I think that each of the factors that you allude to in 1, 2 and 4 play a role, but despite these things, prima facie there still seems to be a market failure. The gap between between the maximum starting salary of a teacher as far as I know (maybe around $30/hr?) and the $500/hr salary for tutoring that you cite seems to be too big to justify via reference to 1, 2 and 4 alone.
I wonder if there’s an arbitrage opportunity here? If so, the limiting factor is probably organization/coordination.
Agree with jsalvatier about 3.
About 5, I would guess that a major part of why the typical wealthy parents hire expensive tutors does have to do with relative status & signaling, but would guess that they’re not primarily concerned with letter grades but rather, e.g. college admissions.
Thanks for raising this interesting topic.
I think that each of the factors that you allude to in 1, 2 and 4 play a role, but despite these things, prima facie there still seems to be a market failure. The gap between between the maximum starting salary of a teacher as far as I know (maybe around $30/hr?) and the $500/hr salary for tutoring that you cite seems to be too big to justify via reference to 1, 2 and 4 alone.
I wonder if there’s an arbitrage opportunity here? If so, the limiting factor is probably organization/coordination.
Agree with jsalvatier about 3.
About 5, I would guess that a major part of why the typical wealthy parents hire expensive tutors does have to do with relative status & signaling, but would guess that they’re not primarily concerned with letter grades but rather, e.g. college admissions.