As far as I can tell, the logic (or lack thereof) in the article linked above is that while teachers make 19.3% less than similarly educated peers, they actually make more because an education major is easier than mathematics or history.¹

I am not going to beat a dead horse, but what bothers me is that the authors, Biggs and Richwine, make their point by comparing teachers to the private sector.

First, this is empirically dubious. Biggs and Richwine are comparing a specific profession to the entirety of the private sector—from a few Wall Street tycoons to legions of burger flippers—and expecting to draw a meaningful conclusion. I can’t help but notice that the authors are willing to redefine their sampling of the private sector depending on what point they’re trying to make.

Secondly, as long as you’re bringing the private sector into this, let’s talk about the free market. If I recall my watered-down undergraduate education correctly, the free market is loosely based on supply and demand—if demand exceeds supply, costs rise.² If that’s the case, then this argument is moot. As long as teacher attrition remains an epidemic and teachers leave the thankless profession at a higher rate than we can toss young, energetic, and naïve souls at it, then teachers aren’t overpaid—it’s simply the free market at work, right?