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Funding in U.S. schools is super unequal. Most school funding in the U.S. comes from local property tax. But if a district has a lot of poverty, then revenue fr

Funding in U.S. schools is super unequal. Most school funding in the U.S. comes from local property tax. But if a district has a lot of poverty, then revenue from property tax is low. That means low funding for the local school, which lowers the quality of education for students, which makes it harder for the students to get out of poverty, which keeps the district's poverty level high. It's a self reinforcing cycle, which need to be fundamentally re-structured.

xyzzyz 5y ago
This might have been true at some point in the past, but it is very much false now, and has been false for at least a decade or two. If local property tax revenues are low, the shortfall is made up for with state and federal funds. Just look at the data: worst performing urban schools often have more funding than better performing ones in rural areas or in smaller towns. If you don’t believe me, just show me a few examples, it shouldn’t be too hard to come up with, if the pattern is as strong and casually important as you suggest it is.
- coryrc 5y ago
  To supplant your point: Detroit Public Schools per-pupil funding: $15,891 Average Michigan per-pupil funding: $13,457 https://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/underfunded-detroit-is-states-15th-best-funded-larger-school-district https://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/underfunded-detr...
- ARandumGuy 5y ago
  The amount of local funding for public education varies wildly from state to state. In New Mexico in 2018, only 15% of public school revenue came from local sources. However, during the same year in Nebraska, that number is 53%. So yes, in some states differences in local property tax has a minimal effect on school funding. But in other states, the issue is still a significant issue. Source: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator/cma?tid=4 https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator/cma?tid=4
  - xyzzyz 5y ago
    And in Nebraska, can you find a strong correlation between funding levels and schools performance? I asked you for examples, can you find any? Importantly, if in many states the school funding is equalized, and yet we still have wide difference in performance between good and bad schools, why would anyone expect that changing funding structure in Nebraska would change school outcomes in a significant way? If school funding levels in Michigan are similar across the board, with worse performing schools getting more, not less funding than better performing ones, clearly something else than funding is responsible for these disparities, isnt it? Lastly, as funding disparities have been equalized in many places in past decades, have we ever observed lower funded schools catch up to better funded ones? The school funding differences are quite obviously not responsible for disparities in school outcomes, and it is beyond clear to me that the entire goal of this narrative is not to improve schools, but instead to funnel more tax funds to politically allied groups, using children as a cover.
    - robocat 5y ago
      > can you find a strong correlation between funding levels and schools performance In New Zealand there is a negative correlation. The performance of schools in New Zealand is very strongly correlated with “the decile” which is how wealthy the area where the school is located (i.e. how well off the parents are correlates with how well their children do academically). The schools in areas of poverty get more state funding, but the results at those schools are very poor, because the parents are poor, and poor parents often cause poor students (edit: cause is the wrong word here, sorry). Our government otherwise funds schools per student at a fairly flat per capita rate, so there is not the variation in school funding (ignoring private schools) like that which occurs in the US. I am just pointing out that in New Zealand the main correlation for average student ability is their home, not their school.
      - xyzzyz 5y ago
