quote: This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the US department of energy. I then took a shower in the clean water provided by the municipal water utility. After that, I turned on the TV to one of the FCC regulated channels to see what the national weather service of the national oceanographic and atmospheric administration determined the weather was going to be like using satellites designed, built, and launched by the national aeronautics and space administration. I watched this while eating my breakfast of US department of agriculture inspected food and taking the drugs which have been determined as safe by the food and drug administration.
At the appropriate time as regulated by the US congress and kept accurate by the national institute of standards and technology and the US naval observatory, I get into my national highway traffic safety administration approved automobile and set out to work on the roads built by the local, state, and federal departments of transportation, possibly stopping to purchase additional fuel of a quality level determined by the environmental protection agency, using legal tender issued by the federal reserve bank. On the way out the door I deposit any mail I have to be sent out via the US postal service and drop the kids off at public school where they learn curriculum from teachers that are both regulated by the Department of Education.
After spending another day not being maimed or killed at work thanks to the workplace regulations imposed by the department of labor and the occupational safety and health administration, enjoying another two meals which again do not kill me because of the USDA, I drive my NHTSA car back home on the DOT roads, to my house which has not burned down in my absence because of the state and local building codes and fire marshal’s inspection, and which has not been plundered of all it’s valuables thanks to the local police department.
I then log on to the internet which was developed by the defense advanced research projects administration and send out emails about how SOCIALISM and TAXES are BAD because the government can’t do anything right.
I usually respond to Libertarians I talk to with some variant of the above but the response is usually "the private sector should be doing it, and it would be better than the public sector/the public doing it is WRONG no matter how effective it is and the private sector should be doing it.
Or some variation of, especially when confronted with the "Tragedy of the Commons" hypothesis of "Then they were not actually doing the task for their best rational self interest. It is impossible for something to be in their best interest AND kill them (deplete their resources etc) at the same time, and that corporations have an "interest" in making sure their privately owned schools are "good".
Though my counter argument is that there is no profit motive for funding subjects like the humanities or social sciences, or for ones that might lead to things like statistics the profit motive is perversed to support predetermined outcomes.
Discuss. What is the Free Market/Libertarian counter argument to the above, and what is our "Free Market but Slightly in favor of some intervention, affirmative action (broad sense) and investment through taxes counter counter argument.
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
Lumping those who favor free (rather, free-er) markets with libertarians won't make for an honest or enlightening conversion, IMO. You can be one and not the other as well as - and I believe this is by far the more common - a varying mix of the two.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
Really Blayne, I don't think it's a productive point of discussion because it's meant to be funny. And it doesn't present a nuanced view of the issue because it doesn't need to, to be funny.
I mean, I dont care to, but I think I could put together an equally funny rant about socialism, having lived in a more socialist country. Rule of funny.
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
Orincoro, I know we don't often agree on things but I just wanted to say I totally agree with your assessment here.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
Well, it's a little something that annoys me about being from Northern California sometimes. People I agree with politically come up with really cheap shots, and a little part of me in the background is screaming: "No! That's what stupid conservatives do!!" So I don't send chain emails. I don't repost witicisms, and when I post something on facebook in the realm of politics- I try to avoid the truly cheap shot, and go for some substance.
It's when I see my like minded country-folk assigning some real truth value to these kinds of things, rather than to really nuanced and more difficult and demanding material, that I get worried about who's in my camp, and why.
Granted I *do* think it's funny. In a Carlinesque kind of way. Nothin wrong with that on its face. But if we're applying some standard of actual productiveness to the joke, then I have to also acknowledge that an equally one sided pile-up gag *against* regulation would probably annoy me, even if it managed to also make me laugh.
And I'm not saying that means that both sides of the coin have equal merit. I'm on the socialist side of that coin. But I recognize that it's a cheapish gag- and to actually ask for an answer to it is to ask that the respondent invite ridicule by not getting the joke. Essentially, asking for a serious response to this is adding insult to injury.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Serves as a thorough explanation for this kind of political humor. I only just read it the other day and haven't finished thinking about it, but it addresses this situation pretty well, I think-on what it's like to zing! the given idiots in one's political pantheon, and why it's likely to be much less innately zing than we think.
Posted by Darth_Mauve (Member # 4709) on :
I don't see the humor in Blayne's bit. Not slap my knee and laugh humor. I see a rational listing of daily realities that go against the Libertarian ideal.
I don't see the attempt to label all pro-freer market folks with the Libertarian fringe.
I just see a request to discuss the fact that the government has and can do some things well, despite what the Libertarians argue is impossible, and the response is an attack not on the facts of his list but on Blayne and the style of the list.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Related to libertarianism, I've actually been watching a very interesting phenomenon take place with Bitcoins, since to many of the True Believers, they represent a chance to implement a libertarian ideal and create an alternative to the regulated fiat currency they hate.
Without fail, the Bitcoin experiment has been a fast-forwarding demonstration of why we have those regulations in place to begin with, and has led many of those true believers to start clamoring for those selfsame regulations within Bitcoin trading. In the meantime, their ideology has made them easy pickings for scammers and schemers.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
Speaking as a Libertarian (and one not involved in politics by choice) it isn't that I want all government to be abolished, replaced by the private sector, or do not appreciate what the gov does for us citizens.
What I don't like is that gov spends its money (our money) as it sees fit. Yes, we vote for our reps, and can vote on local/state issues, but for instance: I would rather see only parents with children in public school -have to- pay for public schools. I would love to see a form where you got to choose where some/most of your tax money went, such as education, law enforcement, disaster relief, roads, etc, etc.
I want a stream lined government, one that doesn't do that many things, but does them very well, instead of large, top heavy authority with a hand in everything.
I also prefer state and local governments to have more power then the federal. We are one people by country, but many many different sub cultures with different needs and priorities, and taking power away from a centralized gov and giving it to the locals would make this country much more flexible and accessible to change from us the citizens.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
I have no children but my life is better because the people with whom I interact every day are educated.
And making only parents pay for education is a super way to make sure the children of poor people stay poor!
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Darth_Mauve: and the response is an attack not on the facts of his list but on Blayne and the style of the list.
I'm not intending to attack Blayne. It's not his list. He's just reposting it.
And no, it's not "the style" of "the list.." It's a joke. It's most obviously a joke. There's a punch line in there, down at the bottom. That's *meant* to be funny. Don't tell me it isn't.
Posted by Raymond Arnold (Member # 11712) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Speaking as a Libertarian (and one not involved in politics by choice) it isn't that I want all government to be abolished, replaced by the private sector, or do not appreciate what the gov does for us citizens.
What I don't like is that gov spends its money (our money) as it sees fit. Yes, we vote for our reps, and can vote on local/state issues, but for instance: I would rather see only parents with children in public school -have to- pay for public schools. I would love to see a form where you got to choose where some/most of your tax money went, such as education, law enforcement, disaster relief, roads, etc, etc.
I want a stream lined government, one that doesn't do that many things, but does them very well, instead of large, top heavy authority with a hand in everything.
I also prefer state and local governments to have more power then the federal. We are one people by country, but many many different sub cultures with different needs and priorities, and taking power away from a centralized gov and giving it to the locals would make this country much more flexible and accessible to change from us the citizens.
In general, I am in favor of systems that give you more control over your tax dollars. But education is one area where everyone should be required to contribute. Education is the single most important thing to guarantee EVERYONE the best version they can possibly have, because it's the one of the few tools that help lower class people improve their situation.
I say this as someone who ALSO thinks the public education system is fundamentally broken and needs a major overhaul. I think the innovation required to fix education will occur in the private sector, but those innovations should be implemented in the public sector as fast as is appropriate.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_:
What I don't like is that gov spends its money (our money) as it sees fit. Yes, we vote for our reps, and can vote on local/state issues, but for instance: I would rather see only parents with children in public school -have to- pay for public schools. .
You understand the real and immediate effect on communities that would result from such a policy? And the enormous burden and disadvantage it would place on the poor? What you're asking for is the makings of institutionalized ghettoization on American education- to a greater extent even than already occurs, with local funds paying for much of education already.
A shchool services a community. It is a public good. Education itself may be treated, sometimes, as a fungible commodity, but a school, and a school system, are not. It's not more reasonable than asking that people only pay for police when they use the police themselves. Thatbwould create a highly perverse set of incentives.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Yeah! Can you imagine the police or fire department being funded by charging people for their services? You get robbed or assaulted or your house catches fire and you get your savings wiped out, too! That would be a disaster.
Come to think of it, it's a lot like we do health care.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
There's a difference between normal "humor" and "goon humor" goon humor is that the joke and the argument tend to indistinguishable. It's a rational argument, ie it has to have content but its also the forum style to be humorous in its point.
So yes it is BOTH a rational listing of every reality based contradiction of the randian libertarian ideal AND a humorous aside at the end as we can't be self aware neckbeards without at least making an active attempt to be insufferable at the sametime.
Its thus a serious criticism of a political ideology and is also meant to be humorous.
The problem with todays US economy is not that it is too much government power but that there is too much private power, the Fed, is supposedly a privately owned institution by a cartel of private banks and most of current modern woes are a result of their chronic mismanagement. Put regulations and the boot on the brakes to limit the ability of the Fed to just infinitly print money and the economy would be brought partly back under control.
Posted by Darth_Mauve (Member # 4709) on :
I was wondering something similar to this conversation: Where has the idea of Community gone? I know, it reeks of socialism or communism. Community organizer is a bad word now. But what happened to the idea that we are a city, state, and nation as a whole, not just a bunch of individuals who seek only what is best for themselves, who happen to live near each other.
Has the pendulum swung so far that the whole idea of "good for the community" is lost? We only care, want our taxes to pay for, and will allow, only those things that have a tangible benefit for ourselves.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
I'd like to start off by saying that I don't think the level of general education we put our children through is actually helpful. There are some basic skills and knowledge that is absolutely important for -everyone- to know, but the lack of vocational skills taught at the high school level at the cost of "general" skills nearly pains me. I exhausted nearly all science and math classes available to me by my Jr. year, and the 100% most useful class I ever took was typing, the second being a study hall in the computer lab. I knew all the math, grammar, history and poly sci I've ever needed before or in Jr. High.
High schools used to be an optional school which was designed for people going on to college, while most people took on an apprenticeship or started to learn their family trade instead of going. Oh God do I wish I had had a family trade or an apprenticeship at a young age.
Not everyone needs college prep classes, and not everyone needs college to be successful. Yes, statistically people with a degree will make more money, but that is part of the core Libertarian point of view: just because something is better for some, doesn't mean it should be mandatory for all.
The kind of people, regardless of social class, location, "race", etc, who flourish in an educational system will seek out more learning and better opportunities. Forcing all teenagers into the round hole of academia is not a good thing. There are all kinds of scholarship programs, grants, federal school loans, etc, and if we streamlined our schools towards the actual needs of different peoples it would be cheaper, more effective and in the end better for everyone.
As to the disadvantage to the impoverished, if everyone had to pay their own way for school, there would be competition for those dollars, much more then now, where the majority go to "free" public school and the elite go to uber expensive private school. "Public schools" would and should be a thing of the past, if people had to pay directly for their children's education, public school would simply be another "private" school competing for the students/money, but there would be a lot more options and appropriate educations.
Posted by Raymond Arnold (Member # 11712) on :
Stone Wolf, I agree completely with most of your points. As I said, there is a lot wrong with public schools, and those things need to be fixed. Emphasis on academia is one of the worst things.
This doesn't mean the problem is "public school," it means the problem is our particular execution of it. There is little economic incentive for the free market to produce good schools catering to the poor. If there WERE, we'd already have plenty of good private schools for the poor and the poor would already go there.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:I knew all the math, grammar, history and poly sci I've ever needed before or in Jr. High.
Yikes. That's...not something I would brag about.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
General skills like reading and writing? Your plan basically insures that people who can't afford secondary education will - no matter their aptitude - get only vocational training that will funnel them into a (vanishing number of) blue collar jobs. So their children will also not be able to afford secondary education and...so on. Forming an even more permanent under class than we have now. Social stratification is already a problem here more that elsewhere despite our egalitarian pretensions. Do we really want to make it more so?
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
If everyone had to pay their own way for education even in childhood...then what would happen is that a very, very great number of people *wouldn't*. Quite simple. It's a bad idea, and that's all there is to it.
If the free market could take care of education in a socially satisfactory way...why on *Earth* did we need to have public education funded by gov't and taxation back when the free market was a *much* more powerful force than it is now?
There are, again, contradictory ideas in your suggestion that make it, after a bit of consideration, fundamentally flawed. Not to mention in effect if not intent cruel and selfish.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
RA: I agree that revamping would be hugely beneficial, but I do think that a big part of the problem is public school. Part of what I think is the problem with public high schools is their cookie cutter approach to education, another is mandatory way it is handled. I knew a lot of kids who knew they had no interest in going to college and hated being forced to learn the year when Napoleon started his Russian campaign.
If our schools were the top number one in the world, producing young adults ready to step into the world of employment as well rounded citizens then I likely would not bat an eyelash at everyone being required to foot the bill. But forcing young people to go and forcing everyone to pay for it when the results are questionable at best is...well, not good.
m_p_h: I have an AS in Computer Drafting and Design and have worked directly with Mechanical and Electrical engineers and Architects and never used the geometry, physics, calculus, trig or statistics that I took. I find science interesting and love to watch shows about it, so, if I had not been forced into all the science classes I took, I would still know quite a bit from seeking it out on my own. My grammatical, reading and writing skills blossomed when I started getting into reading novels, and were not from the uber boring and repetitive classes that were required -every- year of school. Etc, etc. Plus, I wasn't bragging.
Boots: I don't know what High School you went to Boots, but I could read and write well before 9th grade. Also, I didn't say that only vocational schools would be available to less fortunate people. I said that students who do well in school, regardless of background, can and would find ways to excel, and get access to higher and higher forms of education. If there was less of a tax burden, I can only imagine that scholarships and grants would be -more- prevalent then they are now making it easier for low income students to get into better schools.
One might check out a "free public school" in Watts and compare it to a "free public school" in Beverly Hills and then tell me that our current system is one which favors the underclasses.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:If everyone had to pay their own way for education even in childhood...then what would happen is that a very, very great number of people *wouldn't*.
There would still be requirements, but there would be far more reasonable then "graduate high school, go until the age of 16/17). I think the government can set reasonable standards, I just don't think they are the ones to fulfill them.
quote:If the free market could take care of education in a socially satisfactory way...why on *Earth* did we need to have public education funded by gov't and taxation back when the free market was a *much* more powerful force than it is now?
The industrial revolution moved people away from highly skilled craftsmen and small family businesses toward a higher demand for a generally educated workers. High school was considered "higher" education...secondary school...as in more then bare requirements.
What I'm suggesting is much like auto insurance. The government mandates that we have it, but doesn't provide it. As such, there is a lot competition and the price is relatively low for a good quality product.
Before, when there wasn't public school, there was not standard/requirement to be met.
quote:There are, again, contradictory ideas in your suggestion that make it, after a bit of consideration, fundamentally flawed. Not to mention in effect if not intent cruel and selfish.
