BRAVE AND COURAGEOUS TEACHERS

In the tragedies in Newtown, Connecticut, and in Moore, Oklahoma, teachers with children in their care demonstrated great courage and bravery in protecting their students, at times with their own bodies.  Yet here in the richest country in the world, we are less than generous in the wages we pay teachers, despite the fact that educators in the US spend more hours teaching than those in many other countries. 

American teachers spend on average 1,080 hours teaching each year. Across the O.E.C.D., the average is 794 hours on primary education, 709 hours on lower secondary education, and 653 hours on upper secondary education general programs.
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American teachers’ pay is more middling. The average public primary-school teacher who has worked 15 years and has received the minimum amount of training, for example, earns $43,633, compared to the O.E.C.D. average of $39,007.

Why?

See the charts at the link.