Occupation / job
History Teachers, Postsecondary
Median annual pay. Half earn less than this.
Hourly at a standard 2,080-hour year. We do not yet have unpaid-time or cost data for this, so this is not an adjusted figure.
The middle half. A quarter earn below this range.
Source: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 · view
What this figure cannot tell you
It covers people EMPLOYED in this occupation. Anyone who trained for it and was never hired is not in the median above, and neither is anyone doing the work self-employed. No verified count of qualified people exists for this occupation, so this page shows none rather than an estimate. Why that matters · The occupations where we could source it
Who this suits
At $83,820 against a $50,020 national midpoint, History Teachers, Postsecondary pays 68% more than the typical American job — $33,800 a year of difference. Read the entry requirements before the number.
18,790 people work as History Teachers, Postsecondary. That is enough for a functioning national market and not enough for a functioning local one — in most metros this is a few employers rather than a field you can move around inside.
These posts suit people who genuinely enjoy explaining a field to people encountering it for the first time, every year, to a new set of them.
No verified preparation time is on file for History Teachers, Postsecondary. The wage survey behind every figure on this page asks employers what they pay, not what they required, so the honest answer here is that we do not know.
Who should not do this
$48,170 separates the bottom quarter of History Teachers, Postsecondary at $63,920 from the top quarter at $112,090. At a 1.8x ratio the midpoint is a weak guide to your own first year — find out which end you would be entering at.
At $63,920, or $30.73 an hour, the 25th percentile sits $13,900 above the $50,020 the typical American job pays. Occupations with floors this high almost always have a requirement holding them there.
Avoid it if the administrative and committee load would spoil the subject for you, because it is a large share of the week.
There is no failure rate on this page because there is nothing honest to divide by. BLS counted 18,790 people employed as History Teachers, Postsecondary; it did not count the people who trained for it and are doing something else, and a rate built without that denominator would be a number we made up.
What the spread tells you
A ratio of 1.8x — $63,920 to $112,090 — is wide enough that specialising inside History Teachers, Postsecondary pays measurably. $83,820 is the middle of a range you can move within.
The middle half of this field earns between $63,920 and $112,090. That is $48,170 of range, with $83,820 sitting inside it as the point half the field is above and half below.
Getting to $112,090, the 75th percentile, is worth $28,270 a year more than the $83,820 midpoint and $48,170 more than the $63,920 a quarter of History Teachers, Postsecondary settle for.
$28,270 separates $83,820 from the $112,090 top quarter, while only $19,900 separates it from $63,920. The range leans upward, which means the middle of History Teachers, Postsecondary has more room above it than a symmetric reading of the median would suggest.
On a 2,080-hour year the midpoint for History Teachers, Postsecondary is $40.29 an hour. The quarters sit at $30.73 and $53.88, and the all-occupation midpoint at $24.04.
What these figures are, and what they are not
The $83,820 figure is what employers pay employees. It is before tax and before deductions, it excludes the self-employed entirely, and it says nothing about anyone who does this work on their own account.
With no unpaid-hours or cost data for History Teachers, Postsecondary, the hourly figure is $83,820 over a 2,080-hour year — a unit conversion, not an adjustment.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else