Would you say the same about a pilot, mechanic, computer tech/programmer, engineer, attorney, sales/marketing rep, etc? Personally, I’d feel someone who said that about any profession, including teaching is just exhibiting profound cluelessness about the occupation itself at the very least.
As a career educator and child of two career educators who was raised on a campus where every adult I knew until I was 18 was a teacher, I strongly disagree.
Particularly (re experience mattering) - because I don’t see each year teaching as an “essentially identical job” - sometimes, people see something like “L.A. Law” and think they know how to be a lawyer…this is precisely what we’re seeing when a layperson thinks they really understand what it takes to be a teacher because they saw Mrs. Krabappel on the Simpsons. 
Also, re what @cobrat said, even if something is closer to being “essentially identical” (say, being a plumber or pilot) - I’d sure want to hire the more experienced one!
(I say closer to being identical not out of disrespect to pilots or plumbers, but because by nature mechanical things are closer to being identical than human beings are.)
@cobrat, no because those jobs are constantly evolving with a wealth of new material, new products, new customers, evolving relationships, additional responsibilities and procedural and technological upgrades. You can’t say that teaching Algebra II changes very much when you teach a set of new kids every year of the same basic age and ability.
And I was referring to the learning curve. The vast majority of learning in a particular task takes place at the very beginning. Do you deliver more value in year 1 vs year 20? You could argue that the sales rep for sold $500K in year 1 and $20M in year 20 did. Or the software developer who worked on a higher value project did. Or a pilot who flies a 787 instead of an Beechcraft did. I don’t think you could make the same case for a public school teacher who is delivering a similar service in year 1 vs year 20.
@TooOld4School -
"@cobrat, no because those jobs are constantly evolving with a wealth of new material, new products, new customers, evolving relationships, additional responsibilities and procedural and technological upgrades. You can’t say that teaching Algebra II changes very much when you teach a set of new kids every year of the same basic age and ability. "
Actually, I can say exactly that. Since you haven’t to my knowledge ever worked as a teacher, you don’t actually have the ability to speak to this. I’m not understanding why you won’t take the word of actual teachers who say that there is indeed a “wealth of new material, new products, new customers, evolving relationships, additional responsibilities and procedural and technological upgrades” as a matter of fact - that was a pretty good list of the things that change in a school from year to year.
But think even more specifically of a job like being a pilot - the more flights you do, you learn how to respond quickly and appropriately better and better. In the classroom this translates into doing a better job the more you learn and practice your craft - even if nothing actually changed externally year to year (which is untrue in any event).
Occasionally, you also get a very gifted person of one profession or another who has unusual talent right off the bat - even this person improves with experience. I suppose that after many decades, for some workers in all professions, exhaustion and burnout may set in, particularly in professions that are so often maligned 
I can tell you that if I need surgery, Gd forbid, I want a surgeon who has more experience, even if a layperson thinks that their job is “substantially equivalent” each surgery that they do.
ETA to your new statement:
“I don’t think you could make the same case for a public school teacher who is delivering a similar service in year 1 vs year 20”
Then it sounds like you haven’t been in the classroom of the same person in both of these years, because then you would know the difference!
Hear, hear, @fretfulmother !
Update from the Administration’s budget perspective on HBCU funding: The meeting appears to have been for photo op purposes solely as not only did an increase in funding not take place (fine, there are other priorities and we can not increase funding for all the very worthy causes) but it seems they will LOSE funding. The budget calls for maintaining $492 million but the combined discretionary spending for them is actually $577 million right now. The WH directed questions about that difference to the Education Dept who of course, did not respond. Additionally, instead of expanding Pell grants for low-income students to cover summer courses as had been asked, they TOOK nearly $4 billion from that program’s reserves. Guess we now know what “the blacks” had to lose…
^ ^
Methinks a FB friend who suggested IHOP and other breakfast places run a special presidential promotion on waffles was onto something…
@fretfulmother My wish for public education is that every student have a teacher as smart, literate and thoughtful as you. I have no doubt that you improve with every year of experience (claims to the opposite are absolutely mind-boggling).
@Capecodder2014 - thank you so much!! What a kind and generous thing to say.
@fretfulmother and @marvin100 and @cobrat - As a high tech guy who has seen his corporate income grow significantly from year 1 to year X, I back you up 110%. Why? Because my wife is a public school teacher, and she absolutely deserves every raise her union is lucky enough to negotiate in their contract. I am astonished by the ignorance of a society that neither understands nor values the work of a teacher. And this is exactly why teachers’ unions must continue to exist. Yes, they have their faults. Yes, they can sometimes obstruct progress and reform. Yes, some of my children’s teachers (and wife’s colleagues) should have been ousted a long time ago, had it not been for the current tenure practices. But without these protections, people like those running the current administration would make sure teachers get slave wages for their labor. And clueless administrators and crazy parents would make teachers’ lives a living hell. I didn’t understand these things until my wife entered the field of education. Now I know, and I am a staunch advocate.
Thanks @BobShaw! Your wife (and all of us) are lucky to have articulate advocates like you in the “real world”!