How is the value of various jobs decided?

it amazes me how little american teachers make, my mother taught school in canada for over 35 years, she started teaching before you needed a university degree (2 years of teachers college was all that was required), along the way she picked up some credits but never a degree, this affected her wages and pension, however, a few years after she retired she was on a train trip and was talking to a working teacher from the states (can't remember where), and during the course of the conversation it came out that my mother made almost as much as a retired teacher as this woman made as a working teacher

That is at least one reason why there is a public education problem in the US. You get what you pay for in a sense - you don't pay high enough, you end up with low quality teachers - although there are some exceptions to the rule - there are the few that teach simply for the non-monetary rewards. Make a guess what some one fighting overseas makes - much less than teachers or flaggers.

http://www.payscale.com/research/CA/All_K-12_Teachers/Salary/by_State

err, province, not state as the link is labelled

starting salaries
http://www.payscale.com/research/CA/All_K-12_Teachers/Salary/by_Years_Experience

Teachers don't risk getting hit by a car.

Also, what are the respective non-salary benefits?

DJ - when was this train trip your Mother took? What we call Highly Qualified Teachers are those with Masters Degrees and they start, I think, around mid-30k. By retirement age (if you work your full adult life as a teacher) is up around 60k. I haven't landed the job I trained for or I'd be making more than I am now. And, I will only have (hopefully) 25-30 years of teaching by the time I retire. This summer I am at the bottom rank of pay scale for teaching staff as a teacher's assistant. Thanks for the links, Beth.

Linkat - I don't think your statement about good teachers is fair. I think there are a few bad ones, a few who don't care, and many who are good. Maybe my experience has just been lucky? However, your point is probably a good one - "you get what you pay" for includes supplies, technology, lower student to teacher ratios.....

Drew dad - There is a lot of construction that goes on in the cities around where I live - every summer there's more of it. Police detail or civilian, I almost never see the flagger doing any directing of traffic even when traffic isn't running smoothly. They are usually inside the cones, quite near the point of construction, with their arms folded across their chests. I have seen many on cell phones. I have seen many with their backs to traffic watching the construction.

But all that's not really the point. Other perks may be that teachers' work is much more consistent whereas flaggers may be called per job given them sporadic work? We do get a good retirement package, which they probably don't (who knows?)

Strangely enough I used to know a few teachers who worked as flaggers during the summer. Others drove public buses as temps while the regulars were on vacations. Some teach summer school, some take the summers off, but many take on seasonal jobs during their school "vacation".

I was also thinking health insurance.

I think part of the answer lies in how many people want to be teachers, and how many qualified teachers want to be flaggers. Right now, you are paying for the privilage of doing the work you more or less want to do. You are also paying a hefty premium for living in the area you find desirable.

it would be 15 years ago or more, i'm not sure of the teachers qualifications

The links for starting salaries in Canada is for 1st year grads with the standard B.A./B.Ed. combo.

Fifteen years ago, when I was working for an insurer that covered a lot of teachers' groups, a teacher with one Bachelors level degree was making in excess of $60,000 at the five year mark. With the B.A./B.Ed. combo, they were closer to $80,000. Dang good benefits too.

Health insurance, yes, another perk. But, we could also contrast flaggers to other unskilled labor or teachers to other educated labor.

Roger, how does the premium for where I live figure in?

Well, it doesn't. I was pointing out that our choices have costs. Economically, you might be best off living in Texarkana and holding a flag on a construction site.

Actually, I was too far off topic.

Oh! Another point. This 15.75/hour job I have comes with no benefits other than experience that might go on a resume and an air-conditioned workplace.

Two wild guesses --

1) Intrinsic rewards: Teaching children, watching them absorb information, and seeing them apply it in creative ways you hadn't thought about, can be immensely rewarding in itself. I can't think of any non-monetary reward for flagging that would be nearly as motivating. Perhaps the pay difference reflects the intrinsic rewards that teachers enjoy in their jobs and flaggers aren't enjoying in theirs.

2) More tangible benefits: If an accident happens on an inadequately flagged construction site, the victim can sue the constructor for damages. These damage payments are sizeable, prompt, and predictable from past legal precedents. The constructor can prevent these costs by hiring a flagger. The flaggers' union, in turn, can point to the prevented costs when they bargain for wages. By contrast, the damage done by inadequate teaching is hard to predict. It happens years after the teaching that caused it, is hard to trace back to any particular bad teacher once observed, and is hard to put a price tag on. That could make it hard to find the "right" wage for teachers.

All that said, I agree that teachers ought to be making more money, given their contribution to the general welfare.

They're probably part of a better union than you are.

Decades ago, when I started working in the social services I worked at an agency that had non-professional staff that was represented by the Teamsters. Guys who threw broken light bulbs into bins made more most of the professional staff. The upside, at the time, was that we got a lot of the same benefits the Teamsters had negotiated for their members - birthdays off, that sort of thing. Never underestimate the power of a 'good' union.

I think this is pretty much it. The natural way for value to be determined is through supply and demand working things out, but a "good" (and I use this term very loosely) union can inflate value in the right circumstances.

Dunno about the US, but here in Oz, workers having anything to do with constructing stuff have traditionally had very strong unions.

Not always the most honest and well behaved unions, but strong.

(The very famous BLF...Builders' Labourers' Federation....has a motto..."We don't get mad, we get even.")

I assume this is both because it costs a lot if something holds up progress, but also because the members have been ready to fight tooth and nail...they aren't wussy little folk like the people in MY union.


Also, sounds like a no-brainer sort of job, but actually also a pig of a one.....weather, long hours of standing, lots of exposure to toxins from passing cars......

I suspect they got up there financially (if that is the only job they do.....maybe they swap tasks?) with a successful history of pay claims where they were lumped in with a bunch of other construction workers.

One of my friends was the only female industrial officer/advocate with the TWU (Transport Workers' Union) which is the sibling union to the teamsters. She has many a tale to unfold!

The Teamsters old management, of course, got a long way by being criminal-like thugs. I don't know what it's like now.

But their traditional driving jobs are bloody nasty jobs (as I bet you know Beth, from the injury claims) with huge impact on their health, family life etc. I think they deserve good pay.

Mind you, environmentally and road carnage-wise, I'd like to see it all on trains, but I digress.


It can be irksome when you see folk on way more than you get for what seem trivial jobs....but would you want to do them?

I mean, my friend the plumber is a millionaire compared with me, but he does a job which has many disgusting aspects and is very hard on the body....and which has aspects which are extremely skilled. (I didn't mean plumbing was a seemingly trivial job, by the way.)

I don't mean it as a dig to teachers and their capabilities - however, I have heard of many high quality teachers that leave teaching because of pay and also lack of resources/and being unappreciated.