Teachers earn too much? Really?

Well, that's the conclusion reached by a new study published by right-wing thinktank the American Enterprise Institute. To quote AEI: "We estimate that public school teachers receive total compensation roughly 50 percent higher than they would likely receive in private sector jobs." In fact, they conclude that teachers are "overcompensated by 52%."

Many researchers have weighed in to point up serious faults in the methodology of this study. One of them is Jordan Solomon of George Washington University, who attended the presentation of the study. You can find his comments on the methodology in Maureen Downey's "Get Schooled" column in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Solomon concluded: " When confronted by an employee for an association representing retired teachers, the presenters admitted that their goal from the outset was to demonstrate that the benefits for teachers were too high. It would appear that Heritage and AEI set out to produce a paper that allowed conservative governors to denigrate teachers and chastise their unions for the “high” salaries and cushy benefits paid to teachers." [Emphasis mine.] Who would have expected it?

Let's pause for a moment and examine pay vs performance in the private sector. Anyone remember Carly Fiorina? Fiorina was the Hewlett Packard CEO who was ousted by her board of directors after a record of failure. She walked away with a $42 million severance package, then ran for governor of California claiming her private sector experience as a "job creator" would put California back on its feet. Sadly, she neglected to mention that while at HP she laid off 18,000 workers. How's that for "pay for performance?"

John Merrow, education correspondent for the "PBS Newshour" writes in the NY Daily News--not usually a teacher-friendly venue--to point out some interesting facts concerning private sector pay and performance.

"The average teacher today earns about $55,000. At least 75 CEOs earn that much in one day, every day, 365 days a year. According to the AFL-CIO’s “Executive PayWatch,” the CEO who ranked No. 75, David Cote of Honeywell, was paid $20,154,012, for a daily rate of $55,216.47".

"Unlike wages for teachers, CEO salaries have been soaring in recent years. Forty years ago, the average public school teacher earned $49,000, adjusted for inflation. That’s a raise of a whopping $150 a year for 40 years, or about one quarter of 1% annually." [Emphasis mine.]

"[The pay for performance model] doesn’t seem to be true on Wall Street and in corporate boardrooms, where the pay of the CEO is often at odds with his company’s performance. Take Cisco’s John Chambers. The website 24/7 Wall Street ranks Chambers as America’s most overpaid CEO, based on his total compensation of $18,871,875 even as the price of Cisco common stock fell 31.4 %."

"In fairness, some teachers are overpaid, because they have “retired on the job” and are just going through the motions until they can retire for real. Of course, there’s a big difference between being overpaid at $55,000 and being overpaid at $20,500,000, which is what Carl Crawford of the Boston Red Sox earned for hitting .255 with just 11 home runs last season. Like the CEO of Honeywell, Crawford earns about $55,000 a day, every day, 365 days a year. "

Merrow points out one other difference: "Teachers spend their own money on supplies for their classrooms. That came to $1.33 billion in school year 2009-10, or $356 per teacher, according to the National School Supply & Equipment Association. I will wager several packs of colored pencils that Dauman, Cote and the other high earners do not drop by Staples to pick up office supplies for their secretaries."