What contradictions are you referring to? How is it cruel? And are you forgetting I have two children? It's hardly selfish of me to suggest that everyone shouldn't be on the hook for paying for them.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:m_p_h: I have an AS in Computer Drafting and Design and have worked directly with Mechanical and Electrical engineers and Architects and never used the geometry, physics, calculus, trig or statistics that I took. I find science interesting and love to watch shows about it, so, if I had not been forced into all the science classes I took, I would still know quite a bit from seeking it out on my own. My grammatical, reading and writing skills blossomed when I started getting into reading novels, and were not from the uber boring and repetitive classes that were required -every- year of school. Etc, etc. Plus, I wasn't bragging.
I find it surprising that you never use any trigonometry in drafting. I assure you, if you scratch below the surface of whatever CAD system you're using, trigonometry is absolutely essential for what you're doing.
But what's really shocking is that you know so little of history and political science that you don't even realize that you need to know more than you learned in junior high.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
My point isn't that the knowledge is -useless-, it's that it's not useful as -general knowledge-. Why require teenagers to know this stuff? What is the upside? If they are going on to be engineers and mathematicians they are going to get much more specialized training in college, and likely need to redo a lot of their math classes.
I had to retake physics in college even though I took it high school.
As to your last assertion: I enjoy knowing things about history and science, so I tend to read/watch stuff. It isn't that I don't know it, it's again, that it isn't required to make well rounded teen age individuals.
Also, my Jr. High was magnet, so perhaps I have a skewed perception of what is and isn't taught at that level.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Boots: I don't know what High School you went to Boots, but I could read and write well before 9th grade. Also, I didn't say that only vocational schools would be available to less fortunate people. I said that students who do well in school, regardless of background, can and would find ways to excel, and get access to higher and higher forms of education. If there was less of a tax burden, I can only imagine that scholarships and grants would be -more- prevalent then they are now making it easier for low income students to get into better schools.
One might check out a "free public school" in Watts and compare it to a "free public school" in Beverly Hills and then tell me that our current system is one which favors the underclasses.
But that isn't what happens. I read before kindergarten but I had the luxury of a stay home mom. I also went to a great public high school - 98% of my graduating class went on to college. Under your system, do you really think that some idiot son of a millionaire stock brokers are going to go to trade school aptitude or not? Or that the very bright son of a poor single mother is going to overcome the various obstacle to higher education?
Of course not. Rich boy is going on to let's say Texas A&M (where he will make connections if not good grades) and poor kid is never getting out of the slum. We have a hard enough time making decent education affordable as is. My niece - salutatorian, president of student council with a list of extra curriculars as long as your arm (plus working two jobs) could get accepted anywhere but her parents can only afford to send her to state school. You are going to make that more difficult?
Watts and Beverly Hills don't have the same kinds of schools because we already punish the poor by having schools funded mostly by local taxes rather than state or federal funds. Your solution would make that worse, not better.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: I had to retake physics in college even though I took it high school.
I really, really wanted physics in HS, but there were not enough other classmates of mine who did. I was at a serious disadvantage in college physics classes, where almost everyone else already had a grounding in concepts that I was learning for the first time.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:Under your system, do you really think that some idiot son of a millionaire stock brokers are going to go to trade school aptitude or not? Or that the very bright son of a poor single mother is going to overcome the various obstacle to higher education?
Being well off is an unarguable advantage, but who cares if little Jr. billionaire gets a degree or not? It has no bearing on the conversation that I can see.
As to the poor single mother's bright son...I think he would be better off either getting a vocation and being able to instantly help out with family expenses at a young age by being able to work as a professional instead of having a free high school diploma which entitles him to flip burgers at Mc Deadend, or get a grant, scholarship, school loan and go to a great school which helps him propel himself into a fulfilling career after getting more education.
quote:Watts and Beverly Hills don't have the same kinds of schools because we already punish the poor by having schools funded mostly by local taxes rather than state or federal funds. Your solution would make that worse, not better.
There is another reason that the two qualities of schools are so different. Watts High School is clogged with people who have zero interest in being there, learning or creating a culture which is positive to education. If those teens who wanted to learn art, music or mechanics or simply not go to any school, could do so instead of all being crammed together with lots of school budget going to fences, security guards and metal detectors, not only could they attract a better class of teacher, they could have better classroom experiences.
Look, I'm not saying just make people pay for school the way it is. That would be very much a hardship for poor people. I'm saying eliminate a lot of unnecessary requirements and classes and teach every day useful things to most people, with options for more gifted/interested students.
rivka: Again, it is not okay to mandate that because it serves as an advantage for some that it should be a requirement for all. This is a free country and the ideals at the heart of public school are communist, and work just about as well.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
So bright potential astrophysicist gets shunted off to work as an apprentice - what? Factory worker? What exactly do you mean by vocation?
Grants, scholarships, and school loans are not often enough to go to a great school which isn't an option anyway without a high school degree which the kid can't pay for.
Do you think that if the children in Watts had the same opportunities as the children in Beverly Hills that the situation would be the same? Do you think there is something genetically or fundamentally wrong with those children that is fundamentally right with the children in Beverly Hills?
You want to make education better fit the person, make it federally funded, free through university, compulsory through age 16 and with vocational and or academic tracks determined by placement testing.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:There is another reason that the two qualities of schools are so different. Watts High School is clogged with people who have zero interest in being there, learning or creating a culture which is positive to education. If those teens who wanted to learn art, music or mechanics or simply not go to any school, could do so instead of all being crammed together with lots of school budget going to fences, security guards and metal detectors, not only could they attract a better class of teacher, they could have better classroom experiences.
One of the single biggest determining factors in student interest in school is the education level of their parents. That is to say, students whose parents are invested in education are themselves more likely to be well educated.
And how do you think kidsget an interest in higher education? Is it something a child of eight was just born with? "Someday, I'm going to want to know about quantum mechanics so I can do research." No. Nobody is born with a high desire for academic achievement. It's something that is-here are the important words-taught and learned.
As for the ideas that are contradictory, that's one of them right there. That the way to foster better academic achievement is to...offer it to many less people. That privatization will promptly afford vastly greater efficiencies and opportunity (this is sometimes true, but the Libertarian ideal that this is a given is just flat-out wrong). That what stops children from learning more than just junior high history is that 'they just don't want to'. It doesn't ask the next question, "Why don't they want to?" And it also doesn't ask the question, "Is it useful to know more?"
It's selfish in effect because it will ensure that the poorest will be much more likely to have poor descendents.
It's strange because while on the one hand it says, "Children just don't need/want higher education," the exact same things you say stop them from achieving higher levels - desire - can be equally applied to vocations. For students and families who decide, early, that they want their child to go to vocation school it is entirely possible to do so. Far from difficult, so long as a family doesn't decide february of the senior year. The opportunity is there, so what must be stopping (according to this style of thinking) more students from taking this approach is a lack of desire.
Education isn't food. People don't just want it at the same levels as part of being an animal. It's not something that can just be safely relied upon across-the-board. It must be learned, and one of the surest ways to make sure it's learned less and less over time is to teach less.
All of this is aside from the fact that you're basing this idea on the education system we (America) had generations ago. There's just...lots and lots of problems with this idea of yours.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: rivka: Again, it is not okay to mandate that because it serves as an advantage for some that it should be a requirement for all. This is a free country and the ideals at the heart of public school are communist, and work just about as well.
Having taught high school physics to students who had no intention of attending college, I utterly and completely reject your assertion that it is not useful to EVERY student -- certainly as an option they should have.
The word you want is "socialist", not "communist". If you're not sure of the difference, maybe you should have paid more attention in those high school classes you so blithely dismiss.
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: One of the single biggest determining factors in student interest in school is the education level of their parents. That is to say, students whose parents are invested in education are themselves more likely to be well educated.
Are there any studies or data to back this claim? And are you differentiating between well educated and college educated?
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
Boots, I was talking about grants/scholarships to high school, not college.
I think the cultures are different, and those different cultures have a different view of the importance of education as well as ease accessibility to it.
quote:And how do you think kidsget an interest in higher education? Is it something a child of eight was just born with?
Kids, by the time they are about to go to high school, have been in the educational system for eight years. During this time they might just get a feel if they want to continue or not.
quote:As for the ideas that are contradictory, that's one of them right there. That the way to foster better academic achievement is to...offer it to many less people.
It isn't contradictory because "fostering better academic achievement" isn't my goal. I don't think it is so vital as to be a law and to take money from everyone without their choice that we teach teenagers the depth of academia we do. By trying to force all this minutiae down the throats of -all teenagers- we take the emphasis off the useful teachings, clog the schools with people who likely will not retain or use the info and rightfully resent having it foisted on to them.
If what you are saying is true, and vocational school is easy to get to, then great! I'm very happy to hear it.
quote:It must be learned, and one of the surest ways to make sure it's learned less and less over time is to teach less.
To what end must we force feed specific, unimportant detail, specialized tools and repetitive noneffective knowledge to -everyone-...because "it must be learned"? A circular argument?
quote:All of this is aside from the fact that you're basing this idea on the education system we (America) had generations ago.
I'm not basing it on the educational system of generations ago. I was pointing out why it changed and then why it needs to change again!
People seem to think that "education" is a goal in and of itself. It isn't. Knowledge may be, but "education" isn't gold, it isn't food, it only works when it works. Our system is very flawed and mandatory, both as a requirement for attendance and for paying for it.
It is as if I said that everyone on my block HAD to pay for the gardeners, and they tend to kill the plants, and you can't opt out of paying or having your grass cut 18th worst of the blocks around.
ETA: You can opt out, and pay for your own gardener, but you still have to live on a block with poorly gardened houses AND pay for said poor gardening.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:Originally posted by rivka: Having taught high school physics to students who had no intention of attending college, I utterly and completely reject your assertion that it is not useful to EVERY student -- certainly as an option they should have.
How would not being forced to take physics in high school eliminate the option you are speaking of?
quote: The word you want is "socialist", not "communist". If you're not sure of the difference, maybe you should have paid more attention in those high school classes you so blithely dismiss.
Nice!
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
Let me put this as a real question to you advocates of universal education:
What is the advantage that a high school student gets for knowing specific knowledge such as the years of historical events, higher mathematics or chemistry if they do not plan on going on to college?
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
quote:What is the advantage that a high school student gets for knowing specific knowledge such as the years of historical events, higher mathematics or chemistry if they do not plan on going on to college?
- The unemployment rate for dropouts is twice that of the general population - Dropouts are more likely to commit crimes, abuse drugs and alcohol, become teenage parents, live in poverty and commit suicide - Dropouts cost federal and state governments hundreds of billions of dollars in lost earnings, welfare and medical costs, and billions more for dropouts who end up in prison.
There is INCREDIBLE value in having a high school degree. There is even MORE value to a society that establishes a high school degree as the default expectation.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: Yeah! Can you imagine the police or fire department being funded by charging people for their services? You get robbed or assaulted or your house catches fire and you get your savings wiped out, too! That would be a disaster.
Come to think of it, it's a lot like we do health care.
Well, yes, it's very similar. Which is why health care is actually also a public good- and we just pretend it isn't because we're idiots.
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
I currently work at a non-profit where one of the programs involves paying for adults to finish their high school education via an online program. The program has a very large waiting list because of the incredible value of a high school degree (even over a GED). Part of being in the program involves qualifying for welfare (but not being on it)- which realistically means that it is almost all single mothers. Without intervention of some type, the kids are extremely likely to continue the cycle of poverty.
If you want a society in which there is opportunity for advancement and ideally *LESS* money being spent on social safety nets- education is the best place to put it.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: I'd like to start off by saying that I don't think the level of general education we put our children through is actually helpful. There are some basic skills and knowledge that is absolutely important for -everyone- to know, but the lack of vocational skills taught at the high school level at the cost of "general" skills nearly pains me. I exhausted nearly all science and math classes available to me by my Jr. year, and the 100% most useful class I ever took was typing, the second being a study hall in the computer lab. I knew all the math, grammar, history and poly sci I've ever needed before or in Jr. High.
quote: High schools used to be an optional school which was designed for people going on to college, while most people took on an apprenticeship or started to learn their family trade instead of going. Oh God do I wish I had had a family trade or an apprenticeship at a young age.
People used to die of polio at the age of 8, and people thought it was caused by eating ice cream.
They also used to send 6 year olds into factories. Quite a lot of things used to be. That doesn't make them better. Considering that we live longer, safer, healthier, more productive lives today, than we "used to," I'd suggest you reevaluate the idea that "used to" equals "venerable and good."
Respectfully, you betray a general innocence of knowledge about education, and history in general. And as an entree to an argument about the dismantling of public education? This is not the way to go. You are not inviting argument here, you are inviting ridicule.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head:
quote:I knew all the math, grammar, history and poly sci I've ever needed before or in Jr. High.
Yikes. That's...not something I would brag about.
Hard to argue- he's not using an understanding of history that he might have acquired in high school.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
You mean besides the civil benefit of having a more informed citizenry better able to judge the worth of such things in our democratic society than those who know nothing about them thar sciencey magics?
Edit: Darn, too many posts came after mine. This was in response to stone-wolf's last question.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:Originally posted by Amanecer: There is INCREDIBLE value in having a high school degree. There is even MORE value to a society that establishes a high school degree as the default expectation.
While interesting, that is not my question. A high school diploma is one thing, and is used a milestone in our society which does not directly speak to it's usefulness of the knowledge which is the prerequisite for getting it.
As to the issue of poverty and lack of education, I would be willing to add in legislation which provides monies for low income families for schools. I just don't think that having everyone pay for a third rate education is a good plan.
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: You are not inviting argument here, you are inviting ridicule.
quote:Hard to argue- he's not using an understanding of history that he might have acquired in high school.
And yet you are the only one ridiculing while everyone else is having a civil discussion. Perhaps it says much less about me and much more about you, and your wish to ridicule people.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: You mean besides the civil benefit of having a more informed citizenry better able to judge the worth of such things in our democratic society than those who know nothing about them thar sciencey magics?
Higher level math, science and repetitive grammar doesn't help you vote! It isn't a question of "knowing nothing about them thar sciencey magics"...there is a difference between introductory classes which can spark the imagination of those who are interested and install a basic understanding vs being forcibly burred up to your eyeballs in useless specifics which for those who go on, will have them repeated and refined when they receive another round of general education before being allowed to study their chosen field.
Chemistry class has never affected my ability to vote, has it yours?
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
quote:A high school diploma is one thing, and is used a milestone in our society which does not directly speak to it's usefulness of the knowledge which is the prerequisite for getting it.
Many people have agreed with the suggestion to add vocational tracks in high school. I certainly don't think everyone needs to take Physics or Trig. But there's a far cry from saying we should edit the current standards to the claim you are making that a secondary education should be completely optional.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_:
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: You are not inviting argument here, you are inviting ridicule.
quote:Hard to argue- he's not using an understanding of history that he might have acquired in high school.
And yet you are the only one ridiculing while everyone else is having a civil discussion. Perhaps it says much less about me and much more about you, and your wish to ridicule people.
Eh, no. I find what you have to say on the topic to be painfully stupid. I'm not the only the one of course- because it *is* stupid. I'm just happy to tell you, and not concerned with being nice to you. Because I'm a secret handshaking hatrack "scumbag." Remember?
