Survey: Teachers Deserve Higher Pay
Teaching
is a prestigious profession, but
teachers are not paid as much as they deserve.
Those
are the findings of a recent Harris Poll in
which three out of five respondents (60 percent) said teachers are not
paid
enough, even though they have prestigious jobs.
A
slightly smaller number of people said they believe that
the teachers in their local areas are underpaid (54 percent) and a
little more
than half (51 percent) said they believe their local school systems are
underfunded. The
percentage of respondents who said teachers in their areas are underpaid is
up 8
percent from the last time Harris surveyed people on the topic three
years ago.
In 2012, 46 percent of people said they thought teachers in their areas were
underpaid.
Harris
surveyed more than 2,200 people online on
their sentiments about spending on education during the week of July 15.
In
the survey, those who said they were Democrats
were more likely to say teachers are underpaid than Republicans or
independents. Of those claiming they were Democrats, 71 percent
said
teachers deserved higher salaries while just under half who said they
were
Republicans (49 percent) and 58 percent who claimed they were
independents said
the same thing.
Those
respondents who lived in the south were
more likely to believe teachers deserved higher salaries (57 percent).
Meanwhile, 42 percent of respondents who lived in the east said the
same thing.
Fifty-three percent of westerners and 51 percent of midwesterners
told surveyors they thought their
teachers should receive higher salaries.
About the Author
Michael Hart is a Los Angeles-based freelance writer and the former executive editor of THE Journal.