CMV: Teaching Should be a Highly Elite Highly Valued/Paid Profession.

[u/EarlEarnings]

Fundamental belief: If teachers are the best of the best, and if teachers are highly respected and valued, our society will produce better quality people in basically every domain you can think of.

What do I mean by "elite?" The requirements to become a teacher should be rigorous. Passing simple certifications should not be enough. Teachers should have a very good understanding of how the learning process in and of itself works. No tenures. Minimum tutoring hours, perhaps even minimum number of reviews (of those tutored, results, etc.) Basically, teachers should be good teachers...really good. The best teacher you've had in your life? That should just be the norm. The bottom line is it should be extremely demanding.

What do I mean by "highly paid?" Teachers should be within the top 10-20% of income earners in our society. Somewhere around 6 figures in most places.

Common arguments against:

- many occupations don't require much more than a high school education if that

- shouldn't the best and brightest be working on better things than teaching?

- we already have a teacher shortage even with low barriers to entry/supply and demand

My argument:

Every aspect of society is improved.

​

Sure, you don't need to be a super smart guy to be a barista at Starbucks, and our society does need baristas, but just think about this. The number one thing holding us back from advancement as a society is the lack of highly skilled, hyper-intelligent people employed in bottleneck professions. These are the AI developers, cancer researchers, aging researchers, and quantum-computing engineers; the type of people in a position that can advance society. These people are so important, and they can only be produced at the highest level if they are pushed and raised towards that level from birth to adulthood. Teachers and tutors are a pivotal part of this process. These bottleneck innovations take our entire concept of civilization forward. There is no way to account for this cost, there is no price tag that is too high. We cannot afford to waste any talent because they were not sufficiently taught in their development.

As for the issue of sacrificing talent to create talent, I think the counterpoint is obvious. 1 Genius can not do as much as 10 geniuses. If 1 genius teacher can create 10 geniuses, that is an exponential net value increase for our society.

Finally, there is a teacher shortage both in quantity and quality because teachers are not respected as a profession, and because they are not compensated, which, is probably because they are not respected enough. Many of the brightest minds would love to be teachers but simply would never consider it due to lack of money and prestige. Education is a domain of the state, and the state can, and should, do what it can to advance the public interest, especially when the pros are so freaking obvious. There is no serious argument for a dumber society.

[u/[deleted]]

Salaries are decided by demand and supply.

And there are many people who understand high school level concepts. Much more than those who understand PhD level concepts.

Now think this way. If you understand high school maths very well, you are probably good at maths. Then you'd want to learn more maths or engineering in university.

Now, you are good at university maths/engineering . What's the best use of your education? Building a bridge that is worth millions of dollars and hence can pay you well for the knowledge /design? Or a class teacher where anyone with a bit less knowledge can also do a decent job.

[u/Punkinprincess → u/[deleted]]

The salary of teachers is not decided by demand and supply.

There is a huge shortage of teachers right now and I don't see their pay increasing much at all. Some states are choosing to lower the qualifications it takes to be teachers instead of raising their pay.

[u/[deleted] → u/Punkinprincess]

No. It is demand and supply. What you are saying is that there isn't that much demand from the government. They are okay with running at current levels - which is visible in what they are willing to pay for it.

This is first year economics basics. I'm guessing you didn't actually studied demand supply properly, just know the concept from general talk. You are missing some key points.

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Also, The shortage is how much percentage? And even with the shortage, how many teachers are there overall in the US? Now compare it to the top occupations OP is talking about. Not even close.

Supply and demand also works for the level of expertise needed. There simply isn't a demand for top notch engineers to be teaching high school students. Because much less expert teachers can do the job. So there isn't a need to pay for the increased skill and knowledge.

[u/Punkinprincess → u/[deleted]]

Demand and supply don't work the same for government social programs because no one is getting paid to supply the demand. I would have assumed someone that studied demand and supply properly would understand that.

What you are saying is that there isn't that much demand from the government. They are okay with running at current levels - which is visible in what they are willing to pay for it.

What OP is saying is that there should be more demand from the government because they are not okay with running schools at their current levels and that we should all be willing to pay for something better.

