What value do we place on a child’s time?

[coberst]

What value do we place on a child’s time?

Labor has been commodified in the American culture.

I would guess that the average working person makes about $30 an hour. That would be $1200 per week and about $60,000 per year.

The average big corporate CEO makes about 500 times the average worker thus they make about $15,000 per hour.

How do we determine how much we value the time of a child? I guess we might say that a K-12 teacher makes average wages and has about 30 children in their classroom thus we value a child’s time at about $1 per hour.

Do we evaluate a child’s time too highly or too lowly? I think that we place too little value on a child’s time.

The lower we place the value of a child’s time the more likely will a parent or teacher spend less time with that child. The lower value we place on a child’s time the more willing we are to allow that child to “waste time”.

Adolescence appears to be something that has developed late in our culture. A hundred years ago a child became an adult at 16 and today that age often extends to the early to mid 20s.

[Mr Endon]

I'm not too sure that's a sound way of evaluating how one prizes a child's time. With money, I mean. I guess you are saying that in a culture where time is commodified that's the way the average person will look at it? Or at least that teachers are severely underpaid and don't get the recognition they deserve. If that's the case I would heartily agree. I also agree with your general statement that we place the value of a child's time too low, of course. Please tell me if I misinterpreted any of your points.

As for the adolescence, at that time children would start working at an incredibly young age so as not to be a burden, whereas today most parents think it's their duty to at least provide for their education if they can afford it. Also an important factor is that life expectancy was much lower then. What's the net result of this? Well, I admit it really is a shame that youngsters at 20 are usually so emotionally immature nowadays, but I guess it's better than how it was a century ago or even still today in very underprivileged families, i.e. by 14 all work and no play (and, needless to say, no education).

I think it's rather bold of you to say that adolescence today extends to, say, 25. The tendency, however, says that such reality might come to be in a not so distant future.

[NikolaiI]

How do we determine how much we value the time of a child? I guess we might say that a K-12 teacher makes average wages and has about 30 children in their classroom thus we value a child’s time at about $1 per hour.

$30 an hour is a bit on the high side (of an estimate of how much they make). I mean, the average of those who have worked for 20 years might be something close to that, but not the average of all teachers.

And it depends on the state... in California or New York, maybe, yes, sure; but the cost of living is different, too. In Oklahoma, some average teacher pay numbers are...

Salary range (2007 – 2008): $31,600 - $47,135

Average teacher salary (2005 – 2006): $38,772

Average beginning teacher salary (2005 – 2006): $29,473

http://www.teachersalaryinfo.com/ave...er-salary.html

[coberst]

Mr Endon

Our society commodifies labor thus the dollar value of time is a normal mode for determining value.

The more valuable a society considers a child's time to be the better care they make of the child's time. And the more valuable a child's time the less inclined a parent is to trade the time with the child for a minimum wage job.

If we placed a higher value on a child's time we could better recognize the importance of a good education.

Let us say that we felt that a child's time was worth $100 per hour. Would parents treat that child the same as if they set a value at $1? Would we value education at a much greater value? Would we value a teacher at a much greater value? Would a mother go to work at a minimum wage salary except in the most urgent need? Would we allow teens to waste so much time on non sense?


We are meaning creating creatures. As such the culture that we have created leaves much to be desired. I am convinced that if we do not change our culture very soon we will soon become toast. I think that the only avenue available for us is to convince adults to become self-actualizing self-learners in the hope that this will dramatically improve our overall level of intellectual sophistication.

I think that we can no longer afford the luxury of such an extended period of childhood behavior on the part of children. This generation and all future generations have little time left to correct the errors made by past generations. We are at or have passed a tipping point.

My fundamental premise is that the American citizens, as a group, are not intellectually sophisticated enough to comprehend the large number of catastrophic problems bearing down on us. If my premise is correct will this same population have sufficient sophistication to recognize this fact and to do something about it?

New theories in the natural sciences go immediately into the culture because there is often money in it. New theories in the human sciences take generations to reach the general culture. Our society is driven by technology and there is no way that we can intellectually keep up such that we can manage this terrible power that we have created unless somehow we can convince adults that they can no longer place their intellect with their year book in the attic when their school daze are over.

[Uberzensch]

You calculations are way off.

You only capture the teacher's salary, while not counting the building, materials, other employees, etc.

Regardless, I don't think anyone uses the salary of teachers to determine the value of their children. Your making too much of a stretch, there.

Furthermore, while I agree that many lack the "intellectual sophistication" you desire, I'm not sure that past generations were that different. In fact, I think for the most part, our past leaders were just as incompetent as this the leaders this generation will produce.

[coberst]

Our society commodifies labor thus the dollar value of time is a normal mode for determining value.

The more valuable a society considers a child's time to be the better care they make of the child's time. And the more valuable a child's time the less inclined a parent is to trade the time with the child for a minimum wage job.

If we placed a higher value on a child's time we could better recognize the importance of a good education.

Let us say that we felt that a child's time was worth $100 per hour. Would parents treat that child the same as if they set a value at $1? Would we value education at a much greater value? Would we value a teacher at a much greater value? Would a mother go to work at a minimum wage salary except in the most urgent need? Would we allow teens to waste so much time on non sense?


We are meaning creating creatures. As such the culture that we have created leaves much to be desired. I am convinced that if we do not change our culture very soon we will soon become toast. I think that the only avenue available for us is to convince adults to become self-actualizing self-learners in the hope that this will dramatically improve our overall level of intellectual sophistication.

I think that we can no longer afford the luxury of such an extended period of childhood behavior on the part of children. This generation and all future generations have little time left to correct the errors made by past generations. We are at or have passed a tipping point.

My fundamental premise is that the American citizens, as a group, are not intellectually sophisticated enough to comprehend the large number of catastrophic problems bearing down on us. If my premise is correct will this same population have sufficient sophistication to recognize this fact and to do something about it?

New theories in the natural sciences go immediately into the culture because there is often money in it. New theories in the human sciences take generations to reach the general culture. Our society is driven by technology and there is no way that we can intellectually keep up such that we can manage this terrible power that we have created unless somehow we can convince adults that they can no longer place their intellect with their year book in the attic when their school daze are over.

[Uberzensch]

Did you really just post the exact same thing?