The new school year has begun with some confusion over the state of teacher labor markets. News outlets have reported conflicting stories on the teacher shortage, with some saying it is over or improved, and others reporting still not having enough teachers to meet classroom needs. This two-part series looks at labor market conditions of educational professionals and teachers over time to make sense of these conflicting claims and dig deeper into how to diagnose and solve the teacher shortage.

There are two key problems in the teacher labor market. Since at least 2018, and especially since the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, labor market data has clearly signaled a textbook labor shortage for public school teachers. Closing this shortage and attracting—and retaining—enough teachers to fill currently vacant positions should be a high priority for policymakers at all levels of government. To accomplish this, the obvious strategy is to increase the attractiveness of teaching jobs—both through higher compensation for teachers, but also via investments that make teaching easier and more rewarding.

But even closing the current mismatch between vacancies and hiring in teacher labor markets would not imply a socially optimal level of investment in the teacher labor force or public education more broadly. Shortages occur when supply lags demand. And demand for teachers is driven by policymakers’ decisions about how much society should invest in education for kids. If this demand is low, hiring enough teachers to meet it is easy, but it does not address the underinvestment in public education.

This post focuses on the first problem: Today’s labor markets clearly show the supply of willing teachers is lagging demand. It documents the shortage and highlights solutions. A forthcoming post will focus on the second problem: Demand for teachers and other educational inputs is a political decision, and we have long stinted on this investment. There is no market system that ensures society is spending sufficiently on education and hence that demand for teachers is truly healthy relative to unmet social needs.

Some good news: Education employment has recovered since COVID-19 recession

The COVID-19 pandemic and the ensuing transition to remote learning reduced employment not just for teachers, but also for school bus drivers, cafeteria staff, special education professionals, and English language learning instructors, among others. Figure A shows employment changes since the start of the pandemic in the private sector (the dark blue line) and in state and local government education (lighter two blue lines). K–12 teachers comprise 45% of local education and post-secondary (college) teachers comprise 30% of state education, making these industries good proxies for teacher labor markets. At the beginning of the COVID-19 recession, both the public education sector and the private sector saw enormous job losses, but this was more pronounced in the private sector. 

However, employment in the private sector bounced back to pre-recession levels much quicker than in state and local government: By April 2022, private-sector employment growth had rebounded back to pre-COVID-recession levels, whereas state and local government education were still 7% and 4%, respectively, below pre-recession levels. It wasn’t until October 2023 that employment in local government education finally caught up to pre-recession levels and not until February 2024 that employment in state government education caught up. Today, employment in these sectors is about 1% above where it was in February 2020.

If we use state and local government education employment in February 2020 as a benchmark, one might conclude that the teacher shortage has been resolved. And this employment bounce-back was no small feat: The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated teaching difficulties and increased political polarization of the classroom. And many teachers reported additional stress during this period. Districts utilized their Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief funds to staff up in the wake of the pandemic—choices that clearly worked (see other examples here and here). Hiring enough teachers to get back to the February 2020 pre-COVID-19 benchmark should be celebrated. But it’s not the end of the story.

Despite gains at the national level, disparities in teaching labor markets remain

The overall measure of employment used in Figure A obscures the unevenness of the recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, as some schools recovered much faster than others. Disparities in schools being able to fill education positions persist and some positions remain harder to fill than others. Figure B shows the share of schools that reported feeling understaffed entering the August 2023 school year using a survey of nearly 4,000 public schools. The figure reveals that lower-poverty, majority-white schools are less likely to report feeling understaffed than high-poverty schools or schools with majority students of color. Only 42% of low-poverty schools reported feeling understaffed, compared with 57% of higher-poverty schools. Similarly, only 41% of schools that were less than 25% minority said they felt understaffed, compared with 49% of schools comprised of students that were 75% or more minority.

The overall progress on the education shortages also varies by position type. A survey that scraped recent job postings in the state of Washington found that elementary education teacher positions got filled nearly twice as quickly as special education, English as a second language, and STEM positions. 

Despite recovered employment levels, a textbook teaching shortage remains

Even before COVID-19 destabilized education, the education labor market had long been characterized by indicators of chronic shortages. In the years leading up to the pandemic, the teacher labor market saw high job vacancy and quits rates and stagnant hires. Figure C provides historical context on job flows in state and local government education from 2001 to present. The figure shows that hires roughly kept pace with job openings until early 2018, when job openings started outpacing hires. Teachers were already growing less willing to accept teaching jobs and their associated compensation rates and working conditions in the period leading up to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The slow hiring of new teachers might be less damaging if the teachers that were hired stayed in their role for a long time. However, in the lead up to the COVID-19 pandemic, the quits rate also steadily rose from 0.60 in January 2013 to 0.83 in February 2020. Even before the pandemic, teachers were leaving the profession at high rates. Today, the quits rate remains elevated and job openings still outpace hires. One sign of positivity is that the vacancy rate is trending down faster than the hires rate, suggesting that progress is being made in matching teacher demand and supply. But an overall historical and current picture shows a pronounced teaching shortage that existed well before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Conclusion and policy advice

Teacher shortages existed in the lead up to COVID-19. These shortages were exacerbated in the wake of the pandemic as the attractiveness of teaching—both in terms of relative pay and work conditions—plummeted relative to many other jobs held by similarly educated workers. Today’s labor market for teachers is characterized by an excess of openings relative to hires and a rising quits rate (and one that is historically high for the profession).

One of the biggest contributing factors to teacher shortages is low teacher compensation. As of 2023, teachers were paid 26.6% less than workers with similar education credentials. Improving teacher pay would not only draw more eligible candidates into applying for jobs but would also help retain teachers longer and improve the quality of the teacher workforce—a key component influencing student achievement. 

Normally, labor shortages are resolved by market competition pushing up wages. But because this isn’t the type of labor market for education, it won’t happen for teachers. In education, teacher pay is not set in a perfectly competitive labor market where employers are private, profit-seeking entities. The labor shortage will only be solved by policymakers affirmatively deciding to raise the pay of the nation’s public school teachers and undertake investments that help children’s education and make the job of teaching them in our public schools easier and more rewarding.

The impact of a national teaching shortage is profound and will impact students for year to come. Teaching shortages lead to larger class sizes, stressed and over-burdened teachers, and financial strain on the education system. Teaching quality will be threatened and education disparities will harden, with students in high-poverty districts losing out the most.