Saturday, January 23, 2010

American Salaries Department


It's my understanding that the average school teacher salary in the US is $40,000 (+ or -). Then there is TV personality Conan O'Brien who was just given 1,000 times! that much just to sit down and shut up (pronounced Forty Million Dollars, + or -).

There's a lesson in there somewhere, but I don't think it's a good one.

13 comments:

Jennie said...

The lesson is that Conan should have gotten tenure.

unatiche

Evil Twin's Wife said...

Sad... and think about the pro athletes salaries and all they do is get themselves in trouble!

Senorita said...

Perhaps I should become so incredible annoying, that people pay me $40 million to sit down and shut up.

Okay, maybe not 40 million but I am willing to negotiate.

Senorita said...

Oh, and I keep forgetting to thank you for sending me the book. I got it a couple of weeks ago and I'm slowly reading it.

J said...

Ok.Do not get me started on education and teachers, etc etc etc... all of the celebrity salaries notwithstanding... There is a historical reason why the value of teachers and teaching has been on the decline since about the industrial revolution. In fact, if you look at the history of our education system which rose out of the agricultural era, we haven't done much revamping considering we are now more industrial than agricultural - espsecially given the technological advances which allow about, oh... 12 major farms in the US feed not only the the US population but about half the world... very complicated.

Laura said...

I couldn't agree with you more, Paul, especially having once been a teacher myself. And I've noticed similar things about other professions. I was interested in becoming a physicist at one time, but realized that field is also declining.

Cliff said...

I would agree Paul. However there must be about 25% of the teachers who are getting paid too much according to their abilities.
Their money should be given to the top 25%.
It's societal, we're all supposed to be equal no matter our ability.
btw, I just can't bring myself to watch late night talk shows. Especially Letterman.

Ileana said...

Makes no sense at all...but neither do the figures they pay pro athletes (although I wouldn't complain if they paid my little man big bucks for playing hockey one day).

cassie-b said...

Someone's got their reward priorities screwed up. We put our children into the hands of a teacher.

Ralph said...

Teachers deserve a lot of credit without a doubt. But, there are also a lot of "blue collar" profession that work hard and get paid a whole lot less than $40,000,000 and what pro athletes make. Someone wants to give me six million I'll run across the field and hit someone. Then when I got out of the hospital I'd enjoy spending the money.
Ralph

Sparroweye said...

Amen The gap widens.

j said...

Oh shoot Paul! That's one way to look at it LOL!

kc bob said...

Maybe one moral of the story is that life is not fair and lawyers rule :)

Look forward to meeting you next month at HACWN :)