"The Worm in The Apple" by Peter Brimelow

This investigation of teachers unions by journalist Peter Brimelow explains how government schools aren't a free market economy, and therefore, allow the existence of bad teachers to be possible. The book explains how most teacher unions are opposed to the idea of school vouchers.

School vouchers are an idea invented by world-famous economist Milton Friedman which allows every parent in America to have a decision as to where their kids can go (including private schools). What in turn would happen is that the schools not receiving enough vouchers to support their institutions would close down. This would leave the best schools to teach (most of them probably being private schools).

One reason for the lack of good teachers in America, according to Brimelow, is that there is a socialist economy within the educational field. We do not have any education superstars in the government school system. This is because we are not allowed to fire the worst teachers (a protection brought about by most unions). If we were to abolish teacher unions, there would be no entities to protect bad teachers. Plus, there would be no entities to protect the income of teachers.

In Japan, there are teachers who make as much money as some athletes do here. Students respect their teachers a lot more in Japan as well. Respect is never earned by things that are handed over to someone, and in a lot of ways, a teaching profession can just be handed to someone. In order to have teachers that can get paid in the triple digit range, we also need to be able to eliminate the lackluster teachers who put a damper on the profession.