Part 4 of 8 in The Office That Tripled

Philadelphia has about 198,000 students enrolled in its public schools — roughly 13% of the city’s 1.5 million residents. According to the most recent SDP data, it takes 21,543 people to serve that student body. As part of my research into the District’s budget, I wanted to figure out who those people are, what they do, and how much they earn.

The histogram splits into three groups. About 14,000 people — teachers, technicians, social workers, and other in-school support staff — earn between $40,000 and $120,000. About 700 people earn $120,000 to $200,000, covering top-step teachers past their lane ceiling, principals, and central-office administrators. 23 people earn more than $200,000, including the Superintendent at $378,741.

The 14,000 in the first group are mostly doing the same job. TEACHER is the top title in both halves of that band. A first-year teacher sits near $50K; a teacher with ten years of experience and a doctorate sits near $110K. The step-and-lane structure of the union contract sets the pay: years of service plus education level (bachelor’s, master’s, PhD) determine the band, regardless of which school the teacher is at. The two humps inside $40K–$120K aren’t two different roles — they’re the same role at different career stages on the same schedule.

At $120K the union schedule ends. Above that line, SDP uses a separate administrative pay schedule — not covered by any union — for top-step teachers continuing past their lane ceiling, principals, and central-office directors. The thin zone at $120K–$150K is where the two schedules meet (about 385 positions). Past $135K the count drops further: 417 positions, with 4 earning more than $250K and just one above $300K — the Superintendent.

Then and now

Eleven years ago the salaried roster had 16,647 positions. Below $120K the two humps were already there, in roughly the same shape. The total workforce grew 30% between 2014-15 and 2025-26; the population below $120K grew about the same.

What changed was everything above the cliff. The boundary zone filled in: $120K–$135K went from a handful of positions to about 300. Above $150K the count went from 9 to 332. Above $175K: 5 → 57. Above $180K: 2 → 47. The right tail grew about 13× while the rest of the workforce grew 30%.

What this looks like in numbers

Three out of four salaried positions earn below $100K. Below $135K is 98.1% of the workforce:

• 76.5% earn below $100K (16,472 positions).
• 23.3% earn $100K–$175K (5,014 positions).
• 0.26% earn $175K or more (57 positions).

The median SALARIED position pays $67,638. The 75th percentile is around $97K; the 90th is $110,720.

That’s the shape of the salaried workforce by pay. The piece after this one takes the same 21,543 positions and sorts them by what kind of work each role does. The histogram you just looked at and the chart you’ll see next are the same headcount, viewed two different ways.

This is the system that teaches, protects, comforts and supports a student body nearly 200,000 strong — one out of every seven Philadelphians.

Notes, Sources, and Methodology

Source: SDP’s quarterly position roster on OpenDataPhilly, 2014-15 and 2025-26 snapshots. Salaried only: HOURLY × 1,800 annualization inflates part-time workers (a NOON TIME AIDE PER DIEM SUB at $580/hr annualizes to $1.04M) into apparent high earners and would distort the upper tail. Bin width $10K, range $40K–$300K. The top bin captures everything above $290K (1 position: the Superintendent at $378,741); above $250K there are 4 positions. Of the 57 positions earning $175K or more, 53 are central admin (the same C-suite count as Piece 2 of this series) and 4 are school-based.

Counts: 21,543 SALARIED positions in 2025-26; 16,647 in 2014-15. The salary-schedule cliff at $120K–$150K reflects the boundary between the District’s step-and-lane salary schedule (which covers teachers and most school-based roles) and the administrative salary schedule, which is graded separately — a descriptive artifact of how SDP is structured, not a policy claim.