In FL a new 4 year grad earns 45k+pension+benefits. Most teachers I know work from 8-3 in the classroom and a few hours outside of that, and a many of them hold second hand jobs, not because they have to by any means, but to simply support frivolous expenses. Add in the ridiculous amount of holidays and summer off, and they are one of the most overpaid professions in my opinion. It takes little special education and ability to teach and almost anyone can do it. Could I walk into any classroom tomorrow K-12 and teach it, yes with out a doubt.
IIZENII, you obvious know nothing about teaching, have never taught, and likely do not know any teachers. My father was a professor, and I have been in contact with teachers throughout my life. In addition, while my chosen career did not explicitly call for teaching, I made it a point to ensure that I taught my clients enough about what I was doing that the problems they were having were no longer complete mysteries. Let me address some of your points - first off, there is that working day. Most teachers I have known typically get to their classroom at least an hour before school starts, to make sure that they are up to speed on the day's lessons, do final checks that the materials they need are at hand and the room is fairly neat. As for the time afterwards, even taking your numbers it means that teachers work upwards of two hours of unpaid overtime every day. If the tests a teacher gives require more than checking one option of a multiple choice question, then, it can take up to an hour to grade. With too many classrooms having 40 or so students in them, that is anywhere from 20 to 40 hours of other work each week. Add to that the time that it takes the teacher to re-work lesson plans to take into account new data, or the changes implemented by politically motivated school boards and you add more hours to the week.
As for what teacher's earn...The salaries in the high-population states may be relatively high, but, as others have pointed out, the cost of living can be much higher. In Tennessee, for example, the average salary is closer to $37K. In the 1960s, that would have been a good wage. Now, it is close to allowing the teacher to receive food stamps and other state aid. If the teacher is a single person, with no children, it is quite possible to exist on that level of income. All you have to give up are vacations, eating out, and tickets to entertainment events. If the teacher happens to be a single mother, the situation is much, much more challenging.
Finally, as for your remark that "anyone can teach". I have to take issue with that after decades of observing the profession, both from the inside and the outside. Being able to present information is a skill that anyone can have. Being able to teach it - I. E. present it to a student in a form that allows them to understand it, and incorporate that understanding into their model of reality - is more of a gift. The problem is that no two people learn in the same manner, so, what works with one will fail with another. When I am explaining concepts about how the computer works, for example, I have to find concrete examples that people can grasp. To explain how a hard drive works, with one person I might use the example of the pigeonholes that the Post office used to use for sorting mail. With another person, a room full of filing cabinets works better. With a third person, referring to the stacks of a library gives them insight to start them on the path of understanding. Good, gifted teachers understand this, and can tell when a student is not getting it, and, can work to find that concrete example that brings understanding. Poor teachers are only able to present the data they have in one fashion. I am reminded of "The Big Bang Theory", and Sheldon Cooper as a perfect example of the latter teacher. His character is, without a doubt, a genius who is perfectly comfortable moving in worlds of concepts that we, ordinary folks, can only guess at. However, he is almost totally incapable of communicating the information he knows to anyone that is not working on his level of intellect. What good is a teacher who can only teach a few dozen people out of the entire world's population when there are tens of thousands of less capable students who really need to understand basic concepts of physics and math?