The Salary Shame Spiral: Why Teachers Feel Embarrassed About What They Earn (And What To Do About It)

Someone asks what you do for work. You say you're a teacher. They nod, maybe say something about how important teachers are, and then the conversation moves on.

What they don't ask is what you earn. And you're relieved, because if they did, you'd feel that familiar tightness in your chest.

You know the number. You know it hasn't kept pace with your mortgage, with childcare costs, with the price of groceries. You know your friends from uni who went into corporate roles are earning double what you make. You know because you've done the maths late at night when you couldn't sleep.

And somewhere along the way, you started feeling embarrassed about it.

Not just frustrated. Embarrassed. Like your salary says something about your worth as a professional. Like you made a bad choice. Like you should have known better.

This is the salary shame spiral. And it's keeping you stuck.

How the spiral works

It starts with a gap. The gap between what you earn and what you feel your work deserves. The gap between your salary and your peers in other professions. The gap between your contribution and your compensation.

That gap creates cognitive dissonance. You work hard. You're good at what you do. You've developed real expertise. And yet the number on your payslip doesn't reflect any of that.

To resolve the dissonance, your brain tells you a story.

Maybe it tells you that money doesn't matter, that you're in it for the kids, that caring about salary is shallow. This story protects you from the pain of the gap but also keeps you from doing anything about it.

Or maybe it tells you the opposite. That you made a mistake. That teaching was the wrong choice. That the salary reflects your actual value and you're just not worth more. This story is worse. It turns external circumstances into internal identity.

Either way, you stop talking about it. You deflect salary questions. You feel a flush of shame when someone mentions what they earn. You tell yourself it's fine, it's fine, it's fine, whilst a quiet resentment builds.

The shame becomes a prison. Because as long as you're embarrassed by your salary, you can't clearly assess your situation. You can't explore options. You can't advocate for yourself. The shame keeps you silent, and the silence keeps you stuck.

The story you've been told

Here's the narrative that created this shame.

Teaching is a calling. Callings aren't about money. If you wanted money, you should have done something else. The fact that you didn't proves you're not motivated by money, so why would you complain about not having it?

This narrative is convenient for everyone except you.

It's convenient for school systems that need to retain teachers without paying market rates. It's convenient for governments that want quality education without adequate funding. It's convenient for anyone who benefits from your labour being undervalued.

The narrative conflates two separate things: caring about your work and accepting poor compensation for it.

You can care deeply about teaching AND believe you deserve to be paid fairly.

You can love your students AND want financial security for your family.

You can find meaning in education AND feel frustrated that your expertise isn't valued.

These aren't contradictions. They're just being a professional who also has a life outside work.

The "calling" narrative strips you of the right to expect fair compensation. It makes salary concerns feel like moral failures. It turns legitimate economic grievances into personal shortcomings.

No wonder you feel ashamed.

What your skills are actually worth

Let me show you something.

A product manager at a mid-tier tech company earns $150,000 to $200,000 in Australia. Their job is to understand user needs, translate them into requirements, work with teams to build solutions, and communicate across the organisation.

You do this. You identify learning gaps. You translate curriculum into lesson plans. You work with students to build understanding. You communicate with parents, colleagues, and admin constantly.

A management consultant at a Big Four firm earns similar numbers. Their job is to diagnose problems, develop solutions, and present recommendations to executives who don't have time for complexity.

You do this. You diagnose student needs. You develop differentiated approaches. You explain complex ideas simply to people who don't want to listen.

A customer success manager earns $100,000 to $130,000. Their job is to ensure clients achieve their goals, to troubleshoot problems, to build relationships that drive retention.

You do this. With thirty clients at once. Five periods a day. Whilst also handling behaviour management, pastoral care, and playground duty.

An instructional designer earns $80,000 to $120,000. Their job is to create learning experiences that move people from not knowing to knowing, from not being able to do something to being able to do it.

This is literally your job description.

The skills that get these salaries are the skills you've been developing for years. The gap isn't capability. The gap is context.

You're not being paid less because you're worth less. You're being paid less because you're in a system that has historically undervalued the work you do.

That's not a reflection of you. That's a reflection of broken economics.

Why this matters

The shame spiral isn't just emotionally painful. It has practical consequences.

