In Canada, provinces that pay their teachers more do not achieve better student results.
By David Johnson
Teacher salaries must be attractive enough to draw talented people into the profession. The interesting question is: is there evidence on how much is enough? In Canada, provinces that pay their teachers more do not achieve better student results.
To come to this conclusion, some background is necessary. The first step is to see how teachers' salaries stack up versus other earners in the province, as a way of measuring the attractiveness of teaching relative to other jobs. I compared 2013/14 teacher salaries, adjusted for age and education, to earnings of all employees and similarly educated employees in each province.
A similar difference is found for the most common Manitoba teacher, who falls into the third-highest pay category in the province. This teacher would earn an average salary that exceeds 89 per cent of all provincial workers while the equivalent teacher's salary in B.C. would be higher than 73 per cent of the province's workers. Pension differences between B.C. and Manitoba do not offset these gaps. Pension benefits are most generous in Manitoba and least generous in B.C.
Is relatively high compensation in Manitoba a successful strategy for attracting the province's best and brightest to the classroom? And if so, is that translating into better student performance?
The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) measures reading, mathematics and science skills of students aged 15 around the world. All 10 Canadian provinces participate in this assessment.
Cross-country studies of teacher salaries and student assessments have shown countries that pay their teachers more obtain better results. This has been attributed to attracting better persons to become teachers.
But across Canada's six largest provinces, there is no evidence to show paying teachers more results in better student-assessment results. B.C., which tends to have the lowest-paid teachers, on average, has either better or the same test results as in the higher-paying provinces. Salaries and pensions for B.C. teachers seem to be sufficient to attract good teachers to the profession.
On the other hand, Manitoba, while paying some of the highest salaries, has among the lowest test results in the country.
Now, it's not totally fair to compare Manitoba to B.C. The social and economic structure of the two provinces is quite different, as are the needs of students. However, the social and economic structure of Manitoba is very similar to that of its neighbour Saskatchewan.
Saskatchewan's teachers are paid relatively less than their counterparts in Manitoba and have less generous pensions. Yet, Saskatchewan students have somewhat better results than Manitoba students in all subjects -- reading, mathematics and social sciences.
Two things might help explain why Manitoba teachers earn the highest relative salaries and have the most generous pensions among Canada's six largest provinces.
First, Manitoba is the only province where salaries or salary increases are not directly bargained with the provincial government. In Manitoba, these items remain the subject of local bargaining between a school board and its individual union.
Second, Manitoba is the only province among these six provinces where teachers do not have the right to strike. Instead, disputes are settled with arbitration. Together, these differences might help explain higher teacher compensation in Manitoba.
Manitoba has relatively well-compensated teachers, so it appears to have negotiating room to limit the growth of teacher compensation relative to other occupations, without harming the attractiveness of the profession in the province. Saskatchewan and other provinces pay their teachers relatively less, but deliver equal or better student performance results.
Published in the Winnipeg Free Press on September 9, 2015
David Johnson is an economics professor at Wilfrid Laurier University and is the author of the recent C.D. Howe Institute study Value for Money? Teacher Compensation and Student Outcomes In Canada's Six Largest Provinces.
