Teacher's Salary Increase Possible

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by John Doe

Here is the median total incomes in Canada in 2013 (the most recent data I could find):

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/tables-tabl...il108a-eng.htm

Here is a list of salaries of teachers in Canada in 2013:

http://www.bctf.ca/uploadedfiles/pub...13-14brief.pdf

There are 4 lists, each comparing minimum and maximum salaries of teachers in two different categories. If you rank the teachers' salaries in respect to the median incomes for each province (e.g.: Alberta minimum salary of Category 5 teacher ($61,333)/Median Alberta Income ($97,390) = 63.0%), Alberta teachers rank 9th out of 10 in 3 of the lists and 10th in the other (note: I didn't include the Territories).

Yes, Alberta teachers make more money than teachers do in any of the other provinces. However, they make less compared to the rest of the citizens of the province than do most of the other teachers in Canada. If you want to bitch about how much teachers in Alberta make then you should be prepared to bitch about how much everyone else in Alberta makes too.

Hang on, the first table is household income. That doesn't seem a fair figure to measure against an individual teacher's salary. This table shows the median individual income in Alberta is $40,400. That means even the minimum salary of a new teacher in Alberta is 50 per cent higher than the the median individual income in the province, and a teacher with 10 years of experience earns two-and-a-half times the median income.

[JohnnyB]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Maybe you can explain the relevance because I don't see it.

Its equivalent to a 7-11 clerk bitching that he's underpaid because a welder makes 5 times as much as him.

The comparison of teachers across the provinces is pretty relevant.

It's true of all sorts of industries that salary depends on location even when the work is the same. Location is a significant factor.

I imagine most people in Canada, whether welders, engineers, teachers or anything else would be very unhappy to compete on an average salary basis with others doing equivalent work around the world. Lots of jobs have already been lost due to that. Salary is not an expression of the fundamental value of the individual's abilities so much as it is an expression of value relative to location. That's true for everyone.

[para transit fellow]

Originally Posted by automaton 3

Not a criticism but my teacher friends seem to live in a bit of a bubble on some issues. They associate with other teachers in large part, and I believe it becomes an echo chamber.

I think this observation applies to many career groups. Not just teachers but oil patch, non-profit, Finance, law, medicine, etc.

All tend to rely on the same bubble of thought and don't always get exposure to different perspectives.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by John Doe

If you want to bitch about how much teachers in Alberta make then you should be prepared to bitch about how much everyone else in Alberta makes too.

The market is in the process of adjusting the average compensation in Alberta right now.

[John Doe]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Hang on, the first table is household income. That doesn't seem a fair figure to measure against an individual teacher's salary. This table shows the median individual income in Alberta is $40,400. That means even the minimum salary of a new teacher in Alberta is 50 per cent higher than the the median individual income in the province, and a teacher with 10 years of experience earns two-and-a-half times the median income.

Fair enough, but do you think that the ranking of percentage of income as compared to others in their provinces will be any better?

And beside that, the table takes the median income of every Albertan, including children. Over a third of the people listed in the table make less than $25000. If you are including every man, woman and child, then frankly I am shocked that the minimum salary of someone who has completed a degree with a minimum of 4 years of university is ONLY 50% higher than the median individual income in the province, especially when you take into account that in 2013 Alberta had the lowest minimum wage in Canada.

[John Doe]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Maybe you can explain the relevance because I don't see it.

Its equivalent to a 7-11 clerk bitching that he's underpaid because a welder makes 5 times as much as him.

The comparison of teachers across the provinces is pretty relevant.

It is relevant because you are competing for those people. If the market in the rest of Canada says that, for example, teachers make the same as plumbers, then if plumbers make more than teachers in Alberta the plumbing profession will attract more and better people while the teaching profession will attract less attractive employees. In your example, a job as a welder would be much more attractive than a job as a 7-11 clerk and would therefore attract more able employees.

Another example was discussed earlier in this thread. It was that if the other professions pay better than teachers in Alberta as opposed to other provinces, then teachers will have not be able to afford the same kind of houses that they could in the rest of Canada.

I read somewhere that some of the best places in the world to teach are in S.E. Asia. The pay is a fraction of what it is here, but with the low cost of living you are able to save more money from your income than you are in other places, including here.

[Major Major]

Originally Posted by TheAlpineOracle

No the problem is that everyone can name a friend or two that went into teaching for all the wrong reasons, and they are part of a system with no accountability which has the potential to create a train wreck as a result.

I think it's more prevalent today then it was in the past, and I think it's magnified in Alberta, because let's be honest, our school system is full of quite a few people that weren't the pick of the litter coming out of University. Couldn't get jobs in their home Provinces, and moved out here only as a last resort.

That's getting away from my point though, which is that teacher's don't do themselves any favours in the court of public opinion by the comments they make and their constant griping. Everyone else is faces the same pressures they do in every other profession, it just manifests itself in different forms.

One of the most idiotic arguments I hear frequently from teachers/nurses/AHS is that they shouldn't be subject to any rollback or any type of cuts while the private sector suffers because they've never benefited from oil and gas sector like the private sector has. Are they friggen' serious? They are the highest paid in the country. My wife makes probably 30K a year more here than she would in the Maritimes, and 20K more than she would in Ontario.

Again, it seems that the people you consort with are quite simple. As a highly competent teacher with 2 degrees who does not work for the Union nor is protected in any way by it, I too dislike free riding loafs that drag down the system. But my work environment is such that I don't really ever see them. I hear stories though...

Anyhow, if your salary terms were laid out by a collectively bargained and legally binding contract, you would decide to donate $20,000 to the government? I'm just curious since it seems there is sentiment in this thread that people should do that. I'm even open to a market based adjustment based on some contingencies, but it is not on teachers to headman and frankly I think that there is derision in this thread based on anecdotal or even made-up narratives.

[chemgear]

http://calgaryherald.com/news/local-...-workers-wages

Union blasts councillor's call to freeze city workers' wages

Ward 1 Coun. Ward Sutherland’s push to halt pay raises for city employees beginning in 2018 to ensure a property tax freeze shows bad faith toward labour, said CUPE Local 38 President Peter Marsden.
And he said unlike normally lucratively paid oilpatch workers who are now suffering, public servants have traded higher pay for job security.

If unions were held to a wage freeze for two to three years, the city could afford to hold the line on any property tax hike, he said.