Teachers Hard Hit by Inflation
ÐÊ NOW THAT we have climbed back aboard the escalator of inflation, certain groups are bound to be hurt. Conspicuous among these are the NationÛªs schoolteachers, whose incomes are slow to respond to a change in prices.</br></br>NumericallyÛÓand hence politicallyÛÓthey are not a strong group. They number about a million, or 1.6 percent of our labor force; but in the coming decade they may well be among the most important workers in our economy. ByU955, it is estimated, there will be some 37 million young Americans in the school-age group between 5 and 17. This will be. 17 percent above 1950.</br></br>Because schoolteachers are not organized, they cannot compete with such potent pressure groups as auto workers or miners. Furthermore, in times of inflation they suffer from the fact that the sources of school revenues are rigid and inflexible.</br></br>Public school teachers depend for their salaries on the local property tax, a * notably unresponsive form of revenue. Private school and college teachers depend, to a considerable extent, on endowment income, much of it InÛªfixed-interest securities like bonds and mortgages.</br></br>The result is that there is a general exodus from the teaching field during inflation. Afterward, teaching salaries tend to catch up again; and in depression the real income of teachers rise very rapidlyÛÓwhen^ they get paid.