The complaints about teachers' salaries aired on your "Local Live" program were infuriating. Do citizens believe they can have a good education for their children on the cheap, or is it purely ignorance that leads people to think teachers earn lots of money? The average New Jersey teacher, with 16 years experience, earns $28 an hour, plus benefits, and no vacation pay. A recent NJEA poll shows this average teacher earns $48,800 a year, working 47 hours a week. Take 185 days, do the arithmetic, and you get $28 per hour. At the same rate, an employee in industry, working a 40-hour week for 52 weeks would be earning $58,240 a year, plus benefits, plus vacation. Is it unreasonable to expect a professional worker with 16 years experience to earn a salary on a par with this figure? These are raw numbers that exclude the costs of continuing education. Perhaps in the distant past, it could be said with justification that not too much was required of teachers to do their jobs effectively. Yet, while today everyone is crying for changes in education, it has gone almost unrecognized by a complaining public that changes in society have already had a powerful effect on schools, increasing the demands put on teachers. ... Unless the public can think of a cheap way to prepare children for the 21st century, teachers will have to be paid decent salaries, and it is hoped, with less ill will.
Wikidata