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$100K for a 4 year degree is a cheap school now. Take a look at college ROI charts. Top schools can easily hit people with a bill over $200K today.

But that does show up as a problem, and no, it's not just a lack of Amish representation.
Which is why efforts are made to remedy that.

What problem? The one that the article falsely claims? TFA starts with a false premise, and then repeats a fabricated statistic as propaganda. Here is a link to a set of data that disagrees with the idea that women make less money than men. I'm not claiming that there are no differences, but the differences are minor. It's not .77c on the dollar as people try and claim for propaganda, reality says it's much much closer. Sure, we can always improve but if the 'problem' is distorted then the solution will also be distorted.

You are arguing that a person should not have a choice because your liberal viewpoint is that everything should be equal all the time. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Utopia does not exist and people won't do something simply because -you- and people of a similar belief want them to. Many times, the forcing of behavior has the opposite effect in fact (basic psychology, read a book). Further, society can't function if everyone is in a technical field. We need doctors, plumbers, welders, farmers, and many people want to perform those roles in society and not be pigeon holed into what -you- want them to do.

Ask the basic required questions, and these would be true for any claim of bias or discrimination (gender, race, religion):

1. Do the people have the same opportunities to education? I'm pretty sure we can state that the system is pretty fair, not perfect, but fair. If they have the same opportunities for education then they could get into the same line of work if they so choose unless there are barriers to entry in the field. This is why we have so many women doctors, pharmacists, lawyers, etc..

2. Do they have opportunity for employment? I work with a lot of women programmers, most of them are originally from China and Russia, so you would have to show me proof that there are entry barriers to employment for women. If you have knowledge and skill, you get jobs even if your English is not so good and you may have difficulty in communicating.

3. Does society discourage them from working in these fields? Again, you need to show me proof that this is happening. I have not seen any advertising or articles talking about how poor a specific gender, race, or religion is in any field since I was a kid. Anything that would even hint at a bias today would end up in court extremely quickly. I'm sure you could dig up a company that was found guilty of discrimination in recent times, but that company would be an anomaly and not a 'normal' company with what society considered acceptable practice.

If those questions are answered "yes", "yes", and "no", then it's possible that people are just choosing not to do certain jobs. Why not let them make up their minds about their careers instead of trying to force them to be what you want them to be? What I find very ironic is that most people will tell you today that if you want to make an excellent living, you go into welding or plumbing because there are real shortages there. But that's not what -you- want them to do.

Sorry, but someone has to call BS so here we go.

First, presuming you are living in the 2000s and not a time traveler recent data suggests the average working woman makes 23% less than the average man. This DOES NOT try to control for any factors. When you control for factors even AAUW can only find at best a 7% difference. Some reports show the difference as low as 4.3%. Is there a detectable difference in pay between the sexes? Yes, but just barely. Obviously, as people have a hard time understanding these numbers, "Math is hard" is probably a real thing.

Second, the rest of your argument is not a complete lie so I have no problem with it. The argument, and studies, about how much is nature and how much is nurture have been going on for a really long time so there is probably substantial truth in both positions. That being said in the US the 'Tom Boy' description is a great example of how your 'freak if they don't conform to the pink unicorn princess culture' is a bit over exaggerated. (As a side note did you know that pink used to be a masculine color it wasn't till the early 1900s that it was considered feminine).

And here are some things to read if you wish to educate yourself.
http://freakonomics.com/2010/01/28/superfreakonomics-book-club-goldin-and-katz-on-the-male-female-wage-gap/
http://www.payscale.com/data-packages/gender-wage-gap
http://www.aauw.org/what-we-do/public-policy/aauw-issues/gender-pay-gap/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christina-hoff-sommers/wage-gap_b_2073804.html

Median salary of a Computer Technical Support Specialist: $42,646
Median salary of a Plumber: $45,347

And, unlike in IT, plumbers usually get THANKED when they fix a problem and do it well.

Median salary of a Computer Technical Support Specialist: $42,646
Median salary of a Plumber: $45,347

And, unlike in IT, plumbers usually get THANKED when they fix a problem and do it well.

The median salary for a postdoctoral cell biologist is slightly higher than the median for a truck driver, but not as much as I would expect.

My point, though, is that to take someone whose IQ is in the top .01% of the bell curve and put him to work driving a truck is a shocking waste of talent.

Yes, this is just results from a google search.. and admittedly are confusing..

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/People_with_Jobs_as_Physicians_%2F_Doctors/Salary
says GP makes an average of $125,568.

http://www.healthcare-salaries.com/physicians/medical-doctor-salary-md
gives two different salaries in different paragraphs -- $186044, and

An entry level CPA might earn $45k, but realistically, they'll probably intern for less (maybe $25k).http://blogs.payscale.com/salary_report_kris_cowan/2010/04/cpa-salaries.html

To be a CPA you need a degree, two years of supervised experience, years of additional training in accounting (given the requirement for work experience, school+work could take you 5-10 years) and then you need to pass the exam. http://www.calcpa.org/Content/licensure/requirements.aspx

After all that. Then you're an entry level accountant and not just a bookkeeper.

Any job which has a desigation requirement with work experience means you'll be abused for years as an intern. Your bosses know that without the work experience, you'll never get your papers to get a real job.

