Teaching is one of the few professions that are treated like a trade. In few other professions does a union collectively bargain for pay and tie that to the number of years of experience. The rest of the professional world is paid by merit. The best programmers are paid the higher salaries (or get to work for cool companies). They’re rewarded for being good at what they do.
But the teaching profession doesn’t do this. Instead a graduate teacher’s salary is looked up on a negotiated union agreement and they’re paid whatever it says. OK, so they’re a graduate, who knows if they’re really any good at actual classroom teaching? But ludicrously, even after teaching for five, 10 or 20 years, salary is still paid according to tables.
