| > They do. The biggest clue is the difficulty in obtaining what the value of that benefits package is. Because you can't find the value of the benefits, that's a clue that it's excessive? Teacher pay and benefits are 100% public information. Your earlier claim that teacher health benefits in WA were $36,000 per year is patently absurd. An ACA exchange medical plan available to anyone costs under $500/mo with an annual out-of-pocket maximum of $6000. The state may pay $36,000/year for their benefits (but no, they don't, not even close), but even if that were true, if you're comparing it to market value, that's worth $12,000 at most to the teacher. > I find it amazing that one can retire comfortably at 42 if you're a schoolteacher. What other job in the private sector offers that? I shouldn't even have claimed that they can retire comfortably. Quoting from [1]: > For example, under a system with a 1.5 percent multiplier: A teacher retiring with a final average salary of $60,000 and 20 years of service would collect a pension of $18,000 annually. Now this is a nice perk if you start at age 42 and live another 40 years, but it's not a comfortable living. It's barely over the poverty line. It's unclear from this example if it's in a state that excludes Social Security benefits, but even if it doesn't exclude them, that's not a lot of money. From the same article: > Across the nation, teachers pay on average 16 percent of the plan premiums for individual coverage, lower than the 21 percent average for workers in private industry. But for family coverage, teachers pay a comparable portion of the premium to private-sector workers, according to 2017 data from the Labor Department. As I stated previously, most teachers already contribute to their health insurance, and as I stated above, the maximum value of that insurance is only $12,000. Feel free to explore further on your own. I'm tapping out. [1]: https://www.edweek.org/ew/issues/teacher-pay/index.html |
> Teacher pay and benefits are 100% public information
It's easy to find pay, but I haven't been able to find the cost of the benefits.
> I shouldn't even have claimed that they can retire comfortably.
I'd be interested if you can find any private pension plan that gives out anything at all starting at age 42 and going for the rest of their life (another 40 years). Even Social Security doesn't kick in until 62.
> most teachers already contribute to their health insurance
The figure of interest here is what does that cost the government to provide it?