Accountants are paid crap.

That's enough for about 7 NZ developers.

Using Google to say $500k USD is $600k NZD and NZD $80k for a Software Engineer in New Zealand.

Possibly. But encryption is needed for internet commerce, which is worth $684B in the US. If there is anything that talks louder than the military, it's money.

Sorry, but that example doesn't work because it's a postdoc position, not a permanent job. You can't use postdoc salaries as indicative of anything, if that's your point. Postdocs are to PhDs what internists are to MDs. They typically pay around $50-60k, and the person taking the position is doing it to prepare for a career as a professor. It's like an advanced version of PhD that is shorter (typically 2ish years) and where they pay you a little better.

I'd imagine that a person who takes that job for 2 years and kicks ass at it will start near $100k or so, if they choose to go to industry, or a lot less in academia.

Some stats you might find more palatable: http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Degree=Doctorate_(PhD),_Computer_Science_(CS)/Salary

Apparently, you're right if you count only the salary, in which case a CEO makes roughly 90 times the worker salary. If you include all income, it is close to 500 times the worker salary. Sorry, but I don't see how this can be justified in terms of productivity or management skills or whatever.

In 1970, CEO salary and bonus packages were typically about $700,000 - 25 times the average production worker salary; by 2000, CEO salaries had jumped to almost $2.2 million on average, 90 times the average salary of a worker, according to a 2004 study on CEO pay by Kevin J. Murphy and Jan Zabojnik. Toss in stock options and other benefits, and the salary of a CEO is nearly 500 times the average worker salary, the study says.

From here

I'll take your links, with a single person sharing their salary and post from PayScale which has 12! Salary for McDonald's Corporation Employees - Australia

The link you posted was likely a manager of a store, not one of the kids on front which would earn roughly the same as you do in the US so no, we don't earn twice as much as you guys so our games should not be twice the price.

Wow, I thought the skill involved in assembling surface-mount boards would be worth more than 7 pounds an hour. How much would I get paid for stacking shelves in a UK supermarket?

Very slightly less -- £6.75 is the first figure I've found. (Right after a write-up of graduate work as a petrol station checkout assistant ...)

http://www.payscale.com/research/UK/Employer=Tesco_PLC/Hourly_Rate

When I was 18, in 2004, I was paid about £7/hour for cleaning a factory (mopping up oil from around machines). That was completely unskilled -- they just checked I understood what the safety signs meant (which is easy in Europe, they're all pictograms) and gave me a mop. I asked the employment agency why that was better paid than the £5.50/hr (minimum, back then) I got for a different, slightly more skilled job (many more instructions to follow, variety of tasks). He said the cleaning was "man's" work, and the other job for men and women. Hopefully he just meant that there were more people willing to stick with the less-tiring job, so they didn't need to pay so much. (It obviously wasn't "man's" work. I was so scrawny many girls my age were as strong as I was...)

The TSA guy making a low annual salary doesn't pocket half of the money that he finds, or splits it up with the rest of the low level employees?

Well, let's run some numbers.

$409,056.56 divided by about 450 airports is $909 per airport. We're talking about a year, so divide that by 365 and we're talking about an average of $2.49 per day per airport. Figure that an entry level security screen makes a little over $10 per hour and he's basically getting the equivalent of 15 minutes.

Yup. These guys are makin' bank, I'll tell you.

Because real life has to compromise. In that though you should be a big supporter of those Tea Party Republicans who will vote down any tax raises.

Right. Well... Except for taxes on the middle class --screw those losers, right? Thank God we've got the GOP looking out for the job creators --isn't it obvious by now that obscene income inequality creates low unemployment?

They are standing by their guns and sticking to their promises even though they are obviously bad for the United States.

Yes, it is admirable how willing they are to drive the bus over the cliff, proving their ideological purity. I just wish the rest of us weren't on it.

As he said...
Any career that has a known large gap of unemployment isn't too lucrative unless your making bank (per hour, not more hours able to be worked) during those worktimes.

Not great but a livable wage.....

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/All_K-12_Teachers/Salary

You are insane if you think teachers are making $100k/year in retirement. My wife used to teach elementary school and was making ~$40k/year with a masters degree in education. If you take a look at the national teacher averages that's right in line:

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/All_K-12_Teachers/Salary

Ok,l lets look at police:

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Industry=Law_Enforcement/Salary

Wow. Lots of $100k salaries there.

You are insane if you think teachers are making $100k/year in retirement. My wife used to teach elementary school and was making ~$40k/year with a masters degree in education. If you take a look at the national teacher averages that's right in line:

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/All_K-12_Teachers/Salary

Ok,l lets look at police:

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Industry=Law_Enforcement/Salary

Wow. Lots of $100k salaries there.

Im not sure what you mean. I make much less than listed here : http://www.payscale.com/best-colleges/degrees.asp . I applied to about 80 jobs with no call backs before shifting job focus and just doing tech support.

Further, since everyone is caught up in the notion that this applies to religious organizations and that they are the only ones exempt, it might also behoove you to read that specific part:

You don't mention non-profit or public sector here. If this wasn't an attempt to assert that I was saying that only religious organizations were exempt, I'm not sure what you were getting at.

