I don't know a working person in America who doesn't think they aren't worth more money.   It's unfair to lable Educators as more prone to greed than anyone else.   If you don't think inflated budget request are common in private industry you fooling yourself LFS.    Labeling gov workers in ways that make them look much different than you and your neighbors is terribly unfair.

What I find really difficult to know is where do you put the responsibility for failing grades and low attendence?     I happen to think the variables of the home life dominate the problem(hypothesis) Holding teachers responsible as substitute parents takes their focus off of education.   

Problem solvers would ask what's going on at home, as they should.  But is that responsibility of a public school?   I'm not damning educators for working on home life issues, they do it from empathy for the child.     To the flip side you don't evaluate/grade a child's progress based on sympathy for their environment.