        > I am just pointing out that in New Zealand the main correlation for average student ability is their home, not their school. Right. Whatever the casual mechanism is at play, increasing funding of schools is not going to make much of a difference for the kids -- it will, though, for employees of the school systems.
- mcguire 5y ago
  "Does School Spending Matter? The New Literature on an Old Question" (https://works.bepress.com/c_kirabo_jackson/38/ https://works.bepress.com/c_kirabo_jackson/38/) "All but one of the several multi-state studies find a strong link between spending and outcomes –indicating that money matters on average. Importantly, this is true across studies that use different data-sets, examine different time periods, rely on different sources of variation, and employ different statistical techniques. While one can poke holes in each individual study, the robustness of the patterns across a variety of settings is compelling evidence of a real positive causal relationship between increased school spending and student outcomes on average. However, an examination of single-state studies suggests that,on average, money matters, but that this is not always so in all settings or in all contexts." Also see "It’s not nothing: The role of money in improving education" (https://www.brookings.edu/research/its-not-nothing-the-role-of-money-in-improving-education/ https://www.brookings.edu/research/its-not-nothing-the-role-...) and "How Money Matters for Schools" (https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/how-money-matters-report https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/how-money-matter...).
bluGill 5y ago
Maybe, but I went to one of the worst funded schools in my state (MN at the time) and got a great education. We were a rural area with only a small tax base, but everyone cared that we got a good education and so the money was carefully spent to give us a good education with the limited money. In fact as a kid I commented that it didn't seem like we had poor funding as we had a lot of activities and great education. Then it was explained that the historical mining areas of the state had a much better tax base, as did the inner city schools (they got the taxes from expensive downtown properties), and even suburban districts had industrial areas to tax.
treis 5y ago
>Most school funding in the U.S. comes from local property tax. But if a district has a lot of poverty, then revenue from property tax is low This is a common myth but it's not backed up by the numbers. Poverty is (mostly) concentrated in inner cities and those inner cities typically contain large office builds which pay lots of real estate taxes but send no kids to schools. If you look around different states the highest per pupil spending is by far in the cities. As an example, Atlanta public schools spends $15k per pupil while the surrounding suburban counties are 8-10k per pupil.
- mnowicki 5y ago
  that's interesting to hear, and I'll have to take your word on it for now, but I'm curious why(unless things have significantly changed in the past 6-7 years) inner-city schools are still horrendously bad. I've experienced schools in both the worst parts of Philadelphia as well as in middle-class suburbs of Philly, and the contrast is even more exaggerated than they make it seem on TV shows/movies that depict these types of schools. Obviously the students who are raised in these high-crime areas and surrounded by a community that's significantly harsher are going to be harder for teachers to manage, and I do think this is a very big part of it, but there are some things that clearly aren't related to that(such as equipment and the quality/quantity of staff)
  - treis 5y ago
    What we think of as school quality is mostly the quality of the students. Richer districts have, on average, students of high SES with parents that are more willing & able to help their kids succeed in school. Poorer districts have, on average, lower SES kids with terrible living situations and parents. Having disruptive kids also makes educating them much more expensive. Discipline issues chew up a lot of resources and disrupt learning for other students. So you have to spend more to provide equal quality instruction. And, of course, just because they spend more money doesn't mean they spend it on things that help educating students.
    - esyir 5y ago

