For Immediate Release: Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Contact: Phoebe Silag or Karen Conner, news@epi.org 202-775-8810

In The Teaching Penalty: An update through 2010, Economic Policy Institute (EPI) Research Associates Sylvia A. Allegretto and Sean P. Corcoran and EPI President Lawrence Mishel find that public elementary and secondary school teachers continue to be undercompensated relative to comparably-educated workers.  In 2010, public school teachers earned about 12% less in weekly salaries than comparable workers and 9% less in weekly compensation, including benefits.  The Teaching Penalty and the two studies it updates, How Does Teacher Pay Compare? and The Teaching Penalty: Teacher Pay Losing Ground, demonstrate that teachers face an economic disadvantage, and that this disadvantage has grown over the last five decades. The continuing pay penalty for teachers is an impediment to the important goal of recruiting and retaining higher-quality teachers.