RE: Educational brainstorming
John Meyer (john_meyer@geocities.com)
Tue, 19 May 1998 09:46:44 -0600
At 08:47 AM 5/18/98 -0700, you wrote:
>I just can't let go of this as much as I know I should.
>
> Its true that none of us go into teaching for the pay. But what
>about the people who don't go into teaching. Could pay be a factor for
>them? This issue really bugs me because I run into people who don't
>believe teachers are underpaid or who feel that the pay should remain
>low for teachers so that only "dedicated" people will teach. Hogwash!!
>If teachers were paid competitively we would have a larger, more
>qualified pool of people to draw from. Period.
Yes, but there is a problem. Schools aren't competitive; they are run by
the government and have a state-sanctioned monopoly.
Often times when I get into arguements about why teachers aren't paid as
much as basketball players, several things go into it, but I usually point
to price controls. Teachers have to be under price controls because we all
pay for them as taxpayers. We don't have a choice to funnel our money to
the teachers or the schools we think are best. We have to pay them all,
and we have to pay for them all. An increase to put teachers on a level
of, say, basketball players would ruin us in terms of the tax rate.
john_meyer@geocities.com