To be fair, there were others further up the reply chain who were specifically mentioning religious institutions; although that I neglected to include all other edge cases seems moot considering my immediate quote from the FLSA site thereafter specifically points out non-profits, humanitarian organizations, and so forth.

I didn't gloss over your post - I read it carefully and it failed to effectively convince me of your point. Your blockquotes, in particular, don't actually constitute any sort of rebuttal to the statements I made, and you didn't explain why FLSA doesn't apply in this case. If you'd care to make that clear, I'll be glad to read it, but honestly, all you did was make an unfair claim about my comment and fail to back it up.

I recall quoting, from the FLSA link provided by one of the OPs, that SCOTUS declared that FLSA was not unnecessarily broad in that all volunteer labor could be classified as falling under its auspices, regardless of how it related to non-profits, religious organizations, and so forth. Unfortunately, the FLSA site seems to offer an extremely truncated review of both the ruling and the rules. My reading of the material provided in that link is mostly what lead me to believe that Valve would not fall under the scrutiny of FLSA, and why I believe that your speculation is incorrect. For instance:

While this mostly outlines public service, I believe it covers at least part of the spirit of the FLSA in regards to volunteer service by defining what is meant by "volunteer." Being as the translations were offered without "pressure or coercion" and that they are neither employees of Valve nor expect compensation for their labor, they are likely classified as volunteer labor.

Further, I also believe that the volunteer clause in the FLSA is intended to prevent companies from "forcing" employees to volunteer part of their time unfairly in effort to circumvent paying them overtime for their labor. This might also explain why the language used to define volunteers and their role for the organization is mostly concerned with compensation, their existing status with the company, and so forth. That said, according to this, it might be useful to Valve for those volunteers to sign a volunteer agreement, which would certainly give them legal backing if a suit were raised (I don't think one will be).

In particular, I could see where the Department of Labor may side with you since "the DOL has 'a long-standing policy of limiting volunteer status to those individuals performing charitable activities for not-for-profit organizations.'" So yes, you are absolutely correct that there are few exceptions to the rule. However, if you consider these factors listed:

To determine if a person is truly a volunteer and not an employee, the DOL ordinarily will consider the following factors:

1. How much the organization benefits from the services performed;
2. The time spent in the activity (the activity is less than a full-time occupation);
3. The individual's services are of the kind typically associated with volunteer work; and
4. The individual does not expect pay for the services.

It could be argued thus

I see I've been modded down to "troll" by pointing out something which nobody could seriously dispute.

Such as how little they are willing to work for. Just recently I read a comment here on slashdot from some developer who said his whole team had been working 12-16 hour days for a year and a half with no extra pay...

That's just ridiculous and silly.

It's extremely easy to find a job as a programmer right now which pays highish wages relative to other jobs, and which doesn't require working 12-16 hour days. Although there is significant unemployment right now, that unemployment is almost entirely among the working class, and among people who used to be employed in construction etc, and among millenials. The unemployment rate among experienced programmers is 4% at present, meaning unemployment in that sector is almost entirely frictional. At my company, for example, we're trying to find qualified people to hire, but it's virtually impossible. In other words, the labor market for programmers is as tight as it's ever been, with the possible exception of the 1999-2000 timeframe.

Whoever is working 12-16 hour days for no additional money, for a year and a half, has made a silly choice, and has done himself harm for no reason whatsoever. He has many other easy alternatives, which he chose not to investigate or pursue.

Of course, there are many people in this economy who lack skills or experience, and who are seriously suffering. But here we're getting complaints from programmers who have careers in a field with 4% unemployment.

One needs only to type "software engineer pay" into google and come up with links like this one which clearly indicate that someone with a Bachelor's degree makes $60k-$120k per year (not including benefits), Or I could type "unemployment sector" and find that the unemployment rate for programmers is half the national average and that: "With an unemployment rate of under 4% in the tech sector, there’s a shortage of qualified technology professionals, TechFlash reports." Or I could type into google a query about how many hours most programmers work, and find from the Bureau of Labor Statistics that: "Most software engineers and programmers work 40 hours a week, but about 15 percent of software engineers and 11 percent of programmers worked more than 50 hours a week in 2008" which obviously means that working 12-16 hour days is rare. All this took about 60 seconds of research, but perhaps the people working 12-16 hour days never bothered to type these things into google?

Part of living in a capitalist economy involves looking at the options available to you and selecting the best one given your circumstances. I know there is always some rare person who says something like: "I paid $45,000 for a $25,000 car, because I didn't even bother to walk across the street to some other dealership to look," but it's rare and signifies nothing other than that some lone person got ripped off.

The odd thing is that there's constant complaining on slashdot among people, who are essentially highly privileged or fortunate workers. Programmers make $60-$120k for a Bachelor's degree and work 40 hours per week (which apparently is average, according to the BLS) with an unemployment rate of 4%. Clearly programmers are in the top 1% of workers worldwide, by a very comfortable margin, and are within the top 10% even among the rich countries. Nevertheless, they constantly insist on slashdot that they deserve much more than this and that they're the modern equivalent of slaves, that laws should be passed favoring them even more and that they should form unions etc.

I realize this will be modded down to "troll". Of course, there are a few modders here (not most of them, of course) who think that anything which challenges any idea they have in their heads is a troll. Ohwell...

