Cost Report for the Average Physical Education teachers Salary - Essay Example

Cost Report for the Average Physical Education teacher’s Salary Introduction Education is one of the most essential services that the government provides for every citizen. Despite the fact that American Constitution does not mention education, the fourteenth amendment espouses a number of rights that government considers basic and therefore entitles every citizen to, among which is education. To ensure that everyone can access quality education in the country, the government as a state body employs teacher and addresses their employment related issues. Teachers just as any other civil servants therefore draw their earnings from the state budget. Teacher salary follows a strict clustering system, which ensures that every teacher receives a pay commensurate to his or her duties. The cost of an average teacher in the state of Georgia is $ 74,985.07; this is the sum of a basic teacher salary and a number of other benefits, which make the career more attractive. The American government has a set minimum wage for every employee in the country, a feature that protects every citizen from exploitation by employers. The minimum wage in the state of Georgia is $ 20,000 implying that teacher salary is above the minimum wage and therefore conscious of the economic factors in the country. Among the common benefits that teachers enjoy are health insurance, medical insurance, social security, and workman’s compensation insurance. These benefits also vary depending on the nature of a teacher’s responsibilities in the school. The United States of America is a developed country and the government strives to provide the basic life support features in every region thereby dispelling the need for hardship allowances. The table below breaks down the teacher salaries in the state of Georgia: Average teacher cost Pay schedule $ 52,852.32 Local supplement $ 4,447.68 Health insurance $ 10,619.98 FICA $ 830.85 TRS $ 5,890.44 Total teacher salary $ 74,985.07 The additional costs such as the health insurance and the social security contribution all apply in form of uniform percentages of the scheduled pay. This implies that a teacher with a higher basic salary receives larger additional benefits thus validating the salary disparities among the teachers. The salary tabulation above refers to that of an average teacher in the state of Georgia and is therefore applicable to the physical education teacher at Alcovy High School, which is in the Newton county school management system. This therefore exempts Alcovy High School from paying its teachers the social security’s benefits. This way, after paying the teacher their basic remuneration of $52,852.23, the school will further pay the teachers an additional $17,685.07 in benefits thus resulting in a total of $74,985.07, which therefore becomes the cost of an average physical education’s teacher at the facility. There are different sources for this money, teachers are civil servants and therefore paid by the government. However, the school and its other related school systems and state departments also have a prerogative for paying teachers owing to their roles in the subsequent positions. Teachers have their entitlement depending on the nature of their assignments at the facility. The school for example must consider its teacher student ration to ensure that it does not overwork its teachers. The state for example pays every teacher $47,957.59 out of the total $74,985.07, which is the actual cost of every teacher. This implies that the rest of the funding comes for the subsequent systems and departments. In this context, the state sends this money to the Newton county school system. The system and the department thus pay every teacher the additional $27,093.01 to make the figure complete. However, teachers just as the rest of civil servants remit their taxes to the government. This therefore reduces the cost of hiring a teacher, since it is the same government paying the teachers and accepting their tax remittance. The government simply performs a number of arithmetic calculations and deducts the tax from every teacher’s salary. After deducting this, the state thus sends a salary to the Newton school system less the tax value. The subsequent benefits in a teacher’s salary are not taxable, the tax regime applies only to the basic salaries and is always in the form of a uniform percentage. This implies that a teacher with a higher basic salary remits a larger tax. Owing to the tax implications on the teacher salary, the state sends $7,710,621.33 to the county school systems for the 161 teachers at the school, which is $ 47892.06 for every teacher, or $65 cut per teacher. Teachers are civil servants since their salary comes from the taxpayer’s money, and any factor that affects the economy may affect their pay. Among the most prevalent economic factors that affect the economy resulting in financial hardships, are recession, inflation, and dollar crises among others. Recession refers to a period of reduced financial activities. The duration exhibits reduced public spending, these result in reduced tax collection, and numerous job losses. Such financial crises have direct impact on the ability of the government to pay teachers among other important civil servants. To ensure that the teachers receive their pay appropriately, the government employs a number of tactics to ensure that it secures funds for the systems. Firstly, the government sets aside money for paying teachers and other civil servants. This way the central government ensures that such financial crises does not affect the normal functioning of such important sectors of the economy. The fourteenth amendment asserts that the state shall not deny any citizen any of the basic rights key among which is education. The central government therefore sets aside the money in order to secure the essential services to the citizens thereby preventing a constitutional crisis. During such crises when the states do not collect enough revenue, the central government sends money to the sates to cover such services. Additionally, the government provides bailouts for large public and private corporations. This way, the government stabilizes the economy thereby increasing tax take. In extreme cases, the government borrows money from other international financial institutions such as the international monetary fund and the World Bank to cover for the financial deficits resulting from the crises (Wit, 2002). Question 1: The discussion above reveals that every teacher in the school is worth $ 74,985.07. Any additional teacher to the department will earn the same salary as the rest. The department at the high school has six physical education teachers, the department will therefore require ($ 74,985.07*6) = $ 449910.42 monthly budget for the remuneration of teachers. The addition of any teacher will affect the figure by adding the value of each teacher added to the department with the cost of hiring an average as provided by the Newton County school system. However, this applies only to the teachers employed by the school system since the state will recognize them. However, should the department decide to employ the additional teachers on its own, the state budget will remain $ 74,985.07 since the state does not recognize the additional teachers. This budget estimate has a number of flaws since it has a number of assumptions key among which is that all the teachers are of the same level therefore similar job groups, which is indeed unrealistic. With every responsibility that a teacher acquires at the school, he or she receives an increment in salary. Such responsibilities include being the head of a department among others. Question 2: By increasing the teacher ration by three students, the school will be raising the class sizes by increasing more students per class. This way, the school will be saving $27,093.01 for every teacher they dismiss. Additionally the school will report such dismissals with the Newton County school system, which will in turn notify the state. The state also therefore stops its disbursement of $47,892.06 to the school in remunerating the teachers. Question 3: By decreasing the student teacher ratio by three, the school will be reducing their class sizes by reducing the number of students per class possibly creating an additional classroom. For this, the school will require $27,093.01 for every teacher they employ through the official mechanism which will compel the state to reimburse $47,892.06 for every of such teachers. However, should the school fail to hire such teachers formally it will have to spend an additional $ 74,985.07 for every new teacher. Reference Wit, H. . (2002). Internationalization of higher education in the United States of America and Europe: A historical, comparative, and conceptual analysis. Westport, Conn. [u.a.: Greenwood Press. Read More