"however, they do get 3 months vacation every year, on top of holidays, so what an experienced teacher gets is a pretty nice hourly wage." which is unavoidable

"however, they do get 3 months vacation every year, on top of holidays, so what an experienced teacher gets is a pretty nice hourly wage." which is unavoidable, simply because we want them to be available again the following year. The alternative is to underpay them, and thereby force them to find other work during those 3 months and thus ensuring that: (a) they dont get a holiday - which will have a negative impact on their performance and (b) that any other job that does pay them a living wage for the whole year looks attractive to them - which will ensure that we have a high turnover, and have a negative impact on the education system as a whole. Also, my understand is that there frequently is work or various kinds that needs to be done during the summer months, so its not exactly a holiday for them. "If you want better people, yes, you need to pay more, but you must also be more selective. If you just pay more without being selective you will get more applicants, sure, but you will get a lot of mediocre and no-so-good applicants, as well." yes...? Im not sure how this is different from any other job? employers do need to be selective, that is true. "the problem is that teaching, right now, is 'employment of last resort' for many people. So you got yourself a liberal arts degree and have no marketable skills? go back to school for another year and you can become a teacher." right. assuming that this is true, the reason that it is 'employment of last resort' is because in many places the pay is barely adequate, and the working conditions are crap. if we offered a slightly more reasonable salary, and better working conditions we might find people are more enthusiastic about becoming teachers and see it more of a career than a stopgap. I would claim that an average salary of 55k/year is just barely enough to support a family on, the fact that in many other states the average teacher's salary is markedly lower is a bug, not a feature.