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Higher level math, science and repetitive grammar doesn't help you vote!
You really believe this?
Would you vote for a presidential candidate who claimed that ID was a scientific theory, and should be taught in science classrooms? If not, then why not? Where did you learn what science really was? You just picked that up somewhere? Where did you learn to read? Where did you learn to read on complex subjects, and identify solidly presented writing and research, and where did you learn to parse that information and make judgements based on what you read? And did that research also contain graphs and charts, and ask you to understand statistical relationships, basic chemistry and biology and astronomy concepts? How did you understand those? How did you gain the experience to tell you that a certain kind of analysis was sound, and should be looked at more carefully? How did you do those things?
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: While interesting, that is not my question. A high school diploma is one thing, and is used a milestone in our society which does not directly speak to it's usefulness of the knowledge which is the prerequisite for getting it.
No, it speaks indirectly to the usefulness of the knowledge which is the prerequisite for getting it. For it to speak *directly* to that knowledge, you would have to go on some sort of Star Trek quest where you applied all that knowledge in a series of different puzzles in order to *find* your diploma.
You say this crap like it means something, and like everybody actually walks around thinking that a high school diploma is actual knowledge. Like we're the scarecrow in Wizard of OZ. We get it. You have to learn something to get the diploma- that is the nature of its value. It is not supposed to be given away. We want a robust and challenging education system *so that* when presented with a high school diploma we can reasonably assume that the person holding it possesses the knowledge and ability necessary to obtain it at a standard we find acceptable.
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
quote:Eh, no. I find what you have to say on the topic to be painfully stupid. I'm not the only the one of course- because it *is* stupid. I'm just happy to tell you, and not concerned with being nice to you. Because I'm a secret handshaking hatrack "scumbag." Remember?
Man, this kind of offended me. I also completely disagree with Stone_Wolf_ on this topic, but he's not bringing incivility in to this thread. I'm getting involved because if somebody was bashing me the way you're bashing him, I'd hope somebody else would say something.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:Originally posted by Amanecer: Many people have agreed with the suggestion to add vocational tracks in high school. I certainly don't think everyone needs to take Physics or Trig. But there's a far cry from saying we should edit the current standards to the claim you are making that a secondary education should be completely optional.
All I want are options. When you make a law, you have to back it up with punishment. Go to school or we will throw you (or your parents) in jail. It would defiantly be a large step in the right direction to make the more specialized subjects optional, and have a lot more vocational possibilities.
The concept of liberty which is the core idea behind Libertarians means that you have to give up some control of others, and let them make their own mistakes. It may be a good idea for more then half of the teens in the country to be in a learning environment, but should it be so mandatory that it is punishable by law if someone follows a different direction? Does that punishment actually help make the situation better?
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
I appreciate your perspective. And no, the incivility comes from outside of this thread.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
If you can not contain your incivility to whichever thread it originates from you might email me or speak to Janitor Blade if you feel more comfortable, but either way, at least attempt to keep the hostility from leaking over into other conversations.
As far as I know, I've publicly apologized to you at least twice, while you have never done me the same courtesy, and while you are unable to keep your hostility in check, I have been nothing but civil to you in this conversation.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
To Amanecer, thanks!
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: All I want are options.
Earlier you said you wanted to the option to not pay for public schooling.
Do you think that kind of policy provides the poorest Americans, not to mention the middle class, with reasonable options of their own?
Right right, "liberty" and Libertarianism. It's always the same story. Never mind the prison of hunger, of poverty, the prison of ignorance. That's "liberty," I guess. Liberty isn't getting the education you can't pay for for yourself, so that you can choose what you want to do with the rest of your life. You'd be free of those evil government minions if only they didn't take away your choice to be ignorant and starving and wretched. Those bastards!
And also, the Irish should eat their young. A Modest Proposal.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: As far as I know, I've publicly apologized to you at least twice,.
No, you've self-righteously and sarcastically offered entreaties to be "friends." They were insulting in and of themselves.
And I wasn't the first to make the quip about your own education in history being a shame, given your view of high school education requirements. Because you *invited* that quip, so that you could play the victim. How many times did you ask the same basic question? "I didn't need my high school education... did you??" The answer is so bleeding obvious, you'd have to have a heart of stone not to throw it back in your face. That's what you do. You play the goofy fool until somebody calls you a fool, and then you get hurt. It's sad.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:I'm saying eliminate a lot of unnecessary requirements and classes and teach every day useful things to most people, with options for more gifted/interested students.
If you think you literally capped out on all the math, grammar, history, and political science you've 'ever needed' before junior high, I think you're fundamentally too ignorant right now to have an informed perspective on what counts as 'unnecessary requirements' for schoolchildren.
Garishly so, in fact.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Kids, by the time they are about to go to high school, have been in the educational system for eight years. During this time they might just get a feel if they want to continue or not.
You're arguing that 13 year olds should be making these sort of decisions for themselves? I'd love to see a study of how many 13 year olds want to keep going to school. Of course, if the alternative is to become an apprentice welder at 13, I'm betting most would rather continue on. It may surprise you to learn that apprenticeship programs are actually coming back in small way across the country. However, there just aren't the number of those kinds of jobs available that there used to be. Future American jobs will be heavily service-based, sure, but the future of the economy is also in high tech jobs, and as hard as it is to find a job right now, some companies are actually lamenting the fact that they can't find highly trained people for some positions. Education is the silver bullet, and 13 year olds just aren't mature enough yet to make that choice for themselves.
quote:To what end must we force feed specific, unimportant detail, specialized tools and repetitive noneffective knowledge to -everyone-...because "it must be learned"? A circular argument?
Some of this I'm with you on. Education needs some major reforms, especially in the humanities. You simply can't use rote memorization and fill-in-the-blank answers for some of the more important tools that, for example, history teaches. Now, history lessons are greatly important in a number of other ways. Names and dates do matter, but they aren't the only thing that matters. The humanities are an excellent vehicle for teaching problem solving, analysis, critical thinking, reasoning, and communication skills that are woefully lacking in today's graduates. I'm all for revamping to include a little less "In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue" and more questions that force students to provide their own reasoning for their own answers. That's a lot of what really matters.
On the other hand, as Megabyte mentioned, producing good citizens sort of requires that they have a good understanding of how government and society works. Not grounding them in the basics of how our society works, and our past problems and solutions, how government works, can lead to the decay of society. Otherwise they won't think for themselves, or at least, they won't be informed enough to do so reasonably.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
Well, I mean, it took me actually *teaching* American history for a year (20th century mostly, out of the US, significantly) to get why teachers value those dates so much. It's a very effective way of organizing lesson plans. I had never suspected that before. But it was kind of simple! My students were quickly complaining about the number of dates I was always demanding that they know and be familiar with- and of course what I was trying to do was make sure that they understood the sequences of events we were talking about.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
Knowing (at least approximate) dates is the boring, seemingly pointless foundation that an understanding of history is based on. If you don't know when things happened, you can't even begin to grasp what cause and effect, what affected what, etc..
I suspect that another reason dates are taught so much (and often over taught) is that they're so darn easy to test. Understanding the effects that Napoleon had on Europe is a lot harder to test for than knowing the important dates.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
Of course. It helps you know as a teacher, whether your students have even the most basic grasp of the topic. I never went overboard on the dates in terms of testing. I don't think I ever required exact recall of dates- it was always to do with sequence.
Posted by Vadon (Member # 4561) on :
I don't have kids. I'm not sure if I ever want to have kids. But I want a chunk of my tax money to go to paying for the mandated education of children, and I wish more of it would go to public education. If there isn't more money at hand, take more of my money.
Are there problems with our education system? Yes, that's never been the question. What you (Stone_Wolf) seem to be criticizing is the lack of value to things that are simply memorized. I will agree with you when I say that knowing about the Proclamation Line of 1763 hasn't served me much of a practical purpose in every day life. It isn't even very good pick-up line material.
That being said, knowing about our history helps me better understand my identity as a US citizen. Knowing about Russian wars helps me understand my identity as a citizen of the world. There is ample value in knowing who you are and where you've come from.
The biggest problem with our education system is we teach to the test. As long as you get the answers right, you have demonstrated that you've learned something. My biggest gripe with my public education is that I would be told historical facts, mathematical concepts, or rules of English, and I would never be told why these things are important, or told how it works. I think the most valuable thing students should learn in public education is how to learn. Why do we never split an infinitive? Why are we not supposed to end a sentence with a preposition? What's the value of reading the classics, considering the rhetoric of their time doesn't help us with writing today?*
These were all questions I had which were never really answered in public school. The answer was usually something akin to, "Don't worry about it, just go with it."
But here's what I think the wider point should be. Having a well educated populace helps all of us, not just those with children. Further, I know that any success that I derive for myself was not gained solely based upon my own merits. My parents were supportive, I lived in a good neighborhood, my teachers were (by-and-large) pretty good, I used public education, public transport, and had the protection of other public services while growing up. I didn't pay for any of these things as a child. But I wouldn't have any of the success I have today if it weren't for the payments and support of other people. Now, I feel it is my obligation as a citizen to pay into the system that helped me succeed. Taxes aren't the government robbing hard working people, they're an investment into our future and security for our present. Do I agree with all the things the government spends my tax money on? Certainly not. But I'm not going to bemoan taxes as an inherently unsavory thing just because I disagree with the budget.
*I would later find that the value of learning the classics was that it provided pick-up material with literature majors that my historical facts did not.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:Why do we never split an infinitive? Why are we not supposed to end a sentence with a preposition?
Because they don't do it in Latin, of course.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Let me put this as a real question to you advocates of universal education:
What is the advantage that a high school student gets for knowing specific knowledge such as the years of historical events, higher mathematics or chemistry if they do not plan on going on to college?
How many "do not plan" on going to college only because its ludicrously expensive in the USA? Or because the public educational system does very little to prepare or motivate them for it?
Highschool insures
1) Literacy. 2) Sufficient math skills for day to day use and preparation for college, just because "some" are stupid enough to shun it doesnt meant that we still shouldn't put in the effort in case they change their mind. 3) Knowledge in history and pattern recognition, civics are incredibly important to insure the average person has a good understanding of the law of the land and how government works. 4) Insuring enough information so that the average citizen, who we can reasonably expect to vote, be well informed enough to vote for the candidate for whom they are best and well enough educated to make a properly and fully informed decision.
A decision without information to make a informed decision is little different from coercion.
And by eliminated the public school you are effectively enslaving the poor and lower middle class.
Basic chemistry is an important survival skillset, knowing the basics can save your life.
socialism in this case serves for the benefit of the public good, the greatest good for the greatest number, can be efficiently cared for, through taxation to provide a single system of standards and services.
In Canada we have about 11 years or so of general compulsory education before CEGEP which is a sort of half vocational school half pre university before 3-5 years of university.
I could say and agree that maybe at least 3 of those years are redundant. Streamlining should be done, more flexibility should be worked into it, but eliminating federal funding is stupid.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Orincoro: I think it would do a lot of good if you toned down the rude rhetoric. Stone_Wolf while you may feel his ideas are idiotic at a glance, is still calmly and politely discussing them. There's no need to ridicule him or taunt him.
------
I don't find month/day dates to be especially useful, but I do find being able to identify an event within 1-10 years depending on the case to be crucial in understanding context. It's important for students at some point to hear a date and start thinking about other events that might be related that happened around that time.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Vadon: I will agree with you when I say that knowing about the Proclamation Line of 1763 hasn't served me much of a practical purpose in every day life. It isn't even very good pick-up line material.
This is the kind of challenge that the Hatrack Group Mind should be able to deal with ably.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Well put, Vadon.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Indeed.
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
quote:but should it be so mandatory that it is punishable by law if someone follows a different direction? Does that punishment actually help make the situation better?
Absolutely. If it was not mandatory to attend, less people would graduate high school. We would then have more people without marketable skills. More unemployed, more on welfare, and a far more rigid class system that goes completely against American ideals.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
I love how the conservative movement claims fierce patriotism and even flirts with concepts of ethnic Americanism, and then gets put out about the idea of legislated required education. Some countries arent in total denial about their school systems being designed to make their citizens into the people the country needs.
Yeah, I know, libertarians aren't republicans, but it's that self entitled, I-got-here-on-my-own-despite-the-fact-that-I-didn't, chest thumping that's exactly the same.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
My, what a broad brush you have there!
Posted by scholarette (Member # 11540) on :
My high school had an excellent setup. There were basic requirements in math, reading etc that took up half the day. Then you could do your electives during the other half in career training (auto, catering, hair, photo, etc). In the end, you had a high school degree with sufficient punch to go to college, but you also could go straight into a career. If that didn't appeal, you could get a normal high school degree and if you were ambitious, we had an excellent honors program. I graduated high school with like a year of college credits. I have a friend who took the career training in photography. He went to college, paying his way by taking photos. He now has a very successful photography studio.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: My, what a broad brush you have there!
Actually it's one of those foam brushes. You know- for patterning.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro:
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: Yeah! Can you imagine the police or fire department being funded by charging people for their services? You get robbed or assaulted or your house catches fire and you get your savings wiped out, too! That would be a disaster. Come to think of it, it's a lot like we do health care.
Well, yes, it's very similar. Which is why health care is actually also a public good- and we just pretend it isn't because we're idiots.
Yeah. Kinda my point. Geez. It's not like I'm subtle.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
I knew it was your point, I was just trying to agree. Sorry if I didn't make that clear as well. Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
scholarette, that does sound like an excellent model.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
Yeah options are great. Options provided by the schools. Fancy that!
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
One might almost think that, however inefficiently schools many times do that, that's what they're for.
Hint: people don't learn chemistry because it's useful in the day-to-day life to know the atomic weight of lead. People learn chemistry to better understand how the world around them works. To have some idea what is meant when they read 'active ingredient'. People don't learn history to know the name of the island Napoleon was exiled to (initially). They learn history to have some idea why the world is the way it is, and the people in it.
Because, put bluntly, knowing more stuff about the way the world and the people in it *are* is never a bad thing. Knowing more things is never bad-expanding one's knowledge about the world is helpful, period. It may be more or less helpful, and people may make poor use of it, but that's not the same thing.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
Except teaching Californians Spanish. That type of knowledge is *bad*. Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Kidding aside, there's also the little bit about learning getting more difficult as we grow older. For the sake of argument, let's say a kid 'decides' they're not interested in school to learn more about the world when they're young, and bank on vocational school.
Should they get tired of auto mechanics, or whatever job they end up in (and this of course happens in ALL kinds of careers), those best-learnin' years are...gone. Not comin' back.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: Except teaching Californians Spanish. That type of knowledge is *bad*.
Not quite. Teaching them Spanish = good.
Teaching them IN Spanish = bad.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
Well GOD effing forbid we do that. Then we might become like Europe... where most people are at least bilingual...
That would be bad.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
If you thought I was endorsing this benighted notion, you misunderstood my emoticon.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
No, I got it. Just agreeing with you as well. Everybody, I get it!
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: Kidding aside, there's also the little bit about learning getting more difficult as we grow older. For the sake of argument, let's say a kid 'decides' they're not interested in school to learn more about the world when they're young, and bank on vocational school.
