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We're not spending $15K on every student. That's just the total spend divided by the number of students. In reality, we're spending substantially less than that
by throwawaygh 5y ago
We're not spending $15K on every student. That's just the total spend divided by the number of students. In reality, we're spending substantially less than that on most students and substantially more than that on a small number of students with exceptional needs.
> since the 1960s
Right. The 60s.
The 60s are ALWAYS used as the reference point in these conversations. Every. Single. Time.
The ESEA, a cornerstone of the War on Poverty, was passed in 1965. Most other federal/state mandates that brought nearly everyone into the public education fold were passed after 1960. What it meant to educate the populace changed dramatically between 1960 and 1980. Huge swathes of people previously excluded were brought into the fold. Of course costs went up -- those people were excluded precisely because they're not the low-hanging cheap-to-educate fruit.
> fewer than 50% of employees were actually teachers.
Teachers are not the only class of employees who spend most/all of their time in direct contact with students. See above.
I'm not interested in the percent of employees who are teachers. I'm interested in the percent of employees who are not either in direct contact with students or providing essential services (janitorial, transportation, food services, etc.)
- mannerheim 5y agoIn terms of education spending, the US spends more than ever other OECD country other than Luxembourg. The US spends an unusually large share on private education, but even public education expenditures are greater than that of the UK, France, Korea, and Japan, about the same as the Netherlands, and not that far behind Germany https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/5e4ecc25-en/index.html?itemId=/content/component/5e4ecc25-en https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/5e4ecc25-en/index.html?i...
- throwawaygh 5y agoYou eventually get there: the US blows a ton of cash on private education, but our public education expenditures -- which this thread has been about up to now -- are unexceptional compared to peer nations. Smack-dab in the middle of the usually pack, really. (And we're also a far less dense country than many of the countries we technically out-spend, which is notable because rural schooling is horrendously expensive on a per student basis.) If you rolled back to 60s level spending, even inflation adjusted, we'd be down the bottom of that distribution.
- mannerheim 5y agoEither way, claiming that education is underfunded is unfounded unless most of the other OECD countries are similarly underfunding education.
- r00fus 5y agoWhy would we even count private education in this discussion? There are no policy controls on private school spend - of course, it's skyrocketing as the rich get richer.
- mannerheim 5y agoThis is moot; as I said, spending on public schools alone in the US is greater than many other OECD countries.
- r00fus 5y agoIt's on-par with OECD countries, per-child.
- mannerheim 5y agoIt's greater than the UK, France, Korea, and Japan. Either way, hardly underfunded.