Only that's not actually what happens on the ground. The "bad" schools typically had more money per student (and were larger, so more money in total) than the

Only that's not actually what happens on the ground. The "bad" schools typically had more money per student (and were larger, so more money in total) than the "good" schools where I grew up. The sole and only difference that mattered was the raw material (students) that attended. Heck, I attended a private inner city high school for a year - those demographics were identical to the public school next door, but since the private school could filter for the best students they did far more with far less. School funding is rarely the problem. You could increase funding 3x and still not put a dent in the problem until we decide as a society that school's are not social welfare centers. Exceedingly few children can be "saved" from a horrible environment outside of school. Edit: I do actually agree with the virtuous cycle premise - I just don't think it's directly related to finances. I am quite convinced after 20 years of studying the debate that school funding is almost entirely divorced from school performance. I've had a unique enough education background to know small pockets of poor folks who value education exist - and they get just as good if not better outcomes than the rich suburban "college prep" schools for about a quarter of the cost if they are large enough to fund a private school, or even less if it's simply a high-functioning homeschool group. Parents are pretty much the only thing that matters in this debate, the rest is line noise at best.