xyzzyz 5y ago

This might have been true at some point in the past, but it is very much false now, and has been false for at least a decade or two. If local property tax revenues are low, the shortfall is made up for with state and federal funds. Just look at the data: worst performing urban schools often have more funding than better performing ones in rural areas or in smaller towns. If you don’t believe me, just show me a few examples, it shouldn’t be too hard to come up with, if the pattern is as strong and casually important as you suggest it is.

coryrc 5y ago
To supplant your point: Detroit Public Schools per-pupil funding: $15,891 Average Michigan per-pupil funding: $13,457 https://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/underfunded-detroit-is-states-15th-best-funded-larger-school-district https://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/underfunded-detr...
ARandumGuy 5y ago
The amount of local funding for public education varies wildly from state to state. In New Mexico in 2018, only 15% of public school revenue came from local sources. However, during the same year in Nebraska, that number is 53%. So yes, in some states differences in local property tax has a minimal effect on school funding. But in other states, the issue is still a significant issue. Source: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator/cma?tid=4 https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator/cma?tid=4
- xyzzyz 5y ago
  And in Nebraska, can you find a strong correlation between funding levels and schools performance? I asked you for examples, can you find any? Importantly, if in many states the school funding is equalized, and yet we still have wide difference in performance between good and bad schools, why would anyone expect that changing funding structure in Nebraska would change school outcomes in a significant way? If school funding levels in Michigan are similar across the board, with worse performing schools getting more, not less funding than better performing ones, clearly something else than funding is responsible for these disparities, isnt it? Lastly, as funding disparities have been equalized in many places in past decades, have we ever observed lower funded schools catch up to better funded ones? The school funding differences are quite obviously not responsible for disparities in school outcomes, and it is beyond clear to me that the entire goal of this narrative is not to improve schools, but instead to funnel more tax funds to politically allied groups, using children as a cover.
  - robocat 5y ago
    > can you find a strong correlation between funding levels and schools performance In New Zealand there is a negative correlation. The performance of schools in New Zealand is very strongly correlated with “the decile” which is how wealthy the area where the school is located (i.e. how well off the parents are correlates with how well their children do academically). The schools in areas of poverty get more state funding, but the results at those schools are very poor, because the parents are poor, and poor parents often cause poor students (edit: cause is the wrong word here, sorry). Our government otherwise funds schools per student at a fairly flat per capita rate, so there is not the variation in school funding (ignoring private schools) like that which occurs in the US. I am just pointing out that in New Zealand the main correlation for average student ability is their home, not their school.
    - xyzzyz 5y ago
      > I am just pointing out that in New Zealand the main correlation for average student ability is their home, not their school. Right. Whatever the casual mechanism is at play, increasing funding of schools is not going to make much of a difference for the kids -- it will, though, for employees of the school systems.
mcguire 5y ago
"Does School Spending Matter? The New Literature on an Old Question" (https://works.bepress.com/c_kirabo_jackson/38/ https://works.bepress.com/c_kirabo_jackson/38/) "All but one of the several multi-state studies find a strong link between spending and outcomes –indicating that money matters on average. Importantly, this is true across studies that use different data-sets, examine different time periods, rely on different sources of variation, and employ different statistical techniques. While one can poke holes in each individual study, the robustness of the patterns across a variety of settings is compelling evidence of a real positive causal relationship between increased school spending and student outcomes on average. However, an examination of single-state studies suggests that,on average, money matters, but that this is not always so in all settings or in all contexts." Also see "It’s not nothing: The role of money in improving education" (https://www.brookings.edu/research/its-not-nothing-the-role-of-money-in-improving-education/ https://www.brookings.edu/research/its-not-nothing-the-role-...) and "How Money Matters for Schools" (https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/how-money-matters-report https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/how-money-matter...).

bluGill 5y ago

Maybe, but I went to one of the worst funded schools in my state (MN at the time) and got a great education. We were a rural area with only a small tax base, but everyone cared that we got a good education and so the money was carefully spent to give us a good education with the limited money. In fact as a kid I commented that it didn't seem like we had poor funding as we had a lot of activities and great education. Then it was explained that the historical mining areas of the state had a much better tax base, as did the inner city schools (they got the taxes from expensive downtown properties), and even suburban districts had industrial areas to tax.

treis 5y ago

>Most school funding in the U.S. comes from local property tax. But if a district has a lot of poverty, then revenue from property tax is low This is a common myth but it's not backed up by the numbers. Poverty is (mostly) concentrated in inner cities and those inner cities typically contain large office builds which pay lots of real estate taxes but send no kids to schools. If you look around different states the highest per pupil spending is by far in the cities. As an example, Atlanta public schools spends $15k per pupil while the surrounding suburban counties are 8-10k per pupil.

mnowicki 5y ago
that's interesting to hear, and I'll have to take your word on it for now, but I'm curious why(unless things have significantly changed in the past 6-7 years) inner-city schools are still horrendously bad. I've experienced schools in both the worst parts of Philadelphia as well as in middle-class suburbs of Philly, and the contrast is even more exaggerated than they make it seem on TV shows/movies that depict these types of schools. Obviously the students who are raised in these high-crime areas and surrounded by a community that's significantly harsher are going to be harder for teachers to manage, and I do think this is a very big part of it, but there are some things that clearly aren't related to that(such as equipment and the quality/quantity of staff)
- treis 5y ago
  What we think of as school quality is mostly the quality of the students. Richer districts have, on average, students of high SES with parents that are more willing & able to help their kids succeed in school. Poorer districts have, on average, lower SES kids with terrible living situations and parents. Having disruptive kids also makes educating them much more expensive. Discipline issues chew up a lot of resources and disrupt learning for other students. So you have to spend more to provide equal quality instruction. And, of course, just because they spend more money doesn't mean they spend it on things that help educating students.
  - esyir 5y ago