Cessna sued for skydiving accident.

On 2007-12-05, Neil Gould wrote:
Recently, Doug Carter posted:

On 2007-12-04, Neil Gould wrote:

In the US, primary education is not a national priority, nor a
state-level priority, and in many if not most communities, not a
local priority. On a national level,...

Regardless of priority, the presumption that U.S. education is
underfunded is a persistent myth as is the belief that funding levels
and results (educated students) are causally related.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa126.html

To begin with, I did not write that "education is underfunded" in the
sense that you are suggesting or that your cited reference uses. If you
wish to make such an argument, it would be a good idea to quote my entire
paragraph so that others can see how you have intentionally distorted its
meaning.

Sorry. I missunderstood your meaning; my bad.

To support your conclusion based on the article, which IMO is suprisingly
poor for the CATO institute, one has to determine how much of the funding
actually reaches the individual student, as it is only "per pupil" if the
pupil directly benefits from it. The article was written in 1990, and
basically supports the NEA statement that there was a 31% increase in
government spending "for education" during the prior decade. What do we
know about that period of time that might raise questions about the actual
value of that money? How much did your car or your house cost in 1980 vs.
1990? I can tell you that my 1984 vehicle cost about 1/3 of what the same
make and model cost when I replaced it in 1991 (and the cost of the same
make and model was almost 60% more when it was replaced in 2001). Also,
expenditures that were typical in 1990 were non-existant in 1980, for
example purchases of personal computers. So, to me, that 31% increase is
not positively impressive.


I don't think that the rate of increase in education funding has ever been
below the inflation rate in this country.

Even so, my point was not about the *amount* of money, it was about the
PRIORITIES, in particular how that money is spent. In our community, we
spend more per pupil than all but one other community in the state, but we
are not getting that kind of return on our investment. I (and the state
auditor FWIW) attribute it to a top-heavy school system. So, on what do
you base the relevance of your "Regardless of priority..." as an argument
for our lack of success in educating these youth?

Again, I read your post too quickly and missunderstood it. I agree completly
with your last paragraph. Lets start at the Federal level by disolving the
Department of Education as my fellow Republicans promised, but failed to do in
the mid '90s. Next, lets bust the state monopoly on primary and secondary
education.

Recently, Doug Carter posted:

On 2007-12-05, Neil Gould wrote:
Recently, Doug Carter posted:

To begin with, I did not write that "education is underfunded" in the
sense that you are suggesting or that your cited reference uses. If
you wish to make such an argument, it would be a good idea to quote
my entire paragraph so that others can see how you have
intentionally distorted its meaning.

Sorry. I missunderstood your meaning; my bad.

No problem, it happens.

To support your conclusion based on the article, which IMO is
suprisingly poor for the CATO institute, one has to determine how
much of the funding actually reaches the individual student, as it
is only "per pupil" if the pupil directly benefits from it. The
article was written in 1990, and basically supports the NEA
statement that there was a 31% increase in government spending "for
education" during the prior decade. What do we know about that
period of time that might raise questions about the actual value of
that money? How much did your car or your house cost in 1980 vs.
1990? I can tell you that my 1984 vehicle cost about 1/3 of what the
same make and model cost when I replaced it in 1991 (and the cost of
the same make and model was almost 60% more when it was replaced in
2001). Also, expenditures that were typical in 1990 were
non-existant in 1980, for example purchases of personal computers.
So, to me, that 31% increase is not positively impressive.


I don't think that the rate of increase in education funding has ever
been below the inflation rate in this country.

Well, that may be a different issue, but you may be surprised. Do you know
what the rate of inflation was for that period?

http://inflationdata.com/inflation/I..._currentPage=1

Also, I wrote of expenditures that would probably be included in the NEA's
funding statement (the article took a backwards approach to this, so this
is speculation on my part).

Even so, my point was not about the *amount* of money, it was about
the PRIORITIES, in particular how that money is spent. In our
community, we spend more per pupil than all but one other community
in the state, but we are not getting that kind of return on our
investment. I (and the state auditor FWIW) attribute it to a
top-heavy school system. So, on what do you base the relevance of
your "Regardless of priority..." as an argument for our lack of
success in educating these youth?

Again, I read your post too quickly and missunderstood it. I agree
completly with your last paragraph. Lets start at the Federal level
by disolving the Department of Education as my fellow Republicans
promised, but failed to do in the mid '90s. Next, lets bust the
state monopoly on primary and secondary education.

To what end? In this state, the voucher system has established a large
number of independent educational institutions. Most of them are just
ripping off the public coffers, and are doing a worse job than the public
schools.

I think there can be fiscal responsibility and appropriate priorities
within the existing structure. The reason that we don't have that now is
the real problem.

Neil

On 2007-12-05, Neil Gould wrote:
Recently, Doug Carter posted:

Again, I read your post too quickly and missunderstood it. I agree
completly with your last paragraph. Lets start at the Federal level
by disolving the Department of Education as my fellow Republicans
promised, but failed to do in the mid '90s. Next, lets bust the
state monopoly on primary and secondary education.

To what end? In this state, the voucher system has established a large
number of independent educational institutions. Most of them are just
ripping off the public coffers, and are doing a worse job than the public
schools.

Geez... is diversity and choice so bad? At least parents in your state have a
choice.

I think there can be fiscal responsibility and appropriate priorities
within the existing structure. The reason that we don't have that now is
the real problem.

Since the prospects of the government giving up their monoploy are bleak, I
hope you are right but the cycle of underperformance and reform has been going
on for a long time