The Glade 4.0

This week in New Haven, Conn., the local teachers union agreed, in a 21-1 vote, to changes widely resisted by unions elsewhere, including tough performance evaluations and fewer job protections for bad teachers.

Under pressure from the Education Department, the country's two powerful teachers unions, Ms. Weingarten's AFT and the larger National Education Association, are already budging in ways that were previously unthinkable. The two unions have a combined membership of 3.6 million employees.

The AFT recently issued a batch of innovation grants to districts that are tying teacher pay to performance -- a practice usually frowned upon by unions. The NEA is taking similar steps to encourage tougher evaluations and to loosen seniority systems, moves that Mr. Duncan called "monumental breakthroughs."

In New Haven, by contrast, all sides agreed on the new contract after months of closed-door negotiations. The deal allows the city to close its worst schools and bring in new management, though any new teachers would have to join the union. In exchange, the union got an average 3% raise each year for four years.

Overall, total compensation for state and local workers was $39.25 an hour — $11.90 more than in private business. In 2007, the gap in wages and benefits was $11.31.

The gap has been expanding because of the increasing value of public employee benefits. Last year, government benefits rose three times more than those in the private sector: up 69 cents an hour for civil servants, 23 cents for private workers.

Labor costs account for about half of state and local spending, according to BLS and Census data. Benefits consume a growing share of that, now 34%.

Jennifer Porcari of the American Federation of Teachers, a union representing 1.4 million educators and state employees, says BLS figures that show government employees earn higher wages are misleading because jobs aren't comparable. Government jobs, such as teaching, often require more education.

This report compiles information on the hourly pay of public school teachers nationally and in 66 metropolitan areas, as collected by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) in its annual National Compensation Survey. We also compare the reported hourly income of public school teachers with that of workers in similar professions, as defined by the BLS.

# According to the BLS, the average public school teacher in the United States earned $34.06 per hour in 2005.

# The average public school teacher was paid 36% more per hour than the average non-sales white-collar worker and 11% more than the average professional specialty and technical worker.

# 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.

# Compared with public school teachers, editors and reporters earn 24% less; architects, 11% less; psychologists, 9% less; chemists, 5% less; mechanical engineers, 6% less; and economists, 1% less.

# Compared with public school teachers, airplane pilots earn 186% more; physicians, 80% more; lawyers, 49% more; nuclear engineers, 17% more; actuaries, 9% more; and physicists, 3% more.

# Public school teachers are paid 61% more per hour than private school teachers, on average nationwide.

# The Detroit metropolitan area has the highest average public school teacher pay among metropolitan areas for which data are available, at $47.28 per hour, followed by the San Francisco metropolitan area at $46.70 per hour, and the New York metropolitan area at $45.79 per hour.

I would guess that the per-hour figure assumes that teachers are not punching a clock and only putting in thirty six hours a week during the school year. Most teachers I know put in significantly more than that in terms of grading papers, preping lesson plans and extracurriculars such as team/club sponsors, putting on plays, etc. not to mention keeping up with periodicals etc.

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.

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.

The new contract, approved by 81 percent of voting teachers, stipulates 17 furlough Fridays during which schools will be closed, with the first happening Oct. 23. The teachers accepted a concurrent pay reduction of about 8 percent, but teacher vacation, nine paid holidays and six teacher planning days are left untouched.

The new agreement also guarantees no layoffs for two years and postpones the implementation of random drug testing for teachers.

and postpones the implementation of random drug testing for teachers.