Average Teacher Salaries K-12 Across US And remember they are required to have a state specific teaching certificate that includes a minimum of 3 years college education (usually 4). How much do you get paid following a four year college education?

Also, teachers already require students to pre-learn topics before coming to class (why do you think required reading is assigned?). Giving an option to pre-learn the material via lecture vs. required reading is actually quite handy for a number of students.

Remember, according to the OECD as of Dec 2010 for K-12 education measured by knowledge of 15 yr olds, the US is ranked 14th in reading, 17th in science, and 25th in math. Anyone else think maybe, just maybe, this is an indication that the educational system needs to try SOMETHING, ANYTHING different?

Like, oh I don't know, maybe study the systems in place in South Korea, Finland, Canada, New Zealand, Japan, Australia, or The Netherlands (the only countries in the top ten in all three categories) to see what they have implemented that works? I mean as long as we are talking education reform.

You confuse television doctors with reality.

Don't know any engineers that work 9:00 AM to 2:00 AM here. Maybe there are some game programmers that do that, but not your average engineer. Exaggeration is not helpful.

OTOH, I don't know ANY engineers that approach $190K. None. Haven't heard of any. If that sort of pay scale existed here, we wouldn't have an engineer shortage at all. Pay scales are closer to this:

http://www.payscale.com/best-colleges/degrees.asp

There's graphs for both starting salary and average pay. Petroleum engineers may touch $190K. Dunno. But what's happening here is a race to the bottom in pay scale, as the powers that be have determined that the best way to keep everyone working at all is to make US workers earn less than Indian and Chinese workers. Meanwhile, the 2nd-highest corporate tax rate in the world, here in the US, is the real culprit that is pauperizing the entire society, ever so slowly like boiling a frog, so nobody really notices it as the actual problem.

Well you are also wrong again (your groupon sig) Whether people like it or not it matters what you get your degree in and where you go. So say you plan on going to that community college for a degree in literature... that might not benefit you financially. http://www.payscale.com/best-colleges/degrees.asp There is also a website that calculates the annual difference in average salary depending on the university, major, and grades. I don't have time to find it right now but you can probably find it on Google. **All** show that it's significantly beneficial to go to university and that which school you go to matters.

I have a point to make, but first I'll give you sweet, sweet data. Here's the relevant Wikipedia page, you can backtrack the direct sources from there. These are the 2009 PISA results:

Math: China (#1), Finland (#6), United States (#30)

Reading: China (#1), Finland (#3), United States (#17)

Sciences: China #1), Finland (#2), United States (#23)

= = = = = =

And now, the average cost to teach a child (Primary/Grammar/Elementary School Source, Secondary/High School Source) For Primary School and High School:

Primary/Grammar/Elementary School: Switzerland (#2, $6,470.00 per student), U.S. (#4, $6,043.00 per student), China (No data)

Secondary/High School: Switzerland (#1, $9,348.00 per student), U.S. (#3, $7,764.00 per student), China (No data)

= = = = = =

Next, the average salary per teacher for Elementary and High School (U.S. source, Finland source, China source). All are converted to dollars using XE.com.

Elementary School: Finland (~$46,000), United States (~$40,000, China (~$18,000)

High School: Finland (~$46,000 - ~$71,000), United States (~$42,000.00 - ~$44,000), China ($24,000 - ~$28,000)

= = = = = =

On this last bit, I've done some digging but haven't been able to find concrete data on all three countries from one source, so I'm going with estimates. Peek into sources if you want.

The average U.S. School day is 9-3, or about 6 hours. Finland is about 5 hours. China is about 8 hours (roughly 9-5, with a two hour lunch, so still around 7 hours).

= = = = = =

Okay, so. China pays their teachers way less than the U.S. but get far better results. Finland pays their teachers about the same and gets way better results, but not as good as China. The U.S. pays the same amount of money (roughly) that Finland does for much, much worse results.

So what the hell are we doing wrong?

China is all drill, drill, drill. A lot of the East Asian countries (South Korea, China, Japan, Indonesia, etc.) have long school days which are often supplemented by private schooling (a.k.a. "Cram courses") after the fact. Most kids are home anywhere between 8:00-10:00 PM, 2-4 hours of homework, and then wake up at 6:00 or 7:00AM the next day.

Americans, we're 9-3, plus maybe an hour or two of homework (at most). Often there's an after school program, but these are more glorified daycare and less practical education.

Finland actually ends up using *less* hours per day than us, but they use innovative teaching methods that the U.S. is sorely lacking.

I see Finland and China as two extremes. China is like grinding in an MMO. If you simply just do something a lot, you're going to get better by rote and practice. That's the general Asian method, I've found. Drill, test, drill, test, drill, test. Finland seems to be the opposite extreme - less drilling, more trying to find methods that work without having an insanely look school day. The U.S. has the worst parts of both and the benefits of neither.

