This is the clashing of two different life paths ideologies' e.g. the union/public service employee. Of course people will have opinions on this, because they

This is the clashing of two different life paths ideologies' e.g. the union/public service employee. Of course people will have opinions on this, because they will be somewhat resentful of those on the other side. The elephant in the room is that say you have $2MM in the bank and are living off that interest, or are a retired union/public service worker and then you look at how long it took at how long it took to achieve your financial success. If you save 1/2 of salary in VTI (say 100k-150k range) coming out of a bachelors degree and work for 10-15 years at one of the large tech companies you will have 1.5-2MM USD, which is easily enough to retire on. And you'll be like 32-37years old and still be able to climb Mt. Everest, hike the PCT or AT and probably still have your health. However if you are a teacher starting out in California, that would be a 44-50k year range https://www.cde.ca.gov/fg/fr/sa/cefavgsalaries.asp https://www.cde.ca.gov/fg/fr/sa/cefavgsalaries.asp which yes is really low. Then you work for 40 years and hopefully are able to make enough pension contributions to be able to retire at age 62 and have a decent pension of that 5-6k/mo. By this time lots of people are starting to have health issues and will not be able to go on the adventures that a 32-37y/o would be able to. Also you kinda have to work an extra 30 years. TL;DR: Incentive structure for being a teacher is not really there, also benefits are not really there. Maybe Scandinavian countries have a better compensation and work life balance? Incentive to work in tech industry or similar high-paying jobs is there, as financial independence is readily obtainable within 10-15 years.