Public school teacher pay in the U.S. lags significantly when compared to other industrialized countries, according to a late October analysis by the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institution.
Examining average pay for teachers at the primary school level versus that of other college graduates across more than 30 countries, Brookings found the U.S. ranked last — and that its primary school teachers earn about two-thirds of what other college graduates are paid annually.
That pay gap is wider than what the Economic Policy Institute has found in its ongoing teacher pay penalty studies. According to a late August EPI report, U.S. teachers in 2025 earned about 25% less than college graduates in other professions.
In its report, Brookings described the U.S. teacher pay gap as “striking” and said that one possible explanation for the disparity may be widening income gaps in the U.S.
The teacher pay gap seems to widen particularly for teachers who fall in the middle-to-high range of the salary scale, according to Brookings.
Teacher salaries and benefits typically account as the largest expense in school district budgets.
But in examining federal data from the National Center for Education Statistics, Brookings found that the share of public school expenditures on teacher salaries has dropped over the last 100 years. For instance, the report said, teacher salaries made up 57% of public school expenditures in 1919, compared to 26% in 2019.
Brookings added that one explanation for this trend is that school districts have chosen to increase their staffing capacity instead of increasing teacher salaries.
“If you go back 100 years, more than half of school spending went to teacher salaries. Where the data ends — just before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic — the fraction going to teacher salaries had fallen to a quarter,” Brookings said. “Basically, schools are spending more money, just not on teacher salaries.”
The latest findings from Brookings come as some education policy experts have suggested schools should lean into strategic teacher pay approaches — especially as districts have to tighten their budgets due to challenges from widespread enrollment declines. Strategic teacher pay policies can include increasing teacher salaries in hard-to-staff schools and subjects, as well as boosting pay for high-performing teachers.
The National Education Association reported in April that the average teacher salary was $74,495 during the 2024-25 school year. Despite that being a 3.5% increase from the previous school year, the nation’s largest teacher’s union said, the latest teacher pay figures reflect a 5% decline in national averages compared to a decade ago when adjusting for inflation.
