... Most I know in this area work incredibly long hours during the school year, are under constant pressure to do more uncompensated tasks, have to spend more time documenting what they've taught than actually teaching, endure ridiculous pressure from parents and administration, and have to deal with truly awful behavior from students with little support. Morale isn't good at all. ... In a lot of areas, the pensions aren't good at all for new teachers, more like a 401(k). ...
Sounds a lot like the private sector, except without the summers free, and no time off on the holidays (major shipments going on right up through the EOY! Gotta make the Quarter! Be in, or at least be on call!), and substitute 'what pensions?' for 'the pensions aren't good at all' !
Though I agree with others not to make the change solely for the summers and other time off. You owe it to the kids to be 'into it' and do a great job. And the skill sets for being a great teacher may be very different from being great in some other field. I didn't get a feel for how long you'd be teaching (just a few years before full retirement, or a real 'career'?). But if you are going to be more towards a short time (say 10 years or less), you probably don't care that much about taking classes in the summer for advancement. But if you want to make it a career, you probably will need to think about that.
Also, as far as steady pay, one thing I need to get off my chest: When you hear the media (or the Union) say that the teachers in some area 'have not received a raise in three years' or some such, you need to translate that if you are a private sector employee. From what I've seen, they did get a 'raise' - by contract, [had to edit a typo:] a [-]5[/-]
6 year teacher makes more than a [-]6[/-]
5 year teacher. So you get more money next year. In the private sector, this is called 'a raise'. I the school system, this is not a raise, they bury it under the name 'step increase', and wave the 'no raise' flag. Also, when they are not getting 'raises', they may qualify for more pay through those classes they take during the summer. But again, they don't call that a raise - in the private sector, when your base salary increases, it is a 'raise' .
-ERD50