The U.S. Department of Education breaks down the spending percentages in each category for us, as shown in Table 3. The numbers are for the entire United States for the 1994-95 school year. That is, wealthy and poor school districts allocate their funds in approximately these same percentages no matter where they are located. That is a satisfactory response for most school officials, but it doesn't go far enough. Obviously not the students, so it must be the employees.
Education is without a doubt a labor-intensive enterprise.
But just how much education spending goes to labor might come as a shock to some people. Table 4 breaks spending into salaries, benefits, purchased services, supplies, and other. It raises huge unanswered questions about the education labor pool. It bears mentioning that the percentage of spending that has been going to salaries and benefits has been slowly increasing over the last five years. It includes everyone from superintendents to custodians, librarians and secretaries.