Posted By:
Jim VBDavid,
I don't see that as "fortunate." I agree with your assessment as to why those different careers compensate at different levels, but that's not the result of fortune.
Both you and Jeff had decisions to make at various times in your life. How hard to study, what kinds of grades to get, what schools to attend, what majors to pursue, and how to apply that knowledge to a career.
I assume that you made your choices, knowing how society valued and compensated educators. So did Jeff. So did most of the rest of us. To use hindsight and call those decisions "fortunate" is revisionist hindsight.
Unless there was some lottery deciding upon high school grades, college choices, college grades, and careers, it's free choice, not "fortune."
However, Jeff gets the same response when he says $250,000 doesn't go as far in NYC as it does in other places. If he doesn't like NYC economics, he can move to Arizona and practice there. 