And, regardless of popularity as in likeableness, any teacher who demonstrates mastery of their chosen field, that is, the reliability of their word as rational evidence, will get respect from their students, whether willingly or grudgingly.

This would be nice, but in my experience is not always true. Maybe your school experience was different to mine, but I found that within a certain age range the teacher is often most disliked person in student's whole world.

your company is not sought after, but your judgement and knowledge are, and isn't that more important and valuable in the end?

Such a life might not be very pleasant, if people only ever spend time with you when they need you for something, rather than because they like you. I would also imagine it is quite stressful, respect is very easy to lose with a single mistake.