Should they get tired of auto mechanics, or whatever job they end up in (and this of course happens in ALL kinds of careers), those best-learnin' years are...gone. Not comin' back.
Hrrm, I consider this a little dubious, I think an adult is perfectly, if not better capable of learning then a child is, the motivation tends to be there as well as the ability to understand mnenmtics better. Also more life experiences to better connect knowledge to.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
The Conservative response!
quote: This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock, powered by energy generated soley by Southern California Edison and manufactured by the Sony Corporation. I then took a shower in my house constructed by Centex Homes, sold to me by a Century 21 real estate agent, and mortgaged by Citibank. After that, I turned on my Panasonic television which I purchased with a Washington Mutual credit card to a local NBC Corporation affiliate to see what their team of hired meteorologists forecasted the weather to be using their weather radar system. While watching this, I ate my breakfast of eggs and bacon, both produced by a local farm and sold to me by my local grocery store, and took my prescribed medication manufactured by Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, Astra-Zeneca, and Novartis. When my Motorola-manufactured Cable Set Top Box showed the appropriate time, I got into my Toyota-manufactured Prius vehicle and set out to my graphic design workplace and stopped to purchase some gasoline refined by the Royal Dutch Shell company, using my debit card issued to me by Bank of the West. On the way to my workplace, I dropped off a package at the local UPS store for delivery, and droped my children off at a local private school. Then, after spending another day not being maimed or killed at work thanks to the company-mandated standards enforced at my workplace, I drive back to my house which had not burned down in my absence because of the high manufacturing quality of the products inside and of the company which built my house, and which has not been plundered of all its valuables thanks to the alarm services provided by Brinks Home Security. I was able to rest easy knowing that even had this happened, I would have an Allstate insurance policy which would cover any damage to my home and anything that was stolen. I then logged onto the internet, financed and ran in part by various different private corporations such as Google, Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon, and posted on the Huffington Post and Daily Kos about how capitalism is the source of all evil in this country.
quote: Ask them how much all these corporations receive from the government in favorable subsidies and/or legislation. :smug:
A more serious response:
quote: So now when I (or someone) has time we just need to include all the parenthetical state-granted virtual-monopolies (SCE), stolen infrastructure (all internet businesses), education research grabbed by business (batteries, pharmaceuticals) and warped finances (lol they included Citibank as a "good thing").
Using computer models created/programmed by public institutions such as colleges, government agencies or the military. And that radar system? Developed and installed by the military and the National Weather Service. And most meteorology programs are in public universities...a good chunk come from Rutgers, Penn State, OU, Lyndon State in Vermont, Mississippi State, Univ. of Wisconsin, Univ. of Washington, a few SUNY schools, the list goes on...
And where does NBC get the license to broadcast...hmmm, it didn't appear out of thin air?
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: Well GOD effing forbid we do that. Then we might become like Europe... where most people are at least bilingual...
My experience in Europe was that most YOUNG people can say some words in English, and *think* they can carry on a conversation; actual ability is lacking.
The numbers related in the article stated that 34% of respondents said English was their second language; German, 12%; French, 11%. What are the other 43% speaking? (The article hints at Russian as an up and coming language)
I'm not sure that you can look down at Americans with such impunity over an inability to speak another language-- consider geographical and political boundaries. Europe (in my experience) is not so much a melting pot as it is a bento box: languages, cultures, peoples generally stay in their little compartments, but have a very close association with one another. Whereas, America IS a big cauldron: our culture demands you mix. In the aggregate, smaller elements add to the flavor, but they lose some of their own identity.
From that perspective, it's reasonable that Americans know fewer languages than Europeans; we encounter them less frequently in non-academic settings.
This should not be construed as being a post opposing language learning in schools; on the contrary, I think learning a second language and culture is vital in education. But there is more to the numbers than just, "Joe Plumber is a American Idiot."
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Scott R: Oh for crying out loud! Now I am remembering that "Joe The Plumber" guy* from Sarah Palin's debate, where he suddenly had a platform to sound off on all political issues, despite the fact he wasn't a plumber and he wasn't named Joe.
*Completely serious, that's two people in two days I wish I didn't now remember.
Posted by Tarrsk (Member # 332) on :
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Hrrm, I consider this a little dubious, I think an adult is perfectly, if not better capable of learning then a child is, the motivation tends to be there as well as the ability to understand mnenmtics better. Also more life experiences to better connect knowledge to.
Bolding mine.
The bolded statement is biologically untrue. Adult brains are different from the brains of children, and both are different from the brains of teenagers. We are born with a vastly different capacity for learning than we have after puberty. Take language, for the simplest example. Before the age of 12-13, our brains are essentially language sponges, capable of soaking up what people are saying around us and intuitively processing that into a new grammar and vocabulary. After a certain age, we lose this ability, and it becomes far more difficult to learn a new language - particularly one that isn't similar to the one(s) we grew up speaking. In addition, we completely lose the capacity to perceive and produce certain phonemes, so that even if we do learn a new language, we will never sound like a native speaker.
(This, by the way, is why pure "immersion learning" of languages for adults, such Rosetta Stone, rarely work as well as they claim. But that's a debate for a different thread.)
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: Scott R: Oh for crying out loud! Now I am remembering that "Joe The Plumber" guy* from Sarah Palin's debate, where he suddenly had a platform to sound off on all political issues, despite the fact he wasn't a plumber and he wasn't named Joe.
*Completely serious, that's two people in two days I wish I didn't now remember.
octomom
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:octomom
Carrie Prejean
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
wait, I get a good caught-red-handed schadenfreude laugh out of him every time he comes up
uh
richard heene Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: Scott R: Oh for crying out loud! Now I am remembering that "Joe The Plumber" guy* from Sarah Palin's debate, where he suddenly had a platform to sound off on all political issues, despite the fact he wasn't a plumber and he wasn't named Joe.
*Completely serious, that's two people in two days I wish I didn't now remember.
octomom
I'm not afraid to retaliate! You've been fairly warned.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro:
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: As far as I know, I've publicly apologized to you at least twice,.
No, you've self-righteously and sarcastically offered entreaties to be "friends." They were insulting in and of themselves.
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: To Orincoro: While I do not appreciate your mocking me, it doesn't give me the right to call you names and I apologize for doing so.
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Orincoro: Instead of stating that you're insane, here's what I should have said:....
Not an apology, but a retraction. Again, more then you have ever given me.
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: If you think you literally capped out on all the math, grammar, history, and political science you've 'ever needed' before junior high, I think you're fundamentally too ignorant right now to have an informed perspective on what counts as 'unnecessary requirements' for schoolchildren. Garishly so, in fact.
Before going on to 9th grade I took, passed and got As or Bs in: World History, U.S. History, Algebra, Geometry, Earth Science, Creative Writing, etc ad nausium. Exactly what level of education would entitle me to have an opinion by your estimation? The fact that I have much more schooling to my name and that I haven't found it to be needful in my day to day life shouldn't preclude my opinion from being heard, nor is calling me fundamentally ignorant a polite thing to do. As I said before, I'm fascinated by history and science and have sought them out on my own. So it is not a question of things I just don't know, i.e. fundamental ignorance.
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: You're arguing that 13 year olds should be making these sort of decisions for themselves?
Well 14-15 on average. But still! We are not all Ender, super genius six year olds, but many many "children" are fully capable of making important life choices even younger. Treating youths as less then adults was not the norm for the vast majority of the human's time here (although times do change, and usually for the better).
quote:It may surprise you to learn that apprenticeship programs are actually coming back in small way across the country.
Perhaps much of my position is based on my school experience, which was very negative, and in a small town, and over a dozen years ago.
quote:On the other hand, as Megabyte mentioned, producing good citizens sort of requires that they have a good understanding of how government and society works. Not grounding them in the basics of how our society works, and our past problems and solutions, how government works, can lead to the decay of society. Otherwise they won't think for themselves, or at least, they won't be informed enough to do so reasonably.
I agree as well that grounding in the basics is necessary.
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: Knowing (at least approximate) dates is the boring, seemingly pointless foundation that an understanding of history is based on. If you don't know when things happened, you can't even begin to grasp what cause and effect, what affected what, etc..
I suspect that another reason dates are taught so much (and often over taught) is that they're so darn easy to test. Understanding the effects that Napoleon had on Europe is a lot harder to test for than knowing the important dates.
I agree that understanding how things interlock is an important aspect of understanding history. I wish my teachers had more discussed the meaning instead of pushing us to memorize dates.
quote:Originally posted by Vadon: I want a chunk of my tax money to go to paying for the mandated education of children, and I wish more of it would go to public education.
Part of my suggestion is that you would be able to earmark where some/most of your taxes would go...so you would have that option. Likely, I would too choose to allocate my contributions towards education...and roads...etc. The Libertarian view isn't that funding education is bad, but that people should have some choice. I'm not saying that all taxes need to be user allocated, that would tie the hands of the policy makers too harshly, but people should have a say in how their government spends their money.
quote:The biggest problem with our education system is we teach to the test.
Agreed. This is exactly what I mean when I talk about "cookie cutter education". One solution for everyone is not effective nor desirable.
quote:I think the most valuable thing students should learn in public education is how to learn.
Agreed. And all people do not learn the same way. But with 30+ students to one teacher, you get what you get I guess.
quote:Having a well educated populace helps all of us, not just those with children.
I still agree. But I tend to think that for instance, teaching children what trigonometry is used for and the general concept of how it works for one week (with an option of taking the class at a later date) and moving on to more practical issues like balancing a check book or taking care of a child are more helpful towards an "educated populace" then spending months grinding out trig work.
quote:Taxes aren't the government robbing hard working people, they're an investment into our future and security for our present.
Still agreeing. I don't mind paying taxes in and of themselves, and don't think that I'm being robbed. I just wish there was more control and appropriate tax to use implemented. For instance, in a gun control thread I suggested that if you want to own a gun, you should have to pay for the safety and physiological testing. Much like the money that is collected from car registration is used to repair roads, I feel our government should be taxing those who use their services appropriately to a large extent.
quote:Originally posted by Amanecer: If it was not mandatory to attend, less people would graduate high school. We would then have more people without marketable skills. More unemployed, more on welfare, and a far more rigid class system that goes completely against American ideals.
And here I thought American ideals were "freedom for all", not "do what we say or else 'cause we know what is best for you".
quote:Originally posted by scholarette: My high school had an excellent setup. There were basic requirements in math, reading etc that took up half the day. Then you could do your electives during the other half in career training (auto, catering, hair, photo, etc). In the end, you had a high school degree with sufficient punch to go to college, but you also could go straight into a career. If that didn't appeal, you could get a normal high school degree and if you were ambitious, we had an excellent honors program. I graduated high school with like a year of college credits. I have a friend who took the career training in photography. He went to college, paying his way by taking photos. He now has a very successful photography studio.
That sounds awesome! I hope I can find that kind of school when my kidlets are that age.
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: Because, put bluntly, knowing more stuff about the way the world and the people in it *are* is never a bad thing. Knowing more things is never bad-expanding one's knowledge about the world is helpful, period. It may be more or less helpful, and people may make poor use of it, but that's not the same thing.
Knowledge in and of itself is a good thing, but when you forceably take someone's time and use it to make them study things that they can't directly use when they have huge gaps in their knowledge base that stay empty, like job and life skills, and then thrust them out into the world as a fully "prepared adult" then it is indeed wrong. As an example of the principle, and -not- a comparison to HS, if you took a child and locked them in a room and made them study astrophysics all day every day but never toilet trained them or gave them even a basic knowledge of how to prepare a meal, that would be a case of "knowing more stuff about the way the world and the people in it are" being a bad thing.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Stone_Wolf:
quote:Well 14-15 on average. But still! We are not all Ender, super genius six year olds, but many many "children" are fully capable of making important life choices even younger. Treating youths as less then adults was not the norm for the vast majority of the human's time here (although times do change, and usually for the better).
While that's most likely true, you must also remember that life expectancy was so much lower as well. As a result people had no choice but to grow up and make their choices sooner.
In this day and age where we can keep most people alive to the age of 75ish there's not nearly that sort of rush. Taking a 16 year old, why should they make these absolutely crucial choices that dictate the tenor and pace of their life when they are only 21% through their lifespan on the average? With just a few more years of training and time to make choices, they could take a fundamentally different direction in life.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Life skills are schools' job now? I always thought that was part of PARENTS' job.
As for job training, I think having some of that (like the model scholarette was talking about) included in high school is an excellent idea.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
BB: Most states let you drop out between 16 and 18 and graduate/test out at 16. I'd just like to see a more focused education take place on fundamentals in Jr. High and then have a lot more options for actual High School, one being, not going on. Forcing people to be somewhere they don't want to be isn't actually very helpful in the terms of different directions later in life.
rivka: It is definitely a parent's job to give children some life skills, and a moral compass, but some life skills like home ec, wood shop, health class, etc are already taught and should be expanded I think. I'm glad so many people agree about vocational skills though!
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Before going on to 9th grade I took, passed and got As or Bs in: World History, U.S. History, Algebra, Geometry, Earth Science, Creative Writing, etc ad nausium. Exactly what level of education would entitle me to have an opinion by your estimation?
This is not about what things YOU were educated in, but in knowing how to EDUCATE. The science of educating children and managing their early skill development. The deficiency is made evident by the compensatory tool of substituting your own school experience as an anecdotal means of filling in the blanks with a Stone Wolf Educational Model. You're essentially modeling your musings and ideas on what worked for you, and this anecdotal playing-around would come at the great detriment to students for whom this narrow-lens model doesn't work.
Education is a science. One that already struggles in implementation and refinement before the fact, really.
The next step is where we get to "Well, okay, I may not know much about the science of education, but ..."
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Scott R:
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: Well GOD effing forbid we do that. Then we might become like Europe... where most people are at least bilingual...
My experience in Europe was that most YOUNG people can say some words in English, and *think* they can carry on a conversation; actual ability is lacking.
The numbers related in the article stated that 34% of respondents said English was their second language; German, 12%; French, 11%. What are the other 43% speaking? (The article hints at Russian as an up and coming language)
Of course, English is not required to be bilingual. Virtually all people east of slovakia can speak some Russian.
And yeah, I'm very aware of the difference between people self designating as english speakers, and actually bring able to speak it.
Still, i would find it unusual to meet a European, even a western European, without some working knowledge of at least one foreign language. That is common in the united states.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
(and I'm not dismissing the 'but' out of hand, it's where i think the conversation becomes much better focused)
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
I'm curious if Orincoro made all those typos on purpose.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
quote:Originally posted by rivka: Life skills are schools' job now? I always thought that was part of PARENTS' job.
As for job training, I think having some of that (like the model scholarette was talking about) included in high school is an excellent idea.
Heh. You know where I work, yes? This is what I almost burst from not saying to a parent who wanted his son to get independent study credit for learning how to balance a checkbook and open a bank account. "People should know how to do that. Why isn't there a class?"
I also refrained from saying that we didn't teach doing laundry either.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Kate, I would love to say that we don't get requests just like that from parents.
I would love to. Too bad I can't.