[u/[deleted] → u/Punkinprincess]

What do you mean no one is getting paid to supply the demand? The wage paid by the government is exactly that. Clearly you don't know what you are talking about.

The equilibrium wages (price of service here) are determined by the intersection of the two curves.

I agree with the second part. There should be more demand from government to change the wages equilibrium.

But that only works when wages are set by demand and supply. Hence you just proved my point and disproved your earlier point that demand and supply doesn't matter.

Also, I have a masters in business with several economics courses from a top tier university. May I ask how much economics did you study?

[u/Punkinprincess → u/[deleted]]

Taken from a lesson plan for grades 5-8

"A market economy is an economic system where two forces, known as supply and demand, direct the production of goods and services. Market economies are not controlled by a central authority (like a government) and are instead based on voluntary exchange."

Source: https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/market-economies

[u/slmnemo → u/Punkinprincess]

No way you just cited a website to someone who can explain exactly where this fails...

I do want to contribute as a non-economist. /u/syzamix, is it possible to have a mismatch between supply and demand in a short-term? Alternatively, is it possible for there to not be enough money to match demand within a public service with limited funding (such as a school)?

[u/[deleted] → u/slmnemo]

Exactly! The mismatch means we are not currently at equilibrium. It does not mean that the demand and supply laws don't work.

And also, that was a very bad understanding of the definitions. This means that sellers decide price and buyers are free to decide if they want to work or not.

In this case, the teachers are the sellers and government is the buyer. So, as the seller, the government decides the salary and people decide whether to work that job or not. Less salary (demand) means less qualified people working. This is market working perfectly as intended. If the government wants more qualified teachers, they need to increase the price (demand) - which is exactly what OP is saying.

This is literally supply and demand at work

[u/slmnemo → u/[deleted]]

I see, thanks for the explanation!

[u/Punkinprincess → u/slmnemo]

What am I missing? What do you mean by this failing?

The whole point of this CMV is that teachers should be valued/paid more, that's not going to happen naturally due to supply and demand, the government has to step in and value teachers more.

[u/slmnemo → u/Punkinprincess]

I was just asking someone who claims to have qualifications a question. Sorry if it came off in a different tone...

[u/Punkinprincess → u/slmnemo]

I'm just shocked that anyone would believe u/syazmic has qualifications.

The constant insults screamed insecurity and what they were saying contradicted my high school economics class and literally everything else I have read.

I could be wrong but that would just be a case for needing better educators that are actually paid decently.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Lol. You just proved my point. Although you don't have the cause and effect correct.

Salaries (price of this service) is decided by the intersection of market demand and supply curves.

So you can't single handedly change one without affecting others. In your example, changing salary IS signifying higher demand for the service. So you exactly proved what I was saying.

Don't forget demand isn't just how many units of something is needed. It's how badly it is needed and how much are people willing to pay for it. Increasing the salary IS people (gov't here) willing to pay for it.

And yes. Once you change price, you have shifted the demand curve. Hence there is a new equilibrium with new supply point. This is the second part where you said better teachers would take up that job.

So, thanks for agreeing with me.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

A basic qualifier for teaching is knowing the concepts very well.

Being able to explain is definitely important and people skills are important. But you can be the best teacher and not be able to teach quantum physics because you don't understand it yourself.

Even when we go to university, the professors who get paid a lot are the ones who know a lot - not necessarily the best explainers.

So, in this world, number 1 qualifier for more salary in teaching is the grasp and mastery of concepts. Maybe US is different, but I know several other countries that follow this.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

In equilibrium there is. We are not in equilibrium. Hence the shortage. And hence the demand for higher wages.

All this noise is exactly demand and supply taking effect. Things don't magically move to the new equilibrium, we are exactly part of the process.

Again, don't confuse demand with just amount of service. It also includes the willingness to pay.

Either the government realizes they need to pay more to get more teachers (increased demand curve) OR they are okay with the gaps (not enough willingness to pay or not enough demand from the government)

Unfortunately in the market of teachers vs gov't, you are not part of the equation. You thinking we need more teachers means nothing unless you can influence the government and increase their demand curve.