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Guest Commentary April 18, 2002
Give Our Teachers a Tax Cut
The Honorable Zell Miller
The Latin phrase "alma mater" means "nourishing mother." That is a pretty good description of what our schools should be for our children.
Within those schools, all education starts with the teacher standing at the head of the child's classroom. Teachers are the world's most noble creatures, engaged in the world's most noble profession. Teachers are the architects who guide and shape the building of young lives. Teachers are the ones who call forth the best from our children and inspire them to reach new heights. Teachers, I think we would all agree, are the key ingredient to improving education.
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So if we are to build a first class education system in this country, we must be able to attract and hold on to good teachers. Right now, we are losing that battle. We are losing that fight badly.
Last year we set a new standard in Federal aid for education with the passage of President Bush's far-reaching education reform bill. But while we have made big strides in Federal funding for education, we still have not touched teacher salaries at the Federal level.
I would argue that teacher pay is the most important area of all education. Yet our teachers work in sometimes deplorable conditions and for little pay. Public school teachers in America today make an average of $43,335 a year. One would assume that about half of the States have teacher salaries above the national average and the other half have teacher salaries below that level. But actually, only 12 States, plus the District of Columbia, have salaries that are higher than the national average. The other 38 States are below the national average. In fact, the dollar gap between the lowest and the highest average salaries varies greatly from a low of $30,265 in South Dakota to a high of $53,281 in New Jersey.
Sadly, our teachers have even lost financial ground over the past few years. In the past decade, teacher salaries rose only one-half of 1 percent when inflation is taken into account. In many States, teachers actually lost ground to inflation.
Today in this Nation, teacher salaries account for a smaller proportion of total education spending than they did 40 years ago. In 1960, the average education expenditure devoted to teacher salaries was 51 percent. Today it is 36.7 percent, the lowest percentage since records have been kept.
As a result, many of the best and brightest of our young people today steer away from the classrooms to join the ranks of better paying professions. It has become clear that unless we in Congress take some drastic action, and take it soon, this disparity will only get worse because on the horizon ominous storm clouds loom darkly. We must hire 2 million more teachers in the next decade to keep up with new students who are entering our schools. Where are we going to get all those new teachers? Where?
Enrollment at our colleges of education is down 30 percent. Among those who are willing to try teaching, 40 percent leave the profession before the end of their fifth year. In some States, almost 20 percent leave after just 1 year. Most, of course, leave to pursue better paying careers. And who can blame them? It is a hollow message when we constantly tell our teachers how invaluable they are and then pay them so little.
What can we do, and what can we do quickly, to stop this brain drain from our schools? How can we make teaching more competitive with better paying professionals? I will tell you how we could have an immediate effect. Let our teachers keep more of their hard-earned money.
I will be introducing a bill to give our teachers an immediate pay raise in the form of a tax cut. Simply put, teachers would keep more money in their pocket each payday and send less of it to the IRS. They need this money back home more than we need it up here. And I guarantee you they will spend it more wisely than we will. Hard-earned money always goes further in a household than it does in a rathole. I call it the Thank You Teachers Tax Cut. Here is how it would work.
It would include every full-time teacher, public and private, in every prekindergarten and K through 12 classroom. This tax cut would start immediately and would increase the longer the teacher stayed in the classroom.
Teachers with fewer than 5 years in the classroom, about 900,000 teachers, would get a tax cut equal to one-third of their Federal income tax. Teachers with 5 to 10 years of experience, also about 900,000 teachers, would get to keep two-thirds of what they would normally pay in Federal income tax. Teachers with more than 10 years' experience -- about 1.8 million teachers -- would have no Federal income tax at all for as long as they stayed in the classroom.
The Thank You Teachers Tax Cut would mean immediate pay raises of between 5 and 15 percent. It would put more money into teachers' pockets each and every payday. It would immediately give some equity to this noble profession. But it would be more than just more money. It would be a tangible show of our respect and our gratitude to this profession that is all too often taken for granted.
So it would be a huge tax cut, more than $16 billion a year at a minimum -- probably more, according to my very rough math. But when we are talking about a projected budget for 2003 of $2.085 trillion, $16 billion is not even 1 percent of that budget. Don't tell me we cannot tighten our belt that little to help our teachers.
We all know our teachers are not paid adequately. They are not in my State and they are not in your State. Some need more help than others. Mississippi has the lowest average salary for teachers in the South and South Dakota has the lowest paid teachers in the Nation. ...
I also think our Nation's Governors would like this proposal for two reasons: First, it does not interfere with the States' rights to set teacher salaries. But it does boost the bottom line for every State's teachers, and that is what is important.
Our Governors will also like it because today, and especially in the next few years, that Pacman called Medicaid is going to gobble up State revenues as never before. I warn you, that will leave a much smaller pot of money available at the State level for teacher pay raises.
I realize there are shortages in other important professions that have low salaries and bad working conditions, and I have great sympathy for those workers, too. But the long-term security of this Nation is wrapped up in our schools, and that is why this tax cut for teachers is such an important one now.
This tax cut is a chance to really help our children by making sure we put good teachers in their classrooms and keep them there. It is also a chance to help our deserving teachers. It is the fastest, surest way to put more money into their pockets immediately.
Finally, this is a chance for the Senate, for the entire Congress, to say thank you to our teachers.
Zell Miller, a Democrat, is a U.S. Senator from Georgia. The above commentary has been adapted from a speech Sen. Miller delivered on the floor of the Senate, April 17, 2002. To contact him, Click Here.
The above column has been distributed by PoliticsOL.com.
