Bye the way, I found an interesting study. They compared hourly wages of teachers to other professions. It mostly supports my POV about salaries being well above average.
It also supports my premise about a typical work week.
Of major importance, they glossed over was the extraordinary amount of time teachers get off compared to every other profession [apporx 11 weeks more per year]. Their comparisons were based on an average work week when all parties put in a full week of of work.
They also did not factor in partial days, half days & the myriad of other non-work periods that teachers have while at work. Indeed, they counted the entire day, lunch breaks, free periods, study halls, time between classes, etc., all as time worked for teachers. They also included time working at home & work related after school activities.
Below is the link, but here is the interesting comparison.
<<< Full-time public school teachers work on average 36.5 hours per week during weeks that they are working. By comparison, white-collar workers (excluding sales) work 39.4 hours, and professional specialty and technical workers work 39.0 hours per week. Private school teachers work 38.3 hours per week.
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How Many Hours Do Public School Teachers Work Per Week?
According to the BLS, full-time public school teachers work on average 36.5 hours per week during weeks that they are working. (See Table 4.) By comparison, white-collar workers (excluding sales) work 39.4 hours and professional specialty and technical workers work 39.0 hours per week. Private school teachers work 38.3 hours per week.
In Table 4A, we have ranked metro areas by the average number of hours that public school teachers work. Public school teachers in metro Grand Rapids, Michigan, work the fewest hours per week among the metro area for which we have data, at 32.6 hours per week. In metro New York, public school teachers work an average of 32.7 hours per week. And in metro Los Angeles, public school teachers work an average of 33.2 hours per week. The highest reported workweek can be found in metro Milwaukee and Amarillo, where public school teachers work 40.0 hours per week. In metro Portland, Oregon, the average workweek for public school teachers is 39.8 hours.
Are Hours Worked Counted Properly?
BLS figures are supposed to include all hours worked. As the technical appendix to the National Compensation Survey describes it, “Because salaried workers, exempt from overtime provisions, often work beyond the assigned work schedule, their typical number of hours actually worked was collected.”[6]
Some may fear that the extra time that teachers spend grading, preparing for class, and assisting extracurricular activities is not included in the BLS figures, but the BLS appears to include all these activities in its work-hour calculations: “Virtually all teachers worked from 30 to 40 hours per week, which included paid lunch and rest periods, as well as preparation and grading time if such activities were considered by the school to be a part of the teacher’s workday. Additional hours for extracurricular activities were included only if considered part of the regular work schedule.”[7] The inclusion of lunch and rest periods in work-hour calculations is more common for teachers: “[T]eachers, more than the other groups, were the most likely to have paid lunch as well as paid rest periods.”[8]
Teachers also report taking work home at high rates: “Schoolteachers and instructors (excluding college) especially were likely to take work home, with 2.8 million—or about half of all teachers—reporting such activity in the May 2004 survey.”[9] But other professionals also appear to take work home at high rates: “Almost 30 percent of workers in management, professional, and related occupations reported working at home in May 2004.”[10] If any of this work at home, either by teachers or other professionals, is considered by the employer to be part of the actual hours worked, it is included in the BLS figures. It is possible that teachers, as well as other professionals, put in some hours at home that are not captured in these numbers, but those hours would not be considered required for their jobs and thus are not part of their paid employment.
But what if the BLS is wrong in how it counts hours worked? Would that alter the earnings comparisons between public school teachers and white-collar and professional workers? To believe that the BLS unfairly counts hours worked by teachers relative to others, we would have to believe that teachers spend more hours working at home than do other white-collar or professional workers. We would further have to believe that those hours worked at home are not counted in the BLS figures but really are required for employment.
To test how much of a difference this type of error might make in earnings comparisons, let’s assume that public school teachers work the same number of hours per week as do white-collar and professional workers, rather than the fewer hours reported. If we divide the weekly earnings of public school teachers by the 39.4 hours per week reported for white-collar workers, teachers would still earn 26% more per hour than do white-collar workers. If we divide the weekly earnings of public school teachers by the 39.0 hours per week reported for professional specialty and technical workers, teachers would still earn 4% more per hour than do other professionals. That is, the higher mean hourly earnings for public school teachers are not simply a function of fewer reported hours worked per week. Even if we assume that teachers work the same hours as others, they still have higher average pay per hour.
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manhattan-institute.org |