More seriously, many colleges are adding financial literacy classes. But they cover a whole heck of a lot more than how to balance a checkbook. Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Yeah. Honestly, if it is something that "all adults should know" maybe that parent should have been teaching them.
I do think that there is a place for such "life classes" - including things like cooking and laundry - in community colleges. Some parents are not equipped with these skills and there is a gap. But I work at a major research university.
Stone_Wolf, these, btw, were not poor people. The kid is likely just going to turn things over to the family accountant anyway.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
Samp: I don't understand what you are saying...could you restate please?
boots: Cooking is taught, and I never suggested laundry...fyi...I was more talking about "Job Interviews 101" and "Resumes 101" and "Critical thinking 101" and "Taxes 101" and "Caring for an infant" etc.
My main point is that I would like to see much more options presented at the high school level...not major universities.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: I do think that there is a place for such "life classes" - including things like cooking and laundry - in community colleges. Some parents are not equipped with these skills and there is a gap.
I agree. And many of them do offer such classes (sometimes for transferable credit, and sometimes not).
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Samp: I don't understand what you are saying...could you restate please?
boots: Cooking is taught, and I never suggested laundry...fyi...I was more talking about "Job Interviews 101" and "Resumes 101" and "Critical thinking 101" and "Taxes 101" and "Caring for an infant" etc.
My main point is that I would like to see much more options presented at the high school level...not major universities.
I know. My anecdote was an aside. I think those classes are appropriate at a high school or even community college level. In fact, I suggested that the kid take a course at a community college. His response was that he was paying upwards of $40K per year in tuition already. My (internal) response was that for that kind of money, you might want your kid to learn stuff that you couldn't teach him yourself.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
There is way too much agreeing and reasonable discussion going on here today! I'd swear this is a conversation taking place -not- on Hatrack.
Posted by Vadon (Member # 4561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: There is way too much agreeing and reasonable discussion going on here today! I'd swear this is a conversation taking place -not- on Hatrack.
Oh! Well, then let me see if I can't help you out a bit with that.
In response to me you posted:
quote:
Part of my suggestion is that you would be able to earmark where some/most of your taxes would go...so you would have that option. Likely, I would too choose to allocate my contributions towards education...and roads...etc. The Libertarian view isn't that funding education is bad, but that people should have some choice. I'm not saying that all taxes need to be user allocated, that would tie the hands of the policy makers too harshly, but people should have a say in how their government spends their money.
[...]
Still agreeing. I don't mind paying taxes in and of themselves, and don't think that I'm being robbed. I just wish there was more control and appropriate tax to use implemented. For instance, in a gun control thread I suggested that if you want to own a gun, you should have to pay for the safety and physiological testing. Much like the money that is collected from car registration is used to repair roads, I feel our government should be taxing those who use their services appropriately to a large extent.
So if I'm reading this correctly, you wish that people would pay into the services they use or approve of. I disagree with this line of thought when it comes to taxation, but that has no bearing on my point. My point stems from when you also agreed with this:
quote:
quote:Having a well educated populace helps all of us, not just those with children.
I still agree. But I tend to think that for instance, teaching children what trigonometry is used for and the general concept of how it works for one week (with an option of taking the class at a later date) and moving on to more practical issues like balancing a check book or taking care of a child are more helpful towards an "educated populace" then spending months grinding out trig work.
So my contention is that at the point where you're agreeing that everyone is benefiting from children being educated, then by using your stance that people pay into the services they benefit from, everyone should pay for public education regardless of if they have children. I think the debate on what public education entails is separate from the necessity of public education and its funding.
Wait, I don't think I was all that unreasonable in this post. Let me fix that.
I liked Spiderman 3.
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
quote:And here I thought American ideals were "freedom for all", not "do what we say or else 'cause we know what is best for you".
In this case, I think the two are intricately dependent on each other. To have the freedom to not have your life be completely mapped by the socioeconomic status of your parents, there must be societal systems that enable upward mobility. Mandated education is a part of that.
What type of freedom do you have if you are born poor and there is no free education? The freedom to work at dead end jobs until you die?
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
I can accept that public funding for education and content of "general education" are separate issues. And while I agree that education might well be categorized in "Infrastructure", I tend to think that education would hugely benefit from being privatized. It's not simply a matter of "I don't gots kids, I shouldna pay fer dems learnins".
Let's say the auto insurance situation was more like public education. Both with ed and ins the government requires the minimum. Both are for the general good of the country. But with insurance, the government doesn't use tax money to pay for nor provide the coverage for the insurance. Imagine they did! Getting paid for a repair or a hospital trip would be a mountain of paper work and likely not be handled well. We already have lines out the door at the DMV.
Now imagine schools running like auto insurance. Lots of competition driving price down and quality up, smaller more specialized schools (like AARP insurance and professional truck driver insurance).
We could have a low income related school monies much like welfare, which would take some of the pressure off lower income households. And not all the costs would be paid by outside sources...some money still flowing from the Uncle Sam teet.
Oh, and liking Spiderman 3 isn't that unreasonable...you want unreasonable: Spiderman 3 is the best movie ever made ever.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:Originally posted by Amanecer:
quote:And here I thought American ideals were "freedom for all", not "do what we say or else 'cause we know what is best for you".
In this case, I think the two are intricately dependent on each other. To have the freedom to not have your life be completely mapped by the socioeconomic status of your parents, there must be societal systems that enable upward mobility. Mandated education is a part of that.
What type of freedom do you have if you are born poor and there is no free education? The freedom to work at dead end jobs until you die?
There has to be some middle ground between work at a dead end job until you die and if you don't go to school we will put you in jail which is a better representation of freedom of choice and freedom from being stuck in a low social class!
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: I can accept that public funding for education and content of "general education" are separate issues. And while I agree that education might well be categorized in "Infrastructure", I tend to think that education would hugely benefit from being privatized. It's not simply a matter of "I don't gots kids, I shouldna pay fer dems learnins".
Let's say the auto insurance situation was more like public education. Both with ed and ins the government requires the minimum. Both are for the general good of the country. But with insurance, the government doesn't use tax money to pay for nor provide the coverage for the insurance. Imagine they did! Getting paid for a repair or a hospital trip would be a mountain of paper work and likely not be handled well. We already have lines out the door at the DMV.
Now imagine schools running like auto insurance. Lots of competition driving price down and quality up, smaller more specialized schools (like AARP insurance and professional truck driver insurance).
I wish I could etch this point into your computer screen with a paperclip: basic education is a Public Good. Auto insurance is a private good. The private market does not deliver public goods efficiently. The public sector does not deliver private goods efficiently.
If private schools were *actually* more efficient than public ones, then they could compete directly with the public system *now*. They don't. Why? Because they can't. So they offer a premium service, and their excludability maintains their value. Non-excludable = not-private. Non-private = public.
Hell, you're allowing for welfare to intervene in order to eliminate the excludability of a private system because you *recognize* that if it can't actually work as a public good. But consider the effect of a welfare program in place to eliminate the economic excludability of poor students into a privately run system, for a moment. It would be innefective and enormously costly unless the government had the right to bargain for the service, and thus also effect some *control* over the service.
Remind you of anything? Like medicare?
Know why we pay two times the percentage of our GDP into healthcare compared to other countries? Because we treat a public good as if it is private.
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
quote:There has to be some middle ground between work at a dead end job until you die and if you don't go to school we will put you in jail which is a better representation of freedom of choice and freedom from being stuck in a low social class!
What is this middle ground? There are many countries around the world who have tried various things and all of these case studies point to socialized education being a requisite for a society that enables social mobility.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
Now we are crossing discussions...we were talking about mandatory schooling, not socialized. Also, any link to those case studies, as they would be relevant to the other side of the talk and I would be curious to see them.
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
How is mandatory schooling not socialized? I guess that's your proposal- but that's not really in existence anywhere in the world that I know of. And by case studies- I just meant looking at the education systems in other countries and the results from them. I challenge you to find a country that you want to live in that does not offer socialized (that is mandatory) schooling.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
I'm not trying to be contrary...correct me if I'm wrong, but socialized school speaks to that the funds for it come from everyone through taxes while mandatory schooling speaks to a law requiring people of a certain age to undertake accredited schooling of one sort or another.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Stone_Wolf, maybe it would help to narrow down the problem you have with school. Are you bothered by?
a) That we pay for it with taxes b) That children are required to attend c) The quality of the education d) The curriculum
It might help to address these singly.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
Thanks boots!
a) for me is more a problem I have with how our taxes are structured with a lack of citizen's ability to choose where any of the money goes or does not go. Sure, we can elect new representation, but that only goes so far. As I said before, if I had the opportunity to direct where my tax money was going, education would be one of my designations, and not just because I have children.
b) is a problem for me but only to the extent that c) and d) are a problem. If we had the best kick arse education system in the world hands down I might feel a bit different. Being legally required to attend the 18th best is rather painful. I would say that there should be a minimum general knowledge test and not an age limit, as if you have an Ender or Doogy Houser (sp) then their age is not really that relevant to the amount of knowledge they posses, as well as it better ensures the goal of a generally educated populace.
c) and d) are the points which are least in contention as far as I can tell, and also the most relevant to my gripes with the system.
[ August 19, 2011, 05:11 PM: Message edited by: Stone_Wolf_ ]
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
Taxes qrencollected to fund public goods. That is, non excludable, generally unfungible services. Introducing taxpayer choice on the individual level is ludicrous on the federal level. We have legislators. And the speed qt which they work is part of why they are there n the first place. This is not a direct democracy. Legislation and representative government mediate our needs and wishes.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
To address c) I had a great public education; the children in Beverly Hills likely have a great public education. The children in Watts and Englewood not so much. One big difference* is that, since public education is mostly paid for with local property taxes, Lake Forest has a whole lot more money than Englewood. Not that the kids I grew up with were any brighter or have more innate aptitude than the kids on the South Side.
Nor would capitalism ease this problem. I taught in a private school that served inner city kids and it was deplorable - light years away from the quality public school I went to just a few miles away. Scraping together every cent they could for the brightest kids in the neighborhood (and they were plenty bright - painfully bright given how little we could offer them) we still had no real supplies (if I needed paper or pencils, I brought them myself) no computers, no music or art or gym, usually spoiled school lunches, dirty classrooms and teachers who were paid practically nothing and who (understandably) left once they were certified or hired elsewhere.
Cutting public money is the opposite of what we should be doing to solve those problems.
*Other big differences are related to poverty as well but not so much to the schools. Lack of parental support, nutrition, even basic safety plays a big part of success in education as well. As does the lack of a hope for the future. The majority of middle school age kids I was teaching did not think they would survive high school, much less worry about whether what they learned there would be useful to them as adults.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
How would you solve the money problem boots?
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
I tell you one way it WOULDNT be solved, privatization. There is just no incentive.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
I wouldn't call $130,000,000,000.00 a year no incentive.
Source. Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
How would that be incentive to put education in the hands of corporations? Do you want a "Jennifer Government" dystopia?
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
The $130 bil is incentive for the companies...I've never read "Jennifer Government".
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
How does giving money to the companies (raised from taxes) and adding a middle man improve the situation?
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: I wouldn't call $130,000,000,000.00 a year no incentive.
The money is not an incentive to improve the school system. The money is an incentive to *control* the school system. Not the same thing.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Exactly. Same with the privatization of prisons, telecommunications, and energy, the incentive was not to improve the system, but to control it (and by way of regional monopolies granted, gouge it).
The rest of the modern world laughs at the quality of our privatized cell service and reception, for instance. And, I'm sure, look aghast upon our privatized prison systems, most certainly prison health coverage.
(stories like that make libertarianism seem awesome, of course, since systemic issues like that would not be improved by the perverse incentives of invisible hands and free markets and all that; if anything, it would spread it far and wide, like the dozens of other externalities the economic philosophy does not address)
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Vadon: I liked Spiderman 3.
I liked that whole emo look he had going on! It was truly an excellent movie. Center-shelf right next to Phantom Menace.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
The idea that schools cannot be provided to the poor by private markets is absolutely false. The video Victoria's chance shows through narrative how private schools for the poor exist in Ghana. James Tooley, a private school researcher from Britain, whose research shows that low-cost private schools from India perform better than government schools presented and defended his research at the Cato Institute. Private schools are accountable to parents since parents pay the school, and the school's performance improves as a result.
Furthermore, education is not a public good since education is excludable; a school can prevent someone from attending the school.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
I wasn't aware anyone had said that schools cannot be well-managed by private markets.
quote:Furthermore, education is not a public good since education is excludable; a school can prevent someone from attending the school.
This is...well, it's just a bad argument. A given school can prevent someone from attending, if that someone violates some pretty serious rules. That someone then has (and is generally compelled to) attend different public schools. I wasn't aware that the requirement for public schools to be a public good, all students had to be able to attend whatever school they choose regardless of any circumstances.
And...goodness, you've described the absolute ideal of private market systems and the virtues of competition. But we've...kinda seen throughout America's history how unrestrained free market competition doesn't, in fact, by default result in the best possible result for consumers. Is there some reason, aside from faith in capitalism, why it should be considered a given in education?
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
I would like to point out that the CATO institute is an libertarian activist institution with an agenda and not very credibly in its interpretation of the data? Of course it'll present the argument that privately run schools can do well! What they fail to mention is that this will, like the kibbutzes' and communes will break down completely on a nationwide scale.
Also tragedy of the commons, if every parent demands the school be accountable to the needs of their special snowflake then in the worst case situation this will degrade the school's ability to teach. The purpose of parent-teacher organizations in the public sector is a degree of oversight and accountability, you put too much control in their hands in a private market.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
I said that "The idea that schools cannot be provided to the poor by private markets is absolutely false." (In fact, they might be better as the research I mentioned showed.)
I mentioned this in response to comments made by others. This includes kmbboots, who said,
quote:And making only parents pay for education is a super way to make sure the children of poor people stay poor!
And Orincoro, who said,
quote:You understand the real and immediate effect on communities that would result from such a policy? And the enormous burden and disadvantage it would place on the poor? What you're asking for is the makings of institutionalized ghettoization on American education- to a greater extent even than already occurs, with local funds paying for much of education already.
A public good must be non-excludable by the definition of a public good. Education is excludable; hence, it is not a public good. The simple fact that a school could theoretically exclude students from attending establishes that schooling is not an economic public good. It doesn't matter that under present practice schools exclude students only if they violate some rules. That alone establishes that school/education is not a public good since it establishes that schools are capable of excluding people from using their services. A student being able to attend whatever school they choose regardless of any circumstances is not a requirement for a government school to be a public good.
America's history has not been a history of unrestrained free market competition, so I don't think strong conclusions about free market competition can be drawn from America's history. Some private schools really aren't free market schools since they are regulated and subsidized by government.
Even if unrestrained free market competition doesn't result in the best possible result for consumers that doesn't mean that government restraints will be any better because they could be worse. No claim was made that free markets would result in the best possible result for consumers, but it could be better than government-managed education.
How do you know what is best for consumers when people want different things and have different demands and interests? How do you measure what is best for people? Who gets to decide what is best for consumers? You?
[ August 20, 2011, 09:03 PM: Message edited by: EarlNMeyer-Flask ]
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
@Blayne Bradley
"I would like to point out that the CATO institute is an libertarian activist institution with an agenda and not very credibly in its interpretation of the data."
