Teacher Wages & Retirement Reform : Production Equals Security

It seems a stretch to believe teachers, for the most part, aren't paid enough given they only work nine months of the year, and, for the most part, have good retirements. That they aren't compensated properly if they leave the system early isn't the fault of the districts, the individual can understand what the consequences are of their own personal decision when the take the job and when they leave.

It just seems that making the job to secure is not a good thing. I believe with the union influence that exists today making the teachers jobs so secure no matter how badly the fail, they guaranteed no to be fired. Everyone needs to believe they are not a permanent fixture in a job, such security only breeds contempt for the system and thereby low productivity.

Reforming Teacher Compensation
Source: Josh McGee and Marcus A. Winters, "Better Pay, Fairer Pensions: Reforming Teacher Compensation," Manhattan Institute, September 2013.
September 23, 2013

States across the nation have recently turned considerable attention to reforming retirement programs for public school teachers. Such efforts have been spurred by the widely recognized need to address the crisis of unfunded liabilities and the escalating annual payments that states must make to their teacher pension systems. But there is another compelling reason to consider reforming these systems: They work poorly for many teachers, particularly those who remain in the profession for less than the 30 years that is often required to become eligible for the maximum payout, say Josh McGee, vice president for the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, and Marcus Winters, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

From their analysis of compensation in the nation's 10 largest school districts, McGee and Winters find that two simple reforms -- neither of which would increase spending -- would allow school districts to:

• Raise teacher salaries, in some cases substantially;
• Give teachers more retirement security than they now have;
• Make teaching a more attractive option for people who are unsure that they will work for decades in the same school district; and
• Offer teachers more control over when they stop working.

What changes would allow schools to make teaching more attractive in these ways?

• First, districts should jettison their current approach to retirement benefits, in which teachers accrue relatively meager benefits through much of their careers, and then abruptly become eligible for much more as they near retirement age.
• In its place, districts should adopt retirement systems where benefits accrue smoothly, year after year, without sudden, arbitrary jumps late in a teacher's working life.
• Second, districts should increase the amount of teacher compensation that is paid directly as salary and reduce the amount of compensation that is devoted to retirement benefits in order to match the norm for similarly situated workers in the private sector.
• This reform would substantially increase teacher take-home pay in some school systems, while having only a marginal effect in others.