[Phantom Lord]

I have zero sympathy for anyone who spends years and years in college to get degrees with the end game being a job in the teaching profession and then complain that they dont make any money. I don't buy it that people went into teaching and didnt know that the pay sucked.

Just as people who get degrees and advanced degrees in history, or english, or african-american studies and what not. They knew in the beginning that those degrees would not lead to lucrative careers.

As was said in the beginning, people make decisions and those decisions lead to their financial situation.

[Myrddin]

I enjoyed teaching at the local college for 3 1/2 years. The toll equipment engineering job I had at the phone company wasn't very demanding, so I could count on having my evenings free to teach. The phone company was paying me $19K to $27K in that time frame, so a little extra income was desirable. The college paid $21/hr X 8 hrs/week X 36 weeks/yr = $6048 gross per year. The extra income paid for my weekend forays to the airfield to earn a private pilot's license. Teaching was fun. Flying was fun too. No complaints.

My wife works as a police/fire/911/emergency services dispatcher today. She's also a notary public and is responsible for acquiring and administering all the grants that keep the department financially solvent. She's also a certified EMT. She is currently training a new dispatcher in radio and CAD skills. All that responsibility is compensated at the princely rate of $11 per hour in our little town. The San Diego Sheriff's Office paid her $22/hr to keep 30 deputies busy, attend to the emergency communications van, train new dispatchers in phone and radio skills and handle admin/911 phone calls as necessary.

We don't need the extra income she makes at her dispatcher's job. She enjoys the job. I consider it a fallback source of income and benefits for her in case I have an unsuccessful re-run with cancer.