This is ad hominem and irrelevant to the reasons and evidence presented. The argument, reasons, and evidence don't change at all if they were made by the government.
"What they fail to mention is that this will, like the kibbutzes' and communes will break down completely on a nationwide scale."
Why will it break down? (What exactly will break down?) If it breaks down at the national level, then it can be kept local. (Whatever "it" is.) According to the video I mentioned, these schools appear to be working quite well.
"Also tragedy of the commons, if every parent demands the school be accountable to the needs of their special snowflake then in the worst case situation this will degrade the school's ability to teach."
I don't understand the tragedy of the commons assertion. If a parent/student doesn't really get what they want, then they will leave the school. How does this degrade the school's ability to teach? If some students leave, then the school can continue teaching the students that remain. If you mean the school may no longer exist or may loose revenue since some students leave, then that is because people don't want what the school provides. They shouldn't have to pay for what they don't want -- what is not valuable to them.
It is the student and parent that are the direct recipients of educational goods. They have the most to loose and they pay with their effort and lives, so they should have the most control.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
Part of why I feel that the privatization of schools would result in a better end product is that we could have many, smaller, specialized schools which fit better for the highly varied interest and needs of our country's highly varied children.
Yes the government should set standards to ensure that schools are producing well educated students, but those standards should not be so strict and specific that it forces everyone to get cookie cuttered into the same shape and size (teaching memorization to pass standardized tests). Part of what makes this country so great is our highly diverse populace and the different things we do well.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:I would like to point out that the CATO institute is an libertarian activist institution with an agenda and not very credibly in its interpretation of the data? Of course it'll present the argument that privately run schools can do well!
I get so tired of people just automatically assuming that if someone or some group has an agenda (ideals, standards, political affiliation, etc) that anything they do will be false and should be discarded without even looking at it. Let's be realistic, everyone has an agenda, and just because you think that something is true doesn't mean you will falsify your data to make it so.
I'm not saying the data is right on, I'm saying it should be judged on it's own merits and not dismissed out of hand simply because it was presented at institute with an opinion.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
I don't think government standards will ensure that schools are producing well educated students. People are always bickering about these standards. No one can settle on any standards that are effective. Standards are antithetical to diversity since they require sameness, not difference. So how is the idea of government standards consistent with children's highly varied interests? Standards not so strict to be enforced don't do anything, so they might as well be done away with.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
Your explanation is grasping at straws, temporarily suspending a student, or expelling a student to force them to go to a different school, doesn't change this fact. Your grasping at a minor and non trivial technicality that doesn't statistically matter on a national, state, or municipal scale.
Also you fail to understand the good that state intervention provides; which is that of a single standard and gauranteed way to insure full literacy of the population. It is an historical fact that compulsury universal education has always led to universal literacy and a multiplier effect on economy output on a national scale. Where was the 99% literacy for "free market" nations prior to universal education?
Government spending on education provides a service, that everyone can afford because its free, this is in effect just like giving everyone 50,000$ each to spend on education for those 11 years. The demand is still from the people, its their choice which public school to go to.
If every school was private, you'ld have corporations cutting or closing down schools if the demand isnt high enough, irregardless of the number of students who would be out of an education because of so, and the huge number of people who would not be able to afford even a high school education.
There is literally no good argument for the privatization of the national education system.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: I don't think government standards will ensure that schools are producing well educated students. People are always bickering about these standards. No one can settle on any standards that are effective. Standards are antithetical to diversity since they require sameness, not difference. So how is the idea of government standards consistent with children's highly varied interests? Standards not so strict to be enforced don't do anything, so they might as well be done away with.
"You are now educated enough to work in our factory to purchase products from out company owned story in our company built town in our company approved but otherwise toothless union."
^^^ End result of a privatized school system because its impossible to prevent undue corporate influence.
Under your proposal, let us suppose that the social sciences or the humanities. Already ones that aren't in high demand by the job market as it is that everyone more or less only take because the school requires them to, what happens to them and the ~out of my ass number ~800,000 jobs of teachers teaching humanities? If practically no one teachers them, and no one wants them, no one will retain them.
The whole debate to privatize education is crass and open conspiracy by the upper class to destroy and enslave the middle and lower class into perpetual slavery and ignorance.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
This confuses necessity with sufficiency. The fact that governments provide education doesn't mean that we need government to do it. With government education, we have no choice but to pay for it. Government education is not free; it is paid for by taxes, and a free market could provide it for less money than governments spend. Poor people are able to afford education from free markets, as the video I linked to shows.
Some of the increased literacy rate could come from improved teaching methods and better technology as well as increased demand for literacy in a technologically advanced society, not necessarily from government mandated education. Nations with increasing government intervention in education also tend to improve technologically and economically. See India, Ghana, and China for examples. These places have increased government education and are improving economically and technologically as well. Literacy is more important in an economy with more programmers, doctors, etc. than in an economy with more fishers and laborers, so demand for literacy improves with a better economy.
So what if schools close down if demand isn't high enough? If people still want education, they'd build new schools themselves. They'd start new corporations. If demand isn't high enough then that simply means peole don't care about education. Even if there were government schools in this situation, people might not attend them anyway. For some people, education is a pricey service that has little value to them. They shouldn't be compelled to pay for it.
Where are these "free market" nations that you speak of?
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
Working in a corporate factory to buy things from a corporate store doesn't seem so bad to me. I fail to find fault with that. This is worse than what, starvation and poverty?
As with every market, people that lose jobs in an industry with too little demand may have to retrain and find other jobs. This is what humanities people might have to do (as well as anyone else).
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Where was the 99% literacy for "free market" nations prior to universal education?
Show us where a modern, absolutely unrestrained free market education system has been replaced by a "universal" education system and then we will discuss literacy among the population.
quote:Government spending on education provides a service, that everyone can afford because its free, this is in effect just like giving everyone 50,000$ each to spend on education for those 11 years. The demand is still from the people, its their choice which public school to go to.
It's not free. It's paid for by government revenues, which come from the citizens. Definitely not free by any definition of the word. I would prefer to keep my 50 large and educate my future children in the ways and by the institutions that I see fit.
quote:There is literally no good argument for the privatization of the national education system.
No one is calling for a wholesale privatization of education. The government could maintain standards while still allowing students and parents more options and flexibility
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: So how is the idea of government standards consistent with children's highly varied interests?
An example of a government standard off the top of my head that would achieve the goal while leaving interests varied: Children by the age of X must have X number of accredited classes in reading comprehension, X number of classes in Y subject, etc ad nausium.
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: There is literally no good argument for the privatization of the national education system.
That just strikes me that you have already made up your mind and even if a good argument existed (which I think they do) you would reject it. But perhaps I misjudge you...
quote:The whole debate to privatize education is crass and open conspiracy by the upper class to destroy and enslave the middle and lower class into perpetual slavery and ignorance.
Oh...never mind.
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: The whole debate to privatize education is crass and open conspiracy by the upper class to destroy and enslave the middle and lower class into perpetual slavery and ignorance.
And Loch Ness lives!
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
All free markets without regulation or government intervention all tend towards either monopolies or oligarchies.
"Whenever businessmen meet, the topic always without fail turns towards a conspiracy against the public." -Adam Smith.
"No one is calling for a wholesale privatization of education. The government could maintain standards while still allowing students and parents more options and flexibility"
Except not only would the costs of services skyrocket under privatization, but the actual quality of services would decrease, in fact we are seeing this dynamic in FULL FORCE with now with American healthcare, which is one of the lowest ranking in the western world.
A privatized system would eschew and cut corners on services and quality in order to maximize profits, we see this with healthcare and other natural monopoly proned systems like utilities, and especially internet.
Privatized internet in Canada and the US has less bandwidth and lower quality of service at far higher prices than most of Western europe, this is inexcusable failure of the "free market".
It wouldn't end with partial privatization, there would be those calling for even more steps towards privatization, as in with healthcare, those who have been educated to vote against their own interests who hold the view that the problem with free market failures like healthcare is because there was "too much" gov't intervention.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: This confuses necessity with sufficiency. The fact that governments provide education doesn't mean that we need government to do it. With government education, we have no choice but to pay for it. Government education is not free; it is paid for by taxes, and a free market could provide it for less money than governments spend.
It's funny; libertarians say the same thing about healthcare.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
It's true about healthcare.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
the US is the perfect example of how its false, as well as internet. Compare the US Internet and Healthcare to nearly ANY other western country and you'll see US ranks far behind.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: It's true about healthcare.
Sure, for a society that will leave the poor often literally out in the street to die if they cannot afford emergency treatment.
As long as that society doesn't have to deal with the externalities of issues like vaccination and possible endemic health threats that require systemic, proactive treatment, though.
So, basically, overall, only in a world that we aren't going to see exist because it is reliant on far too many convenient circumstances.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:For some people, education is a pricey service that has little value to them. They shouldn't be compelled to pay for it.
What do you believe people should be compelled to pay for?
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
By compel, I mean coerce. So, nothing.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
*nod* Which is, sadly, the only reason I'm not a Libertarian; scratch one, and they pop.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: *nod* Which is, sadly, the only reason I'm not a Libertarian; scratch one, and they pop.
Seth Finklestein's "House of Cards" theory as used to describe libertarianism is apt:
quote:The fanatical opposition of Libertarians to anti-discrimination laws also illuminates a crucial aspect of the effects of the philosophy. They can never admit even one instance of government intervention doing good overall for society as opposed to the effects of the market. This isn't a matter of preference, it's absolutely crucial to the function of the ideology. If they ever do that, then it's an admission that social engineering can work, the market can fail, and it's just a matter of figuring out what is the proper mixture to have the best society.
This is what sets it apart from Liberalism, Conservatism, and so on. One outcome against prediction will not send those intellectual foundations crashing down, because they aren't based so heavily on absolute rules applications. Libertarianism, by contrast, if it ever concedes a market failure fixed by a government law, is in deep trouble.
So this in turn leads Libertarians into amazing flights of fancy, for example, to deny the success of civil-rights laws. They must say institutional segregation was somehow all the government's fault, or it would have gone away anyway, or something like that. Rather than racism, it's being made stupid by ideology-poisoning.
Libertarian logic is an axiomatic system that bears very little resemblance to standard deductive thought - which is in part why it's so debilitating to people. It's a little like one of those non-Euclidean geometries, internally valid results can be derived from the postulates, but they sound extremely weird when applied to the real world.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
Like having two parallel lines intersect.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
There are a lot of things wrong with health care in this country, but just laying them at the door of privatization and saying, "See, clearly privatization doesn't work!" is such an over simplification to be nearly meaningless.
Are there advantages and disadvantages to both government run and private run systems...yes! Does the way private and government interact fall in that scale...yes!
I don't think generalities are helpful at this level.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: By compel, I mean coerce. So, nothing.
Should the defence of the nation be privatized? Would "market" forces provide a "better" military? If not what makes it different from healthcare, telecommunications, utilities, or education?
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: There are a lot of things wrong with health care in this country, but just laying them at the door of privatization and saying, "See, clearly privatization doesn't work!" is such an over simplification to be nearly meaningless.
Are there advantages and disadvantages to both government run and private run systems...yes! Does the way private and government interact fall in that scale...yes!
I don't think generalities are helpful at this level.
But clearly US healthcare is significantly more privatized than most if not in fact every other western system; and provides worse care on a per capita basis adjusted for scale than every other western nation. Every other western nation has significantly higher degree of socialization of their healthcare, by having universal coverage that is paid for through progressive taxation. The results speak for themselves.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
Some of the statements by Mr. Finkelstein are straw men and misrepresentations. There are libertarians that are okay with civil rights laws. There are different attitudes towards what the proper role of a minimal government should be.
Government may be effective at stamping out racism, but it isn't necessary. In fact, government could be more effective or more quick to reduce racism than a market since it can punish it harshly. However, markets could punish racism as well. It depends on how much people care to discriminate against racist companies and how much they prefer or don't prefer to consume products and services made along racist lines.
The benefit of civil rights laws in reducing racism is questionable. People were becoming less racist before civil-rights laws. The argument has been made that civil rights laws backfire by motivating employers to hire fewer employees that might sue under civil rights laws. Having an employee that might sue makes that employee costly to hire, so an employer may simply refuse to hire that employee rather than risk a lawsuit.
Businesses were prevented from opening non-racist diners because of Jim Crow laws, so the south may have been less racist were it not for government-sponsored racism. How racist people are still can depend on their preference for racism.
The idea of market failure is really a difference of values for what should be produced. Some people don't care to pay for a good, so it is reasoned that a market has failed because that good is inordinately valuable. Seawater is polluted because markets fail at protecting the environment. This isn't a market failure; it's a difference in values. People don't care enough to pay the costs of protecting the environment (if that is what happens).
There's nothing inconsistent with libertarianism in conceding that governments do good overall for society, but libertarians may not prefer government intervention because they think that freedom is better. Furthermore, free markets can produce what governments produce.
I don't understand this statement, "Libertarian logic is an axiomatic system that bears very little resemblance to standard deductive thought " Isn't an axiomatic system precisely deductive? They are the same thing.
[ August 21, 2011, 02:44 AM: Message edited by: EarlNMeyer-Flask ]
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
National defense could be privatized.
How does US healthcare provide worse care on a per capita basis adjusted for scale than every other western nation?
There are some things that the US system does well. I think I read that the market for generic medicines in the US makes generic medicines cheaper than most every other country. Also, in Canada, you have to wait to get elective surgery, even life-saving surgery, since it is rationed. In the US, you can get it so long as you can pay for it.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: How does US healthcare provide worse care on a per capita basis adjusted for scale than every other western nation?
There are multiple reasons why. But make no mistake, it does provide worse care. And at an exorbitantly much higher cost — well over two times the developed world's median — while being the only nation in that category that does not provide universal care to every citizen.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: Some of the statements by Mr. Finkelstein are straw men and misrepresentations. There are libertarians that are okay with civil rights laws.
Do you think that they are right? If a libertarian thought that it was good that the government forced you to serve customers without any regard for their race, are you going to agree with them?
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
I, by the way, am rather fond of civil rights laws.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: National defense could be privatized.
How does US healthcare provide worse care on a per capita basis adjusted for scale than every other western nation?
There are some things that the US system does well. I think I read that the market for generic medicines in the US makes generic medicines cheaper than most every other country. Also, in Canada, you have to wait to get elective surgery, even life-saving surgery, since it is rationed. In the US, you can get it so long as you can pay for it.
Only if you can't pay for it otherwise. Specifically if your in a position to be able to pay for private insurance that can do it quicker than you still have that option, but for an overwhelming majority of Canadians we would not be able to afford "US-style" healthcare; 50,000$ if I recall for reattaching a finger.
quote: This isn't a market failure; it's a difference in values. People don't care enough to pay the costs of protecting the environment (if that is what happens).
No, it is a free market failure. Because the market isn't meant, designed or intended to factor in "values" only the value of a good, and the fact of the matter is that the "market" only acts against resource depletion only when the stocks are so heavily depleted as to be effectively too late to reverse. Every individual actor in each case was acting in their rational best interest to make a profit. But lacked the objective or scientific perspective to see the "tragedy" as it were unfolding before them.
