Okay. I see the math. I'm going to show why her math doesn't work.
She's looking at gross only. The top line. From that amount, she'll need to subtract overhead--that's facilities costs. How much does her building cost to rent? Probably a lot, because she only needs the one, big room. Say a storefront downtown. Renting means she doesn't have to pay for repairs and other maintenance costs...directly. How much does her power bill run? Her water/sewer bill? The trash bill? The gas bill for heating? Yeah, that's a ton more. Best figure the facilities cost will run around $200K. Maybe $250K. Minimum.
That leaves...somewhere between $127K and $77,600.
Cool. Now figure your janitor's wages. You're not getting one for less than $20K per year...and that's part time.
So. That pulls it down to $107-$57,600.
But wait! There's MORE!!!
This silly bitch be a public school teacher. Public schools provide breakfast and lunch on their dime for around half of the students. That involves food costs, and salaries for cooks!
There goes another $50K! Minimum! So...her share's shrinking. Hugely.
Okay. Let's assume she's not going to transport the little darlings herself, since that would leave her in the red. Let's look at...insurance. Insurance is going to eat probably another $30-50K/year.
Her take-home is going to be maybe $14K, if she's lucky, and has the brains to cut a LOT of deals. (Which, on balance, given her starting premise with no thought, I doubt she's capable of.)
Suddenly, that starting teachers' salary of $27-$37K is looking a whole lot better, isn't it?
I'm glad you wrote this post. It summarizes the distorted logic used to pander for more money to throw into the pit.
ReplyDelete..and another thing: Unless I'm clueless, I don't think any teacher ever was forced at gunpoint to pursue their major, completely ignore the consequences of their decision, and is completely surprised by the amount of money earned in the profession. I can feel for them, but just can't reach them.
ReplyDeleteIf they were surprised, they weren't listening. It is clearly stated that teacher salaries are...very low. Very, very low. Lower than unskilled factory work low. They're warned in intro to teacher ed, and in every year they hear it again in at least one class per semester.
DeleteI know. I took intro to teacher ed when I was thinking about teaching high school. Dumped the major like putrid leftovers as soon as I realized what it would demand of me (my time, patience I didn't have, and my common fucking sense turned off), and what it would give back (...maybe my student loans--which I didn't have any of--forgiven. If I was lucky. If I could get a job in the right/wrong district).