When you're ashamed of your salary, you don't explore options. You assume other fields won't want you. You don't apply for roles you're qualified for because the imposter syndrome is too strong. The shame becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

When you're ashamed of your salary, you undersell yourself. In conversations, in interviews, in negotiations. You're so used to feeling undervalued that you accept undervaluation as normal. You don't ask for what you're worth because you're not sure you're worth anything.

When you're ashamed of your salary, you stay silent. You don't talk to colleagues about pay. You don't share information that might help others. You don't advocate collectively for better conditions. The shame isolates you, and isolation weakens everyone.

Breaking the spiral isn't just about feeling better. It's about seeing clearly enough to take action.

The reframe

Here's what I want you to understand.

Your salary is not a measure of your worth. It's a measure of the market you're in.

Markets value skills differently based on supply, demand, and what buyers are willing to pay. The private sector pays more for communication skills, user empathy, and learning design because companies have learnt these skills drive business outcomes. Schools pay less because public funding is constrained and the "calling" narrative suppresses wage demands.

Same skills. Different markets. Different prices.

This means your salary says nothing about your capability. It only says something about where you've been applying your capability.

If you took your skills to a different market, you would be paid differently. Not because you'd suddenly become more valuable, but because you'd be in a context that prices those skills higher.

The shame you feel comes from conflating your salary with your worth. Once you separate them, the shame loses its power.

You are a highly capable professional with transferable skills that command premium salaries in other contexts. You happen to be in a context that doesn't pay premium salaries.

That's not embarrassing. That's just information.

What to do about it

Breaking the spiral requires action, not just reframing. Here's where to start.

Step 1: Know the numbers

Research what your skills are worth in other markets. Look at job postings for instructional designers, learning experience designers, customer success managers, product managers. Note the salary ranges. Note the skill requirements.

You'll find that you meet most of them. That's not an accident.

Step 2: Translate your experience

Stop describing your work in education language. Start translating it to business language.

"I taught Year 10 English" becomes "I designed and delivered learning experiences for diverse audiences, adjusting in real-time based on engagement signals."

"I managed parent communication" becomes "I handled sensitive stakeholder communications, balancing competing interests whilst maintaining trust."

"I differentiated for mixed abilities" becomes "I created personalised user experiences that met people where they were and moved them toward shared outcomes."

Same work. Different framing. Completely different perceived value.

Step 3: Build evidence

You have years of work that demonstrates your capabilities. You just haven't documented it in a way that non-teachers can evaluate.

Write up one project as a case study. A curriculum redesign. A technology adoption. A process improvement. Use problem-solution-results structure. Quantify where you can.

This becomes your portfolio. Proof that you can do the work, even if you've never had the title.

Step 4: Talk about it

Break the silence. Tell colleagues what you're exploring. Share salary information when appropriate. Normalise the conversation about teacher pay and what it means.

The shame thrives in isolation. Connection dissolves it.

Step 5: Make a decision

Once you've done the research, you have information you didn't have before. You know what your skills are worth. You know what's available. You can make an informed choice.

You might decide to stay in teaching because you love it, knowing you're choosing meaning over money. That's a legitimate choice, made with clear eyes.

You might decide to transition, knowing you have skills that transfer and markets that value them. That's also a legitimate choice.

You might decide to build something on the side, keeping teaching whilst creating additional income. That's a third path.

The point isn't what you choose. The point is that you're choosing from clarity, not from shame.

The permission you need

If you've read this far, let me give you something directly.

You are allowed to care about money.

You are allowed to want financial security, to want to pay off your mortgage faster, to want to take holidays without counting every dollar.

You are allowed to feel frustrated that your skills aren't valued the way they would be in other contexts.

You are allowed to explore options without betraying your love of teaching.

You are allowed to leave teaching if that's what you want, and you're allowed to stay if that's what you want, and neither choice makes you a better or worse person.

The salary shame spiral keeps you stuck because it makes all of this feel forbidden. It makes wanting more feel like wanting too much. It makes self-interest feel like selfishness.

It's not. It's just being a professional who deserves to be paid fairly for valuable work.

Your skills are worth $120,000+ in the private sector. You just haven't translated them yet.

That's not a limitation. That's an opportunity.