Leandro Nunes Soares da Silva

Regarding the importance of higher education level, for both the persons and the society they live in, and the fact that Brazil has demonstrated poor performance on international evaluations, this paper aims at presenting an evaluation of the teachers’ labor market. This study was conducted by analyzing the appeal of the teaching career, the determinants of the wage differential among teachers’ categories, in addition to scrutinizing the determinants of educational performance, stressing the role of the teacher. For this purpose, data from RAIS and SAEB, 2017, were studied by using the yield equation methods, the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition method, and spatial econometrics. The main results obtained regarding the teachers' labor market was that their remuneration is higher than the average remuneration of the population with other formal work. However, when looking at teachers that have higher education levels, the total remuneration of teachers is lower than that of other professionals, but the hourly wage is practically the same, even though the teachers are older and have more experience at work. Considering the analysis of the wage return through the income equation, in which countless control characteristics are needed, it was noticed that teachers earn less, even when their wage is compared among professionals with all qualifications. An analysis of wage differences has shown that statutory teachers who work in Paraná and have a long-time experience in the field are paid higher salaries despite their education. On the other hand, teachers who work in private schools and the ones who teach at primary of elementary schools, receive less money according to their attributes. The results regarding school performance showed that the three states in southern Brazil have the highest scores of the country when it comes to proficiency level in certain school subjects. Although the analysis among the cities scores has shown heterogeneity in the indicators, the cities in the South of Rio Grande do Sul have presented the lowest scores. Concerning school performance determinants, it was possible to notice that the socioeconomic variables had a great impact on students’ grades. At last, the research demonstrated that teachers with a higher income may contribute to students’ good performance. Therefore, the remuneration of elementary education teachers in southern Brazil is not attractive, especially for teachers with higher education. Besides, it was possible to understand that a higher remuneration can help to increase the grades obtained by students in The National Basic Education Assessment System – SAEB.