Yes, in my opinion our values are out of whack. Not only pro-athletes (some are educated) but tv personalities make you point as well.

Keep in mind the top 100 teachers don’t make the millions and teachers become burned out from job related stress. In general, we have more free time now and people seem to value entertainment more than education (or religion as many pastors point out about church vs. sports/concerts attendance).

Teachers are simply not viewed or held in high regard as professionals in the way other professionals (surgeons for example)are — even by teachers themself and therein may be the problem. Look what we are willing to pay the medical profession. And back to sports, people are willing to pay $250 or more for a ticket to a pro game but complain when they pay taxes to provide for schools.

The situation is generational and created by free choices people make. We don’t want to change free choice, so I don’t have the answer to swaying values except for discussions such as this and maybe teachers teaching students to value life long learning or teachers standing up for themselves. Thanks for noticing.

BTW, if and when we value education more than entertainment, then teachers would not need to “tap dance” across the room or compete with entertainers in order to facilatate learning.

The first is the number of jobs. When you consider that if there are 12 people on an NBA team or 20 on an NHL team they are the best 360 or 600 people in the world at their respective sports. The best few hundred of anything in the world earn a lot.

Meanwhile there are a lot of people with degrees that become teachers. Math and science teachers earn slightly better than English and history since there are fewer of them showing a perfect example of supply and demand. Most people with the technical degrees go into industry where the pay is better (but the hours tend to be longer).

Another skewing factor for athletes is their short life span in their sport. You have people trying to earn a lifetime worth of money in 5 years. Not many people can play for 15 or 20 years either due to diminishing skills or injuries.

The last is people are willing to pay top dollar for entertainment but not so much for education. Private schools are expensive but they can keep the teacher’s salaries in check by offering just slightly better salaries than the public schools.

Is it fair? No. What can be done? Unfortunately, not much. Vote for tax issues that address education to try and funnel more money there but whether it gets to the teachers is another question.

People seem to want to watch football more than they want to watch people teach math.. until someone teachings math in a way better than watching football, logic says that the football player will make more money. You may think that he’s uneducated, but he seems to know something that math teacher hasn’t figured out yet.

One year contract for a pro b-ball player – 2.7 million

one year contract for a union backed teacher – 24,000.00