If we lengthened the school days in America and really put the kids asses to work, we could edge up closer to China - maybe eve beat it out. They do way better than us for 1/3 - 1/2 the cost on teacher salary. However, if we maintained the same salary but looked at where our methodology is wrong and tried new things, we could achieve similar resu

I have a point to make, but first I'll give you sweet, sweet data. Here's the relevant Wikipedia page, you can backtrack the direct sources from there. These are the 2009 PISA results:

Math: China (#1), Finland (#6), United States (#30)

Reading: China (#1), Finland (#3), United States (#17)

Sciences: China #1), Finland (#2), United States (#23)

= = = = = =

And now, the average cost to teach a child (Primary/Grammar/Elementary School Source, Secondary/High School Source) For Primary School and High School:

Primary/Grammar/Elementary School: Switzerland (#2, $6,470.00 per student), U.S. (#4, $6,043.00 per student), China (No data)

Secondary/High School: Switzerland (#1, $9,348.00 per student), U.S. (#3, $7,764.00 per student), China (No data)

= = = = = =

Next, the average salary per teacher for Elementary and High School (U.S. source, Finland source, China source). All are converted to dollars using XE.com.

Elementary School: Finland (~$46,000), United States (~$40,000, China (~$18,000)

High School: Finland (~$46,000 - ~$71,000), United States (~$42,000.00 - ~$44,000), China ($24,000 - ~$28,000)

= = = = = =

On this last bit, I've done some digging but haven't been able to find concrete data on all three countries from one source, so I'm going with estimates. Peek into sources if you want.

The average U.S. School day is 9-3, or about 6 hours. Finland is about 5 hours. China is about 8 hours (roughly 9-5, with a two hour lunch, so still around 7 hours).

= = = = = =

Okay, so. China pays their teachers way less than the U.S. but get far better results. Finland pays their teachers about the same and gets way better results, but not as good as China. The U.S. pays the same amount of money (roughly) that Finland does for much, much worse results.

So what the hell are we doing wrong?

China is all drill, drill, drill. A lot of the East Asian countries (South Korea, China, Japan, Indonesia, etc.) have long school days which are often supplemented by private schooling (a.k.a. "Cram courses") after the fact. Most kids are home anywhere between 8:00-10:00 PM, 2-4 hours of homework, and then wake up at 6:00 or 7:00AM the next day.

Americans, we're 9-3, plus maybe an hour or two of homework (at most). Often there's an after school program, but these are more glorified daycare and less practical education.

Finland actually ends up using *less* hours per day than us, but they use innovative teaching methods that the U.S. is sorely lacking.

I see Finland and China as two extremes. China is like grinding in an MMO. If you simply just do something a lot, you're going to get better by rote and practice. That's the general Asian method, I've found. Drill, test, drill, test, drill, test. Finland seems to be the opposite extreme - less drilling, more trying to find methods that work without having an insanely look school day. The U.S. has the worst parts of both and the benefits of neither.

If we lengthened the school days in America and really put the kids asses to work, we could edge up closer to China - maybe eve beat it out. They do way better than us for 1/3 - 1/2 the cost on teacher salary. However, if we maintained the same salary but looked at where our methodology is wrong and tried new things, we could achieve similar resu

I have a point to make, but first I'll give you sweet, sweet data. Here's the relevant Wikipedia page, you can backtrack the direct sources from there. These are the 2009 PISA results:

Math: China (#1), Finland (#6), United States (#30)

Reading: China (#1), Finland (#3), United States (#17)

Sciences: China #1), Finland (#2), United States (#23)

= = = = = =

And now, the average cost to teach a child (Primary/Grammar/Elementary School Source, Secondary/High School Source) For Primary School and High School:

Primary/Grammar/Elementary School: Switzerland (#2, $6,470.00 per student), U.S. (#4, $6,043.00 per student), China (No data)

Secondary/High School: Switzerland (#1, $9,348.00 per student), U.S. (#3, $7,764.00 per student), China (No data)

= = = = = =

Next, the average salary per teacher for Elementary and High School (U.S. source, Finland source, China source). All are converted to dollars using XE.com.

Elementary School: Finland (~$46,000), United States (~$40,000, China (~$18,000)

High School: Finland (~$46,000 - ~$71,000), United States (~$42,000.00 - ~$44,000), China ($24,000 - ~$28,000)

= = = = = =

On this last bit, I've done some digging but haven't been able to find concrete data on all three countries from one source, so I'm going with estimates. Peek into sources if you want.

The average U.S. School day is 9-3, or about 6 hours. Finland is about 5 hours. China is about 8 hours (roughly 9-5, with a two hour lunch, so still around 7 hours).

= = = = = =

Okay, so. China pays their teachers way less than the U.S. but get far better results. Finland pays their teachers about the same and gets way better results, but not as good as China. The U.S. pays the same amount of money (roughly) that Finland does for much, much worse results.

So what the hell are we doing wrong?

China is all drill, drill, drill. A lot of the East Asian countries (South Korea, China, Japan, Indonesia, etc.) have long school days which are often supplemented by private schooling (a.k.a. "Cram courses") after the fact. Most kids are home anywhere between 8:00-10:00 PM, 2-4 hours of homework, and then wake up at 6:00 or 7:00AM the next day.

Americans, we're 9-3, plus maybe an hour or two of homework (at most). Often there's an after school program, but these are more glorified daycare and less practical education.

Finland actually ends up using *less* hours per day than us, but they use innovative teaching methods that the U.S. is sorely lacking.

