Blog: Mobility and Portability

Half of all new teachers are worse off than if they had been in a 401k plan.

Pension advocates call it a "feature, not a bug" that some small minority of educators receive quite generous benefits while everyone else gets much less.

The same pension plan can simultaneously be too stingy for some workers and too generous for others.

Teacher pension plans expose teachers to attrition risk--the possibility that a teacher won't stick around long enough to qualify for the larger benefits waiting for those who stay.

There are teaching jobs in every state, but compared to other professionals, teachers are unlikely to move across state lines.

Teachers aren't immune from basic economics.

The economy is likely the primary driver of the supply of new teachers.

A revolving door of short- term teachers in some districts can end up padding the retirement benefits of others.

It may sound easy to answer how many teachers retire each year, but it's not as straightforward as it seems.

While we tend to talk about the “teaching profession” as monolithic, there are significant differences across and within states.