it for the love of teaching. But most are just trying to collect a paycheck, just like most accountants and engineers.

I am an engineer, married to an accountant, with very little regard for today's crop of teachers. They send home 3-4 hours of homework for grade school students, and my wife and I do most of the teaching.

They whine and complain, and our schools keep getting worse. They are more interested in self-esteem than learning. I go to "awards" ceremonies where my daughter cries because she got the "dumb person" award. The children know which awards have meaning, and the teachers are too stupid to realize that the kids are in on the joke.

Some teachers become malicious because they can't match wits with a grade schooler. Tolerance is the new watchword in our society, and tolerance is what I learn by having to put up with so many incompetent fools.

You pretty much shoot yourself in the foot with your first statement.

I'm going to stop now before I post something about the common sense ability of engineers that I will regret.

Which just goes to show, I think, how wildly out of touch with the average American work experience our teacher's unions are.

And yes, they do bring home work. But my friends whose parents are teachers say that this is true only in the first 2-5 years of teaching, when the teachers are learning their trade. After a teacher has taught Intro to Chemistry for 25 years, he can be on the golf course by 3:15. Or so I'm told.