In fact it seems like the entire US economy is running on faulty assumptions from deliberately obstification in its data collection. Manipulated CDI values to cut Social Security, adjustments to how inflation is calculated to make it look like there's growth when in reality there's been a recession for the US since the yearly 2000's and an entire sensationalist lazy media at best to one dedicated to spreading misinformation and lies at worst about the very real economic realities facing the US.
Plutarch had once wrote that income inequality inevitably leads to the downfall of all republics. Things need to change course and quickly.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote: Seawater is polluted because markets fail at protecting the environment. This isn't a market failure; it's a difference in values.
No, it fundamentally is a market failure, in that people are not necessarily able to intelligently determine the personal economic value of all things. This is, in fact, something that you would do well to understand: a market model is inherently flawed precisely because people cannot be trusted to value things correctly, even in their own self-interest.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:A public good must be non-excludable by the definition of a public good. Education is excludable; hence, it is not a public good. The simple fact that a school could theoretically exclude students from attending establishes that schooling is not an economic public good. It doesn't matter that under present practice schools exclude students only if they violate some rules. That alone establishes that school/education is not a public good since it establishes that schools are capable of excluding people from using their services. A student being able to attend whatever school they choose regardless of any circumstances is not a requirement for a government school to be a public good.
So, then, there are no public goods, really-because there is nothing that is absolutely, for all time, completely inviolable to everyone under the sun who is a citizen. (Yes, this includes national defense.) For the present, sure, America is in a position of military dominance over sufficient portions of the world that no one is going to be invaded, but this hasn't always been the case and, human nations being what they are, likely won't be the case forever. It's an interesting bit of absolutist thinking.
quote:America's history has not been a history of unrestrained free market competition, so I don't think strong conclusions about free market competition can be drawn from America's history. Some private schools really aren't free market schools since they are regulated and subsidized by government.
This is another classic Libertarian line of reasoning, and I've always thought it's strange. I mean, on the one hand, America has never been a totally free-market society, so we can't draw strong conclusions. Ask a Libertarian (and I'm asking you personally, Earl) if strong conclusions can be drawn about...communism and socialism. There's never been a society on Earth that lived up to the 100% ideal communist or socialist system, either. But I'll bet you arrive at some pretty strong conclusions about the dangers and flaws of communism and socialism.
That's really the single biggest flaw with Libertarianism (as it is often practiced or rather believed, anyway) that I can see: evidence is not given equal chances.
quote:How do you know what is best for consumers when people want different things and have different demands and interests? How do you measure what is best for people? Who gets to decide what is best for consumers? You?
Me and, y'know, a plurality of my voting peers, yeah.
quote:This confuses necessity with sufficiency. The fact that governments provide education doesn't mean that we need government to do it. With government education, we have no choice but to pay for it. Government education is not free; it is paid for by taxes, and a free market could provide it for less money than governments spend. Poor people are able to afford education from free markets, as the video I linked to shows.
What your video showed was an example of poor people affording education from free markets. It most emphatically didn't show the generalization that you're making. How many videos out there do you think there are of excellent public schools working brilliantly for a given region across the world? I somehow suspect that such a video wouldn't prove conclusive to you.
quote:By compel, I mean coerce. So, nothing.
Another classic Libertarian theme. We live in a representative system. Unless everyone agrees all the time, that means that by definition some people aren't going to be getting what they want some of the time. This equals 'coercion', apparently.
quote:Government may be effective at stamping out racism, but it isn't necessary. In fact, government could be more effective or more quick to reduce racism than a market since it can punish it harshly. However, markets could punish racism as well. It depends on how much people care to discriminate against racist companies and how much they prefer or don't prefer to consume products and services made along racist lines.
Where has racism been 'stamped out' without government involvement? Or is this a case where you can't draw strong conclusions about 100% free markets because they don't exist, but you can draw strong conclusions about socialism/communism, but you can't draw strong conclusions about the need for government to deal with racism...but you can draw strong conclusions about the lack of a need for government to deal with racism. Despite the fact that...well, hasn't been done anywhere that I know of. Do you?
quote:The benefit of civil rights laws in reducing racism is questionable. People were becoming less racist before civil-rights laws. The argument has been made that civil rights laws backfire by motivating employers to hire fewer employees that might sue under civil rights laws. Having an employee that might sue makes that employee costly to hire, so an employer may simply refuse to hire that employee rather than risk a lawsuit.
*snort* Here is yet another Libertarian example of minimizing actual history in favor of what would have happened in an imaginary ideal situation...while supporting the latter by evidence drawn from history, while denying the former when looking at history. People were 'becoming less racist' for thousands of years.
quote:There's nothing inconsistent with libertarianism in conceding that governments do good overall for society, but libertarians may not prefer government intervention because they think that freedom is better. Furthermore, free markets can produce what governments produce.
Freedom and government intervention isn't incompatible. It's just not. That's a falsehood (I don't think you're lying, just that you're wrong) right at the start. It's a representative system. Not getting your way all of the time doesn't equal oppression. Strangely, it's one that privatization wouldn't resolve either. Do all boardrooms agree all the time? No.
quote:National defense could be privatized.
Do you have an...example of this being done successfully? Or is this another Libertarian ideal that doesn't require strong real-world examples?
[ August 21, 2011, 11:12 AM: Message edited by: Rakeesh ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Touching anti-discrimination laws: It may be worth pointing out that the market was never given a chance. The US went straight from having the old Jim-Crow laws to the various anti-discrimination measures. We do not know what would have happened if there had just been the repeal of the discriminatory laws; but it seems likely that, since the laws were thought necessary, the discrimination could not have been maintained voluntarily.
National defense: The feudal system is basically a formalisation of private, decentralised defense.
Pollution is a market failure because nobody owns the seawater. It is not that people mis-value the effects of pollution on themselves; pollution does not affect any one person very strongly. It's only when you add up a small effect over very many people that you see the true cost. This is a classic case of concentrated benefits (one factory owner can make a lot of money from polluting) and diluted costs. It is not the case that the factory owners are failing to evaluate the costs correctly, it is just that they don't have to pay for the costs they impose on others. This market fails because it doesn't exist: Nobody is able to enforce a claim to the tiny bit of seawater that they might reasonably be said to own. A rational government would say "Right, everyone owns so-and-so much seawater and they can pollute that bit; if they want to pollute anyone else's water, they can negotiate with the other owners for the right to do so." In practice this should probably be done as a cap-and-trade system with the proceeds being evenly distributed across the population, since it's a bit impractical to track down six billion individual quota owners. People who wanted to keep their own bit unpolluted could opt out of the system, reducing the cap and forgoing the payments. The point is, however, that markets are created only by force, specifically, the force that enforces ownership. In the case of land that force can be supplied by the owner and his neighbours forming a local militia; but that's a special case. For things like pollution rights, a government is required to make the market.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
Wouldnt that be a good argument for cap and trade then?
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Um, yes. That's what I said. Cap and trade is not government intervention in a freely functioning market, it is government intervention to create a market that didn't exist.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
I'm just putting it out there, C&T gets alot of flak.
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: Also, in Canada, you have to wait to get elective surgery, even life-saving surgery, since it is rationed.
I have not seen this to be more the case in Canada than the US, at least for non-elective procedures. Often for elective, as well.
It would be odd if the above claim were to be true *and* not have it reflected in the respective overall morbidity and mortality rates. And it doesn't seem to be.
[Note: if you don't think there is rationing in the US, then you've likely never tried to get preapproval from an insurance company for an expensive medical procedure! Or, thankfully, had to deal with the fallout of getting the covergae that was initially promised.]
As someone with a prior open heart surgery, when I was concerned about my cardiac health in the US, I had to schedule an appointment with a family care doctor before I could be seen by a cardiology specialist. Finding a family care doctor who was both accepting new patients and took my HMO took a couple of weeks, and then it was several months before I could be booked into cardiology. It turned out that I was indeed developing heart failure and needed a second open heart surgery. Which was booked some time out into the future.
Contrast this to the experience I had as a medical student visiting to work in Canada. When I started having some cardiac symptoms, I was covered already on provincial health insurance and could walk into any of the many family doctor clinics in the city (which -- by the way -- are run as private small businesses, without their patient volume and practice limited by HMO regulations). I was seen the next day, got an echocardiogram the day after that, and was started immediately on IV antibiotics for endocarditis that staved off complications for a good long while.
---
Added: The Canadian system has its problems. The US system has its problems. These statements are not mutually exclusionary.
But when you are judging one system versus another system, you look at systemic outcomes -- which are better for Canada, as well as several other developed countries. This is true for morbidity and mortality indicators as well as for patient satisfaction surveys. When large random samples from the various populations are asked, Americans tend to be less satisfied with their system, and they tend to be sicker and more likely to die earlier. That doesn't mean you can't find dissatisfied people in other countries -- just a lower percentage of them.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
@CT: I wonder where you get the data that systemic outcomes are better in Canada.
@TomDavidson: Only an individual can determine what is in their self-interest. If people are ignorant of the effects of something, then they can be educated about that in a market so that they may eventually make other choices. Ignorance of the effects of something is something that would exist if government intervened in a market as well.
@Rakeesh: A public good requires non-excludability. National defense is non-excludable since people cannot be excluded from the benefits of their homes being defended from invaders.
Why weren't societies able to achieve 100% ideal communism and socialism? Communism-in-practice is what history shows us.
I think your ideas about freedom are equivocated. When talking about government intervention, it is meant negative freedom is infringed. This is the freedom to do what you want with your own resources (without infringing on others property rights, etc.) Constraints are not placed on you to do so. Meanwhile positive freedom is the freedom to actually get what you want. For example, not getting what you want from a corporate board because they won't give it to you prevents you from obtaining a desirable object. (They don't have to give it to you.) However, this does not infringe on your right to pursue with your own property, etc. the things that you want. Hence, government intervention, which takes away people's ability to do with their own property, etc. what they want is incompatible with negative freedom.
Adding to King of Men's example I have the following to add. The British in the American Revolution were confronted and defeated by the minutemen, local militia not a government military, in the Battles of Lexington and Concord.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:If people are ignorant of the effects of something, then they can be educated about that in a market so that they may eventually make other choices. Ignorance of the effects of something is something that would exist if government intervened in a market as well.
*laugh* I'm curious: are you naive enough to really believe this, or are you just refusing to bite the bullet of your own ideology and own up to its flaws?
quote:A public good requires non-excludability.
Why do you think so? Or, more to the point, at what level of scarcity do you consider that something might not be a public good? If, for example, the air we breathe could in fact be partitioned out and rented to us by the government -- something that's certainly technically possible, if hysterically unlikely -- would you argue that breathable air would at that moment cease to be a public good? (More to the point, you do recognize that the people using the phrase "public good" in this thread have been largely referring to pooled goods, right? Given this, would you apply different arguments?)
quote:When talking about government intervention, it is meant negative freedom is infringed.
More accurately, you are talking about negative freedom.
quote:The British in the American Revolution were confronted and defeated by the minutemen, local militia not a government military, in the Battles of Lexington and Concord.
And if those were the only two battles fought, you'd have a point. But, y'know, they weren't. Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:@CT: I wonder where you get the data that systemic outcomes are better in Canada.
Where do you get the data that they're not?
quote: National defense is non-excludable since people cannot be excluded from the benefits of their homes being defended from invaders.
By that logic, public education is non-excludable since people can't be excluded from the benefits of living in a more literate, educated society.
[ August 21, 2011, 04:50 PM: Message edited by: Samprimary ]
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: @CT: I wonder where you get the data that systemic outcomes are better in Canada.
Generally via the WHO, Harvard School of Public Health, US CDC, NIH, Health and Statistics Canada, and various peer-reviewed medical journals.
Where do you get your data?
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
@TomDavidson: I don't see what's so naive about thinking that education about the effects of market choices can influence consumer behavior.
I don't see much point in debating so much about whether or not something is a public good. This is a squabble over economic jargon. A public good requires non-excludability because that is its definition. Partitioned air (like in outer space) would cease to be a public good (since it can be excluded). Terms like public goods can be rather fuzzy.
A pooled good on the other hand, can be provided by a free market. People can pool their resources to pay for something. They do this with insurance.
@Samprimary:
"Where do you get the data that they're not?"
I'm not making the claims. I'm interested where these facts come from. A claim isn't proven right because I can't prove the opposite claim.
"By that logic, public education is non-excludable since people can't be exculded from the benefits of living in a more literate, educated society."
This is an external benefit rather than a public good. They're different things.
@CT: What data?
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: @CT: What data?
The data that provides the basis you use to assess US and Canadian healthcare systems. For example, the four claims below:
quote: 1. There are some things that the US system does well. 2. I think I read that the market for generic medicines in the US makes generic medicines cheaper than most every other country. 3. Also, in Canada, you have to wait to get elective surgery, even life-saving surgery, since it is rationed. 4. In the US, you can get it so long as you can pay for it.
I have been a patient on both sides of the border. More importantly from a systems-assessment perspective, I am a trained physician who worked a 2-year research position funded by the US National Institutes of Health in order to study these issues (among others), have completed a fellowship specific to research training, and worked on these matters as a part of a graduate thesis.
I know the field and the players well, and I'm invested in staying up to date and advocating both for my home country (the USA) and for patients on both sides of the border.
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
PS: Mind you, I don't disagree that there are some things the US healthcare system does well. I am just curious as to how you yourself go about gathering and assessing information about it. And Canada's.
---
Added: I'm also extraordinarily cranky right now, being in the middle of a move across over a thousand miles.
I shouldn't take that out on you. My apologies for being abrupt and surly.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote: "Where do you get the data that they're not?"
I'm not making the claims. I'm interested where these facts come from. A claim isn't proven right because I can't prove the opposite claim.
You are making some claims, actually. But for the sake of figuring out where you're hedging from: do you think the canadian healthcare system or the american healthcare system works better?
quote:"By that logic, public education is non-excludable since people can't be exculded from the benefits of living in a more literate, educated society."
This is an external benefit rather than a public good. They're different things.
You are describing them the same, then arbitrarily attaching different labels to them. Not being invaded by foreigners is as much an 'external benefit' to national defense as a literate educated society is an 'external benefit' of national schooling, because they're both core intended functions of each system. There's no sufficient reason to differentiate the labels, except to create an arbitrary, artificial distinction in moral acceptability of public funding.
@CT: What data? [/QB][/QUOTE]
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
I created a new topic for discussing US and Canadian healthcare, and I cite some sources that I found since this is a bit off topic.
Posted by CT (Member # 8342) on :
quote:Originally posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask: I cite some sources that I found since this is a bit off topic.
I read you as saying you cited some sources you just found to reference on this topic today to further the discussion now-- is that right? But I am curious as to where you have gotten your information about the systems in the past, specifically in reference to the claims made above.
---
Added: I am interested because I find it hard to follow many people's thinking in these matters, and I don't know generallyif people are aware of the information sources that are out there and which are more reliable, or if they have a handle on how to assess that information in a useful way.