I see Finland and China as two extremes. China is like grinding in an MMO. If you simply just do something a lot, you're going to get better by rote and practice. That's the general Asian method, I've found. Drill, test, drill, test, drill, test. Finland seems to be the opposite extreme - less drilling, more trying to find methods that work without having an insanely look school day. The U.S. has the worst parts of both and the benefits of neither.

If we lengthened the school days in America and really put the kids asses to work, we could edge up closer to China - maybe eve beat it out. They do way better than us for 1/3 - 1/2 the cost on teacher salary. However, if we maintained the same salary but looked at where our methodology is wrong and tried new things, we could achieve similar resu

Lawyers and judges. I think it's notable that it seems only those with skill in manipulating others are exhibiting upward mobility. What about the poor texas kid who's got a great mind for algorithms and math but can't go to college because of . In some parts of the country there is decent public education and a whole slew of leg-ups (scholarships, competitions, etc) for students to make their way forward, but it is still really hard to achieve more than the "average" quality of life through application of math, science, and technology skills. The applied "public relations" field of employment (lawyers and politicians) seems to have a disproportionately greater share (as compared to technology workers) of the wealth distribution. It should be obvious: people's who's job is to manipulate the decisions of other people come out way ahead of people who's job is to improve society. Oh and because we're all greedy bastard humans, it's no surprise that those manipulative people on top using their own strong powers of influence to make sure they stay on top.

Electrical Engineer Average Salary

Software Engineer Average Salary

Average Lobbyist Salary

Lawyers and judges. I think it's notable that it seems only those with skill in manipulating others are exhibiting upward mobility. What about the poor texas kid who's got a great mind for algorithms and math but can't go to college because of . In some parts of the country there is decent public education and a whole slew of leg-ups (scholarships, competitions, etc) for students to make their way forward, but it is still really hard to achieve more than the "average" quality of life through application of math, science, and technology skills. The applied "public relations" field of employment (lawyers and politicians) seems to have a disproportionately greater share (as compared to technology workers) of the wealth distribution. It should be obvious: people's who's job is to manipulate the decisions of other people come out way ahead of people who's job is to improve society. Oh and because we're all greedy bastard humans, it's no surprise that those manipulative people on top using their own strong powers of influence to make sure they stay on top.

Electrical Engineer Average Salary

Software Engineer Average Salary

Average Lobbyist Salary

Lawyers and judges. I think it's notable that it seems only those with skill in manipulating others are exhibiting upward mobility. What about the poor texas kid who's got a great mind for algorithms and math but can't go to college because of . In some parts of the country there is decent public education and a whole slew of leg-ups (scholarships, competitions, etc) for students to make their way forward, but it is still really hard to achieve more than the "average" quality of life through application of math, science, and technology skills. The applied "public relations" field of employment (lawyers and politicians) seems to have a disproportionately greater share (as compared to technology workers) of the wealth distribution. It should be obvious: people's who's job is to manipulate the decisions of other people come out way ahead of people who's job is to improve society. Oh and because we're all greedy bastard humans, it's no surprise that those manipulative people on top using their own strong powers of influence to make sure they stay on top.

Electrical Engineer Average Salary

Software Engineer Average Salary

Average Lobbyist Salary

I don't know who you are arguing with, but I'll bite.

#1: The GP was referring to the numerous less-than-living-wage jobs that are available. These are unskilled jobs and many don't even require a diploma.
#2: Numbers clearly show that a college degree is a better indicator of a worthwhile career than a lack thereof: http://www.bls.gov/emp/ep_chart_001.htm
#3: They may be higher paid than a lot of folks at wal*mart but the average is nowhere near $19/hr. Nice try though. http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Employer=Costco_Wholesale_company/Hourly_Rate
#4: Skilled labor certainly pays more than unskilled labor, however examples where skilled laborers are making more than those with college degrees are uncommon and if you look at the averages shown for #2, you can see that they are far from the "rule."
#5: Who said anything about how good a foreign degree is vs. a domestic degree? When it comes down to it, a degree is only as "good" as the student who earned it.

Certainly the cost of delivery should reflect on the postage.

Let's say there is a house 5 miles away from the post office in its own secluded neighborhood, and the road's speed limit is 20 mph. It takes 15 minutes to drive there, and 15 minutes to drive back, for a total of 30 minutes. At a pay rate of $50k/yr, that's about $24 an hour. The total cost of that delivery, assuming there is only one first class mail in the truck for that house, is $12. The postage you pay right now for a first class mail is 44 cents.

To be profitable, USPS would have to save enough letters and packages for this house and deliver a large batch. Someone in this household can choose to pick up mail from the postoffice sooner, or will have to wait for a few days for more mail to come. At the rate I receive mail, it would probably take a month to accumulate that much mail.

The telecom industry knows this as the last mile problem. I see no exemption for USPS.

my wife is paid hourly... she is an occupational therapist and paid fairly.

what do you do again? do you have a job? what is your name? what is your address? who is your employer?

why do you cower behind a chosen urine based pseudonym? what are you afraid of?

you're completely pathetic.

I find this difficult to believe.

I got it from this website. On the high end, partners in law firms make big bucks. Going into a private practice has a double edge; you can make lots of money or little money based on how much business you can bring in. If you're a corporate/government attorney, you've got steady income but the potential is limited. Also your specialty affects earnings. For example, civil/criminal lawyer is highly variable but often very crowded so the salary is variable. Intellectual Property law is highly specialized as only lawyers that have an undergraduate technical degree (Science, Engineering, etc.) qualify for it. But the difference is that the average starting salary is $100K and there is high demand.

