This state of affairs has had one other effect which is of vital importance when the economic position of women teachers is being considered, namely, that local authorities, in order to appease the popular outcry against this apparently overstocked market, have been led to sanction regulations for the compulsory retirement of women teachers on marriage. Happily the London County Council has not succumbed to this temptation, and there are other equally enlightened authorities. But constant watchfulness is needed in order to prevent retrogression in this matter. Young teachers, anxiously awaiting promotion, sometimes foolishly resist the appointment or retention of married women. This is a suicidal policy, to be resisted at all costs, both in the interests of the teachers and of the children. Salaries are bound to remain low, while women are forced to consider their profession in the light of a stop-gap until marriage, and not as a life-work. Moreover, there are real dangers in entrusting girls' education entirely to unmarried women. The salaries of assistant teachers vary very considerably. In no single instance is a woman teacher paid the same rate of salary as a man of the same professional status. This is true even when the work is identical in character, as is the case in mixed schools and pupil teachers' centres. One of the results of this inequality of payment is that women teachers are often employed to teach the lower classes in boys' schools, and some rural schools are staffed entirely by women, not because the woman teacher is deemed more suitable for the work, but because her labour is cheaper; hence the need, in the teaching profession, for recognition of the principle of "equal pay for equal work." Without it, the status of the woman becomes lower than that of the man, inferior or unqualified women are appointed, and men are driven from the profession. Only when there is equality of pay can there be security that the best candidate will be appointed, irrespective of sex. The following table taken from the latest returns of the Board of Education contrasts the number of women and men employed in the elementary schools of England, and the number of women and men employed in the better paid higher elementary schools of the country, for the year 1910-11. Higher Elementary Elementary Schools Schools. No. of Head Teachers (certificated) Men : 12,477 : 36 " " " " Women : 16,648 : 4 " Assistant " " Men : 18,659 : 161 " " " Women : 46,881 : 117 " " (uncertificated) Men : 5,091 : 4 " " " Women : 34,910 : 2