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Comment by auctiontheory | Hacker News Reader

Maybe it depends where you live. Here in the San Francisco Bay Area, teachers do not make a middle-class wage, by any reasonable definition of "middle class." Is that what we want?

Your second paragraph seems to make some kind of fairness or economic efficiency argument about teachers. Why not ask a question about society? If the best people (for the most part) weigh the pros and cons and decide they want to own a home and have two kids, and therefore choose a non-teaching career, is that best for society?

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A high school teacher in SF can expect to make 58k a year(1). Median household income in SF 71k a year(2).

Now that's 13k lower but that's only one salary when many household's have two and, as the top commenter says, 9 months instead of 12. Plenty of teachers pick up some extra cash over the summer.

Sounds pretty middle class to me.

1. http://www.indeed.com/salary/q-High-School-Teacher-l-San-Fra...

2. http://www.bayareacensus.ca.gov/counties/SanFranciscoCounty....

My guess is that you don't live in SF. ONE-bedroom apartments are renting for $2500 and up. (Multiply that by 12.) Very average places, not luxury apartments. And that rent may not include a $200-300 parking spot.

My definition of "middle-class" includes being able to buy a house and have two kids. You'd have a hard time doing that in SF on 58K, even given your assumptions about a spouse and summer cash.

http://www.zillow.com/local-info/CA-San-Francisco-home-value...

And in the end, society loses.

My definition of middle class is those people making around the median (or middle) wage.

Yours is interesting too though!

Most middle-class people who work in San Francisco don't live in San Francisco.

> My definition of "middle-class" includes being able to buy a house and have two kids.

Any definition of "middle class" that excludes median-income households is non-sensible.

Living in San Francisco is a luxury. Middle class people do not buy a house and have two kids in San Francisco. They commute from Oakland or some place with cheaper housing.

So it sucks to be middle class in SF.

This reminds me of those articles right after the 2008 crash, where some NY-Fi worker accustomed to 500k bonuses would explain how they were suffering --- at 300k/yr --- every bit as much as an underemployed Youngstown former- auto worker, if you just took into account how expensive private pre-school, nannies, housekeepers, and a decent Manhattan apartment are.

Those NY-Fi people also saw themselves as solidly middle class.

You're definition of middle class isn't what middle class actually is. It actually is some range around the median income. I'm a software developer, and I have neither the ability or desire to spend 2500 a month on a one bedroom apartment. You are pointing out issues with San Francisco. They have nothing to do with teachers.

My friend is a high school teacher and her husband is a civil engineer in Albany. They make about $150K total. ($65K+$85K) They have two kids and I'd say they are pretty middle class. They seem to have a lot more feeling of security than most of the software engineers in the area, even though the engineers have higher wages. Their house is a lot smaller than it would be if they lived somewhere like Minnesota, though.

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