You're missing a couple of additional points.
The cost of living in San Francisco is 70% above the national average. So flagging to them still makes that car affordable.

Second the model S is competing for the $40,000 - $60,000 Sedan market. Audi has a great filter where you can set the price and see all their cars in that price range. That is what the model S is competing against.

If you keep up with Tesla you know they also are working on a car that would be at or under $30,000 for their next model. They are going from luxury cars down to consumer cars for everyone. They are hoping that early adopters will finance the cars for everyone else. They are after all a tech company turned automaker, not the other way around.

Nice troll there, really. I clapped.

First off public schools don't get much in the way of 'donations' from anyone, anywhere. Sure there are bake sales and other fundraisers but those usually go to specific programs such as band or a sports team, but donations? No, not really. 'Rich' areas get more in the way of property taxes, the primary source of local funding for public schools. The children tend to get better medical care and have better diets as well, all of which factors into performance.

Second, the average salary for a teacher is
over 40k. In my district high school teachers make 50-60.

Yeah maybe I should have worded it better but I was more trying to fend off the people who would attack the idea of UAV's.

If the privacy argument comes down to 'people sunbathing naked on their rooftops' than that is a pretty weak crutch of an excuse.
I would think more along the lines of a person who has an outside shower in their backyard, but we are playing a really dumb numbers game if you want to play that. The footage they shoot has to be reviewed by others and supervisors, I would think they could be professional about it.
Also everyone knows there is no sunshine in the UK, so that would be like saying I am going out to the desert for a swim. Just kidding, the UK is a beautiful place...

How exactly are they deceiving, they laid out all the facts of what they are going to use this for; traffic, burglary(?),theft from cash machines, preventing theft of tractors and monitoring antisocial driving'
I don't know what the difference is between you hearing a helicopter above and not hearing a UAV; whether that has to do with privacy I don't really see the connection or why they owe it to you to vocally/visually heard.

Hah you are right about pilots not making good pay
http://www.payscale.com/research/UK/Job=Helicopter_Pilot/Salary

around $35,000, but still at the end of the day the total costs and fuel have got to be ridiculous.

So I hope! I, and most IT guys I know, make less money than your average teacher [...]

You make less than $40,000 a year? You have to find yourself a real

128k average for game developer:
http://www.payscale.com/mypayscale.aspx?pid=206d010d-248c-470c-acc3-eaf4c851e03d

114k average for general software developer with same years of experience:
http://www.payscale.com/mypayscale.aspx?pid=21227c5a-f934-4e14-8e00-df80d9279d06

128k average for game developer:
http://www.payscale.com/mypayscale.aspx?pid=206d010d-248c-470c-acc3-eaf4c851e03d

114k average for general software developer with same years of experience:
http://www.payscale.com/mypayscale.aspx?pid=21227c5a-f934-4e14-8e00-df80d9279d06

Yet another article about the revenge of the nerds. Seriously folks, if you don't like the way you're treated you have to do something about it. Life is not fair and adaptation is the key to success regardless where you stand on a socioeconomic ladder. Also, it is a pity that Hodgeman misses one critical point: Geeks or whatever you call people who use brains for living are already paid well enough.

I've met really smart people in my life. Some of them were way to close to either of the ends of autism spectrum. Those folks were different by nature and to pick on them would be wrong from a purely moral standpoint. Also I have met plenty of geeks who -- for the lack of better expression -- called for a wrong kind of attention. Showing up to work wearing the same t-shirt they wore when painting the house a week ago, having no hygiene habits, screaming "Linux!" every time somebody asks for a solution (even if the question is not IT related). Add a superiority complex on that and you get an individual that is not very nice to deal with. I tend to avoid those people simply because I know that shit won't stink if you do not touch it. However, there may be people who intentionally would go out of their way to annoy these outliers...

And finally of salaries... If you take a look at the degrees which lead to best paid entry level positions you will see that those degrees are in tech and sciences. Thus a person who gets a good start in the field of science can further move up and earn more money if they combine science with business down the road. No, you won't earn millions of dollars for throwing a ball but being a lead scientist or a guy who writes top notch trading software is a pretty good thing to have on your resume. Those positions will be bullet proof careers in the next century. Too bad football and baseball players can't say the same thing :)

I highly doubt it.

I highly doubt it.

I imagine her biggest single expense is malpractice...

The National Coalition of Healthcare has some interesting data here. I don't know their particular "angle" so you may want to take their data with a grain of salt. However one point in particular that gelled with info I have heard from practicing physicians is the impact of administrative costs. I don't have their source handy but in essence when comparing healthcare provider's (nurses, doctors, techs, etc...) cost to administrative ones, administrative costs have skyrocketed in the mid 90's -- not sure if it was after HIPAA or more HMO type events that it was correlated (although not necessary cuasated) with. At any rate - my point (and based on the data in the link above) is that administrative costs are a huge factor as well.

