The Facts About PBC Teacher Pay & Midterm Momentum – Top 3 Takeaways – May 6th, 2026
Takeaway #1: Conflating
When it comes to WPTV these days, it’s no surprise to me that they’d effectively be organizing a political rally for the teacher’s union which is essentially what they did in Royal Palm Beach yesterday. Therefore, it’s not for that reason that I’m taking time in my takeaways today to address teacher pay. The reason I’m doing so is the false pretense under which WPTV’s defacto pro teacher’s-union political rally took place yesterday and how it’s also commonly being reported across many parts of our state. Let’s start with what is true. It is true that Florida’s ranks 50th in average teacher pay with typical compensation checking in at $56,600 per year. What isn’t at all true is that Palm Beach County’s teachers do. Teachers in Palm Beach County earn an average of $69,300 per year or 22% more than the number from the state that’s being bandied about. It’s a number that’s close to the national average that sits at about $72k – especially with the county’s proposed raise which would result in average pay above 70k. This is part of the reason there’s been an impasse between the teacher’s union, the CTA, which originally had demanded a 4.8% raise for PBC’s teacher's while the Palm Beach County School District had offered up raises of 1.5%. Notably, the district has been hemorrhaging students as other South Florida school districts have been doing as well. In fact, there are about 6,600 fewer students in Palm Beach County’s schools year-over-year. With federal and state funding tied to head count, what the decline in student populations mean is $66 million less in funding. In other words, it’s not as if additional money for whatever size raises the CTA (and seemingly WPTV) are seeking just magically exists which also significantly complicates this. It’s easy to shout platitudes about paying teachers more. It’s much harder to be a serious person with $66 million less coming through the door and attempting to figure out how to balance the district’s checkbook and all while still offering to pay teachers more). The significantly lower student count also means the district needs significantly fewer teachers generally. Palm Beach County’s public schools average about 16 students per teacher. That means the district needs about 413 fewer teachers than it did last year, and in fact the district eliminated 765 positions prior to the start of this school year. It’s also worth mentioning that the average full-time income in Palm Beach County is approximately $55k per year, or about 25% less than what teachers make before a raise. Somewhere along the way I feel it’s also appropriate to ask the question about how much more than the average parent of a student in a local school a teacher should be earning too. It can still be debated whether $70k per year is enough for teachers to teach here – but in order for any honest debate or even conversations to take place – the facts first need to be established. Whether it’s intellectual dishonesty or just poor reporting from people who don’t know things but say stuff, the coverage of teacher compensation has been consistently conflated.
Takeaway #2: The Political Disconnect
The Iran war isn’t popular, President Trump currently isn’t either, and no one likes paying higher gas prices...yet there remains a significant political disconnect which also creates an excellent opportunity for the incumbent party. One of the points I often will hear made when talking with Trump supporters who can’t believe that the Democrat Party could potentially be in position to sweep toss up races and seize congressional control this November is that suddenly most Americans have decided that they like Democrats and their inflation, open borders, and sanctuary policies. In reality, they don’t. Let's break down the macro political state of play. In the RealClear Politics average of polls only 40% of Americans approve of the Iran war. Similarly, President Trump’s overall approval rating only stands at 40%. Combined with the fact that this is a midterm election cycle, in which historic political trends have led to the party out-of-power almost always winning (all but 3 midterm elections since the advent of the current two-party system) ...the outlook for the GOP looks particularly bleak. And to be sure the generic ballot shows that if the midterm election were today – Democrats would win going away. But at the same time what we also see is...
Takeaway #3: A significant political opportunity for President Trump and the GOP
Take the YouGov/Economist poll released yesterday. President Trump’s approval rating was shown to be 40% - which is exactly the overall average of all polls. In that same poll that showed Trump with a net negative 18% approval rating – on the generic ballot the same voters only said they currently preferred Democrats on the generic ballot by 3-points. Meaning that there’s a 15-point disconnect between current displeasure with President Trump’s policies and the desire to vote for the Democrat Party. In fact, the Democrat Party’s favorability rating remains 4-points lower than the GOP currently. What this shows is a potential political opportunity. One in which if President Trump can quickly stick the landing on Iran, quickly wrap up whatever will be with Cuba and then relentlessly focus on domestic issues a la affordability, there still appears to be a meaningful window of opportunity to change the current midterm trajectory. That’s a lot that would need to come together – but what’s clear is that the Democrat Party hasn’t won over any voters with their positioning and messaging – thus Trump has a chance to win them back.