I think it may be that many people hear things bandied about but don't know (or have enough interest) to look at more detailed sources.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Ok, about the militia in the colonies, it was very much a government function, just not the federal government, since, y'know, there wasn't one. (In fact they were a direct import from England. If you check out the English Civil War, for example, you'll find militias all over the place.) The state governments were always trying to get people to take the militia obligation (observe that service was compulsory for all able-bodied men!) seriously and show up for drill once in a while, and failing miserably. As a result of which, the militias uniformly sucked. At Lexington/Concord they outnumbered the regulars two to one, and failed to inflict anything worse than a check. At Ticonderoga the New England militias showed up in time to consume much-needed supplies, then went back home before the English arrived. At Bunker Hill the Americans were driven from a well fortified position by, no less, a bayonet charge. There are no instances of colonial militias standing their ground in the open against reasonably even numbers of British regulars. If you want good examples of privatised defense, the American state militias really will not serve.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
When I originally said something about education not being a public good, I was making a technical point about economic jargon. My argument about it has nothing to do with moral acceptability of public funding.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
Oh yeah, good point the militias aren't really a good example of private defense, but they are less centralized than a federal military.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Ok, decentralisation and privatisation are completely different things.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote: I don't see what's so naive about thinking that education about the effects of market choices can influence consumer behavior.
I will ask some leading questions, in the hope that you -- in the course of answering them -- will understand.
1) Who should provide this education? 2) Would this education be mandatory? 3) How would the standards of this education be established and maintained?
It is my hope that you reached #3 and realized that, yeah, any such education would be pathetic and worthless at best unless there were a compelling economic interest for at least one private party to guarantee otherwise -- which, let's face it, is highly unlikely.
quote:I don't see much point in debating so much about whether or not something is a public good. This is a squabble over economic jargon.
I agree. So, rather than hiding behind definitions, why not address the meaning of the arguments being presented to you?
quote:A pooled good on the other hand, can be provided by a free market. People can pool their resources to pay for something. They do this with insurance.
You misunderstand what a pooled good is, in this case. It is a good that is doled out (or purchased) from a single common pool of limited resource, not a good that is paid for from a common pool.
Posted by EarlNMeyer-Flask (Member # 1546) on :
1) Who should provide this education? This education, by which is meant information about effects of a product or quality of a product or service, can be provided by businesses or consumers that have some incentive to provide it. For example, Microsoft and Sun could provide information on the quality of one another's server technology informing consumers of the benefits and costs of using them. A charitable organization or a non-profit organization provides information to the public about effects of environmental pollutants because they have some interest in doing so. Pehaps they are environmentalists.
2) Would this education be mandatory? No one is compelled to learn information or provide it.
3) How would the standards of this education be established and maintained? The accuracy of information is vetted by other organizations and skeptical consumers with some interest in its accuracy.
quote:You misunderstand what a pooled good is, in this case. It is a good that is doled out (or purchased) from a single common pool of limited resource, not a good that is paid for from a common pool.
Is there authority on this?
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:The accuracy of information is vetted by other organizations and skeptical consumers with some interest in its accuracy.
Much like credit ratings.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
About private defense, I just remembered that Norway's army, from around 1870 onwards, was supposed to be supplemented by rifle clubs, the "volunteer shooters". Even now there are apparently 150000 rifle-club members in Norway, which is a pretty large percentage of a population of 5 million. Now you can argue about how private this was; the overall organisation was instituted by the Storting. Still, membership was always voluntary. The statutes of the organisation include a sentence about its purpose: ""The National Rifle Association's goal is to promote marksmanship throughout the Norwegian population and thus prepare the population for National Defence". I observe in passing that similar government support and propaganda is the reason why outdoor sports, especially skiing and orienteering, are much more popular in Norway (and Scandinavia) than outside it; these were thought to be useful skills for war.
Now one can argue about how well all of this worked. The invention of cheap machine guns, heavy artillery, and especially airpower and tanks tended to reduce the effect of individual riflemen. In 1940, part of the system worked as intended: The resistance to the German invasion, such as it was, rested basically on volunteers, because the government (demonstrating near-treasonous incompetence, for which they should have been shot after the war) failed to mobilise the regular Army fully, even after they realised the invasion was happening. On the other hand, these militias were unable to accomplish much of anything against the regular troops of the Wehrmacht; the famous delaying action (perhaps not so famous outside Norway!) at Midtskogen, for example, was just that: A delaying action, which just barely kept the Germans at bay long enough for the government to make good its escape. There was certainly no question of counterattacking against regular units of the Wehrmacht. Conversely, the resistance in the north lasted until the Allied troops departed for France because there, the regular units of the 6th division had time to mobilise and organise.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote: A charitable organization or a non-profit organization provides information to the public about effects of environmental pollutants because they have some interest in doing so. Pehaps they are environmentalists.
How is this hypothetical non-profit organization funded? (Let's bear in mind, too, that we're talking about a libertarian paradise here, in which the distinction between a for-profit and non-profit organization is moot.)
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
quote: Do not use Medicare. Do not use Social Security Do not become a member of the US military, who are paid with tax dollars. Do not ask the National Guard to help you after a disaster. Do not call 911 when you get hurt. Do not call the police to stop intruders in your home. Do not summon the fire department to save your burning home. Do not drive on any paved road, highway, and interstate or drive on any bridge. Do not use public restrooms. Do not send your kids to public schools. Do not put your trash out for city garbage collectors. Do not live in areas with clean air. Do not drink clean water. Do not visit National Parks. Do not visit public museums, zoos, and monuments. Do not eat or use FDA inspected food and medicines. Do not bring your kids to public playgrounds. Do not walk or run on sidewalks. Do not use public recreational facilities such as basketball and tennis courts. Do not seek shelter facilities or food in soup kitchens when you are homeless and hungry. Do not apply for educational or job training assistance when you lose your job. Do not apply for food stamps when you can’t feed your children. Do not use the judiciary system for any reason. Do not ask for an attorney when you are arrested and do not ask for one to be assigned to you by the court. Do not apply for any Pell Grants. Do not use cures that were discovered by labs using federal dollars. Do not fly on federally regulated airplanes. Do not use any product that can trace its development back to NASA. Do not watch the weather provided by the National Weather Service. Do not listen to severe weather warnings from the National Weather Service. Do not listen to tsunami, hurricane, or earthquake alert systems. Do not apply for federal housing. Do not use the internet, which was developed by the military. Do not swim in clean rivers. Do not allow your child to eat school lunches or breakfasts. Do not ask for FEMA assistance when everything you own gets wiped out by disaster. Do not ask the military to defend your life and home in the event of a foreign invasion. Do not use your cell phone or home telephone. Do not buy firearms that wouldn’t have been developed without the support of the US Government and military. That includes most of them. Do not eat USDA inspected produce and meat. Do not apply for government grants to start your own business. Do not apply to win a government contract. Do not buy any vehicle that has been inspected by government safety agencies. Do not buy any product that is protected from poisons, toxins, etc…by the Consumer Protection Agency. Do not save your money in a bank that is FDIC insured. Do not use Veterans benefits or military health care. Do not use the G.I. Bill to go to college. Do not apply for unemployment benefits. Do not use any electricity from companies regulated by the Department of Energy. Do not live in homes that are built to code. Do not run for public office. Politicians are paid with taxpayer dollars. Do not ask for help from the FBI, S.W.A.T, the bomb squad, Homeland Security, State troopers, etc… Do not apply for any government job whatsoever as all state and federal employees are paid with tax dollars. Do not use public libraries. Do not use the US Postal Service. Do not visit the National Archives. Do not visit Presidential Libraries. Do not use airports that are secured by the federal government. Do not apply for loans from any bank that is FDIC insured. Do not ask the government to help you clean up after a tornado. Do not ask the Department of Agriculture to provide a subsidy to help you run your farm. Do not take walks in National Forests. Do not ask for taxpayer dollars for your oil company. Do not ask the federal government to bail your company out during recessions. Do not seek medical care from places that use federal dollars. Do not use Medicaid. Do not use WIC. Do not use electricity generated by Hoover Dam. Do not use electricity or any service provided by the Tennessee Valley Authority. Do not ask the Army Corps of Engineers to rebuild levees when they break. Do not let the Coast Guard save you from drowning when your boat capsizes at sea. Do not ask the government to help evacuate you when all hell breaks loose in the country you are in. Do not visit historic landmarks. Do not visit fisheries. Do not expect to see animals that are federally protected because of the Endangered Species List. Do not expect plows to clear roads of snow and ice so your kids can go to school and so you can get to work. Do not hunt or camp on federal land. Do not work anywhere that has a safe workplace because of government regulations. Do not use public transportation. Do not drink water from public water fountains. Do not whine when someone copies your work and sells it as their own. Government enforces copyright laws. Do not expect to own your home, car, or boat. Government organizes and keeps all titles. Do not expect convicted felons to remain off the streets. Do not eat in restaurants that are regulated by food quality and safety standards. Do not seek help from the US Embassy if you need assistance in a foreign nation. Do not apply for a passport to travel outside of the United States. Do not apply for a patent when you invent something. Do not adopt a child through your local, state, or federal governments. 89.Do not use elevators that have been inspected by federal or state safety regulators. Do not use any resource that was discovered by the USGS. Do not ask for energy assistance from the government. Do not move to any other developed nation, because the taxes are much higher. Do not go to a beach that is kept clean by the state. Do not use money printed by the US Treasury. Do not complain when millions more illegal immigrants cross the border because there are no more border patrol agents. Do not attend a state university. Do not see any doctor that is licensed through the state. Do not use any water from municipal water systems. Do not complain when diseases and viruses, that were once fought around the globe by the US government and CDC, reach your house. Do not work for any company that is required to pay its workers a livable wage, provide them sick days, vacation days, and benefits. Do not expect to be able to vote on election days. Government provides voting booths, election day officials, and voting machines which are paid for with taxes. Do not ride trains. The railroad was built with government financial assistance.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
That is one long, bossy list which is directed at who exactly Blayne?
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
Yeah, what was the point of that list? Don't use things we pay taxes for?
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
I forgot to write down the sentence.
"Someone just posted an ordered list on facebook for "People who hate taxes or 'Socialism'""
[ August 24, 2011, 07:00 PM: Message edited by: Blayne Bradley ]
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
And I find it mildly frustrating (it used to be amusing) that you hate people laughing at your expense in the just same way you did at theirs.
Grow up some more Blayne.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
list is dumb. it's like recommending to an anti-war protester that they should 'go live somewhere else' if they don't like our war.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: And I find it mildly frustrating (it used to be amusing) that you hate people laughing at your expense in the just same way you did at theirs.
Grow up some more Blayne.
I believe your exaggerating a fair bit there, though I should point out that I don't recall you stepping in the last few times people did so then, maybe show some consistency?
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
Huh? ≠ "WHY!? *tears*"
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley:
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: And I find it mildly frustrating (it used to be amusing) that you hate people laughing at your expense in the just same way you did at theirs.
Grow up some more Blayne.
I believe your exaggerating a fair bit there, though I should point out that I don't recall you stepping in the last few times people did so then, maybe show some consistency?
I'm not exaggerating at all, you were asked a question, and you decided to be rude.
Oh, and you should point out should you? Pray tell why is that? Are you so sure you know what I am and am not doing when you write me?
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Blayne: I don't wish to have an altercation with you here, if you want to tell me how you like/dislike my moderating, do it by email.
I was posting in response to you as BlackBlade, not JanitorBlade.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
Whatever, editing it out, you could have just asked instead of going for a guilt trip.
Posted by Stone_Wolf_ (Member # 8299) on :
Dude, he just said it wasn't an official rebuke, just a user comment.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Blayne: I'm not parsing your last statement.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
I found this interesting.
quote: Consider the residential housing construction market and its boom and bust. In a nutshell, what happened was we built too much residential housing, particularly in areas like inland SoCal, around Las Vegas, and South Florida. When developers realized they had built way more housing than they were going to sell, they laid-off tons of construction workers and many developers went bankrupt. So now workers are getting less work and spending less money, and banks are stuck with crappy loans that won't be repaid. So how do the different sides describe a solution?
Keynesian: What we're seeing here is a classic Keynesian feedback loop. Construction workers get fired, so they spend less money and buy less stuff, so the people they buy from have less money, so they spend less, and the factories make less, so the factory workers have less money, and so on and so forth in a downward spiral. So let's have a government intervention. The government can borrow money cheaper and easily and then they put that money in someone's pocket, preferably someone who will spend it asap. They buy stuff, so whoever they buy stuff from now has more money, and just as the downward spiral happens, we get an upward spiral. This gets us back on the right trajectory. Eventually people have enough money that they buy up all that extra housing.
Austrian: The problem isn't that people have too little money - it's that they were doing the wrong thing. Why did we build all this housing that we don't demand? Something (probably unnecessary government meddling eg mortgage interest tax credit, Fannie/Freddie Mac, etc) messed up the market's incentives and price signals so we built too much. A Keynesian intervention is just going to continue us on the wrong track, paying construction workers to do more construction when we already have too much. What we need is what Schumpeter called "creative destruction". Too much of our economy is in construction - let's close down some of our construction industry and move into other industries that the markets demand more of. So retrain our construction workers as IT experts and health care professionals - let the market shift us to more demanded industries. This will get our economy doing actually productive stuff again, rather than continuing on the path of more-of-the-same that got us here.
Keynesian reply: There are huge frictions in the creative destruction process you describe. It's not so simple to turn construction workers into nurses and engineers. It'll take a long time, during which there will be human suffering as people are poorer and have all the problems that go along with that. Indeed, they might be so much poorer that it won't be possible for them to retrain in IT - they'll be too busy barely getting by working 3 jobs at Walmart. Government intervention and spending can hurry this process up by getting money moving again, to say nothing of a moral obligation to relive suffering.
Austrian reply: Your government intervention will just encourage another unproductive boom-bust cycle. Let the market decide and people will be put to work the right way!
If only human suffering were fungible....
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
Aha, got a reply as to what should've been done in 2008/2009.
quote: Massive spending, focused on infrastructure, that would sustain demand while giving the private sector time to work out its enormous debt issues. It's a worthwhile investment since infrastructure is the backbone of productivity, and government borrowing is so ridiculously cheap that the payoff would be well, well worth it.
An unemployment insurance extension to go along with it. Homeowner mortgage relief for people who are viable-but-underwater, along with allowing people to rent foreclosed homes if they really, really can't afford the mortgage, so the houses don't disintegrate from neglect.
Couple that with a fed policy targeting inflation at about 3-4% to let the market know that hoarding will cost you money, and a policy allowing the dollar to drop to what it should be worth, since the US dollar should be trading a frack of a lot lower than it had been in 2008, and China needs to understand that they can't fuel their growth with cheap exports forever. They need to become a grown-up, consumer-driven economy like everybody else.
Oh, and resurrecting Glass-Steagel, considering the fact that rescinding it was the entire fraking problem in the first place. Banks need regulation. They're simply too powerful to be left to their own devices.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Interesting article. Is libertarianism compatible with democracy?
As it is so often preached, absolutely not. After all, a democracy grants its citizens collectively the right and power to take things from portions of its people and, y'know, redistribute them. A strict no-no. Some form of diluted or qualified libertarianism, sure, maybe.
Though to be fair, you won't find an ideal, unmitigated form of government anywhere.
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