There have been many comments here about the "outrageous" salaries of doctors (and parent poster, this is not you, but something I have to rant about for a second). I wonder if they are referring to the 120-140k that a family physician gets for their 7 years of training, constant call schedule, and constant licensing requirements? How many software engineers would train that hard for that long for that kind of money? Software is necessary and helps people -- let's face it, without it the world as we know it would not go around. Software can (and constantly does) save peoples lives, relieves suffering, and in my (and many people's opinion) are a huge benefit to society (Windows comments, bugs, and such aside). But how many engineers would take cuts because this software is too expensive? I know plenty of software people who make close to or better than a family doc (and I was one of those people, even post-boom)

And yes, there are those specialties that make 250k, 350k, etc... after their 4+ years of med school and 5-9 years of training after that. Many of these are high stress, high stakes jobs with 80+ hour workweeks. I know that many of you have worked deathmarches before. How would you like to sign up for the 80-100 hour work weeks for an indefinite period of time? How much monetary incentive would that take? What would you be making at your current hourly rate if you worked those hours? This isn't a "poor doctors work too hard" jab, but perhaps something to think about what it would take for you to work under the stress/pressure/hours that doctors do.

If you think that the 200k a physician makes or the 80k a traveling nurse makes is too much, then what about the health care insurance company CEO? The health care insurance actuarial?

Ok - end rant. That's what a get for commenting after a bike crash.

Sorry, but as a physician, you come to the table with a prior of zero credibility in a discussion of financial matters.

Most physicians ought to try working in any other profession besides the guaranteed-high-salary-MD-world before commenting on who it is that lives in a parallel universe.

Physicians in the US have created a closed system that requires a *state license* to enter, and then they earn 3-10+ times the median salary:
http://www.payscale.com/research/US/People_with_Jobs_as_Physicians_%2F_Doctors/Salary
commensurate with remarkably low unemployment (while the rest of the US are now around 9.4% and rising).

I'm a strong supporter of anyone who creates high value earning as much as possible. When one builds value or manages high responsibility, they get the money.

Unfortunately, physicians in the US are not creating significant value despite the costs and their salaries. The costs to the US society have gone now above 17% of the nation`s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), and rising at rising four times faster on average than workers` earnings since 1999. That means more than 1 in 6 of *EVERY* dollar of value created in the US goes to this racket (sic). High cost, by itself, not a problem: health is extremely important BUT, health results in the US are not very good, on a cost comparison basis with other 1st world countries:
http://www.commonwealthfund.org/Content/Publications/Fund-Reports/2006/Sep/Why-Not-the-Best--Results-from-a-National-Scorecard-on-U-S--Health-System-Performance.aspx

For all this expense, and all those salaries, US health is not as good. Why?

Becuase care providing is a controlled, state-sponsored monopoly. In any other industry physicians would all have been fired and improved long ago for such a horrible financial mess coupled with such poor comparative results. As a physician you and your peers created and profit directly from the high costs in the system.

I agree with any of your assessment of EMRs. They are dead on - but interested physicians driving this technology forward with a sincere interest in human health and not solely on protecting their business and on profits would have made EMRs a priority more then 30 years ago when research in this area first started, and solved all those issues.

And as for "Medical care in most locales in the US has long been collaborative, team-based system" - that`s comic. A physician`s definition of "team" and what everyone else in the work world means with that word are miles apart.

We are over http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos069.htmpaying http://www.aft.org/salary/our http://www.payscale.com/research/US/All_K-12_Teachers/Salary teachers!?

I don't think so... Mods can clean up my html...

While it's true that starting pay is low, it's not in the $15K range; more like $20-$25K. But it's also true that that you don't stay in that pay range for long. See here.Your post is very misleading. Average pay and starting pay are very different things!

I come from a family of pilots (IANAP), and they all live quite well. The low pay is a known problem, because many pilots do extra duty to make ends meet, but it also has the effect of encouraging only the truly motivated ones to stick around.

<loaded question>How much do military pilots make? Do you feel unsafe with them?</loaded question>

The problem with a career in science is that it is like a career in acting. Sure, there's the super stars at the top who are doing extremely well for themselves but then pretty much everyone else is struggling just to feed their families.

Salaries for Chemists

Geology

You've got chemists coming out of the gate making almost 70k a year, moving up to 120k a year as their career progresses.

You're right that certain applied scientists do OK financially - not as well as medical doctors or lawyers but enough to feed their families. The "geologist" salaries you linked to were for petroleum geologists. The "chemist" salaries you linked to showed large variation. For example, the chemistry post-doc salaries were down at $40,000. It's also worth noting that many of the "chemist" jobs (particularly the high paying ones) were almost certainly primarily management jobs.

I'll agree that a few scientists are doing very well for themselves financially and that certain other classes of scientists are doing OK financially (particularly those working in applied science and in management positions). What you'll find, though, is that the scientists who are trying to make a career out of actual basic science research are far from financially secure.

It may even be that at some level we agree. If you were to claim that PhD scientists (even those doing basic science) should earn a minimum salary of $70K per year then I would say, sure, problem solved. As it is, though, I personally know plenty of talented hard-working PhD scientists making only about half that ($30,000-$40,000 per year).

Maybe $35K is a fair salary for a PhD scientist and maybe it's not - but young people considering a career in science need to be aware of the reality that most hard-working PhD scientists are only earning $30K-$40K per year.