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>"I'm not sure if there are empirical analyses to support this, but I believe that investing in education has the greatest returns (up to the limit when your wh

>"I'm not sure if there are empirical analyses to support this, but I believe that investing in education has the greatest returns (up to the limit when your whole population is educated maximally--but that's a far ways off from where we are right now). " Most people don't get this point, but the US spends A LOT of money on education, more than most countries. "More money" is the easy answer, the one that politicians like to use. But I don't think the returns of spending more federal money on the current educational system are positive. Here is a chart comparing US education spending with the performance of its students on international math tests. I don't think you can look at stats like this and say "more money" is the answer. http://www.heritage.org/Research/features/issues/charts/Ed_K12/Ed_K123_l.gif http://www.heritage.org/Research/features/issues/charts/Ed_K...

mk 18y ago
The US may spend a lot of money on education, but there is an underlying problem that isn't addressed in either your comment or Phil Greenspun's argument. K-12 education is primarily funded through property tax. This results in wealthy communities having great schools with tons of resources and poor communities that are using decades old resources and schools that are falling apart. So maybe you are correct in saying that "more money" isn't the answer. The tax system that we use for education is not equal and is failing us as a country. If we want to maximize the ability of people we should give the most people the best opportunity that we can.
- Prrometheus 18y ago
  DC is regularly one of the top 3 school districts in the country in terms of per pupil spending. I don't think you would want to send your children there. There are fundamental incentive problems with public monopolies. When you have a group of dedicated, wealthy, involved parents, these negative incentives can be overcome. However, the system fails your average person, and it surely fails those who need the most help even when a lot of money is spent on them. Those of us who advocate market reforms simply want the incentives of the system to be a help, rather than a hindrance. But we're radical right-wing nazis who hate children and eat puppies, so I don't think our plans are going to be implemented any time soon. Also, it's funny that we are characterized that way in the United States, when such right-wing countries as Sweden and the Netherlands already have universal school vouchers that can be spent on private schools.
  - tptacek 18y ago
    DC spends more on administrative costs and less in the actual classroom than most other school districts. The fact that DC's money is misspent does not automatically mean that the problem isn't money. And sure, one good way to raise money for the DC school system would be to streamline their administration.
    - Prrometheus 18y ago
      I agree that DC public schools misspends its money. But I am not very interested in how can we fix the problem in just this particular time and place. I am more concerned about what incentives of the system cause this problem, and what new incentives would keep this problem from recurring in other times and places. It is easier to look at a particular district and point out what they are doing wrong (cronyism, graft, etc.) than to build universal policy that improves the system as a whole. "There are a thousand people cutting branches for every one striking at the root", and all that.
      - tptacek 18y ago
        So, that makes sense, but your original argument appeared to be something to the effect of, "money isn't the solution; we've tried money, for instance in DC, and it hasn't worked". That argument is wrong. It's akin to saying, "penicillin isn't the answer to infection; we've tried it, for instance by putting it on an altar and praying to it, and it hasn't worked". I'm not engaging with the rest of your argument.
        Prrometheus 18y ago
        The evidence that I've seen suggests the correlation between school spending and educational achievement is weak. There may be specific districts that we can target as being underfunded, and money might help those districts. But untargeted increases in education spending seem unlikely to help. After all, there are very well funded districts in the United States that are horrible. That would be my main argument. Then I wandered a bit.
- russell 18y ago
  In California the public schools are funded mostly by the state with some additional money for wealthy districts grandfathered in. Still we have the disparity. Wealth districts have volunteer parents, fund raising, and voters willing to approve special bond issues. The poorer districts tend to be poorly run, wasting more money. They have less community support, fewer volunteers, etc., etc. There are individual schools in poorer districts that do extraordinary things, but usually it's the case of an extraordinary principal.
davidw 18y ago
Ok, so it's probably not a money problem, although perhaps it's not allocated well. And while we may agree that the unions are sort of a hindrance, many other countries have heavily unionized teaching systems, and still do better, so I think it would be wrong to pin everything on that. So what is it? I wonder if it's a cultural thing. I remember how important it was during high school to not be seen as a "nerd". In Italy, my friends can't really relate to that sort of mentality - it doesn't really exist there like it does in the US. Doing well in school is basically seen as a good thing. Maybe it's not foremost in everyone's minds, but it's not something to be derided either.

mk 18y ago

The US may spend a lot of money on education, but there is an underlying problem that isn't addressed in either your comment or Phil Greenspun's argument. K-12 education is primarily funded through property tax. This results in wealthy communities having great schools with tons of resources and poor communities that are using decades old resources and schools that are falling apart. So maybe you are correct in saying that "more money" isn't the answer. The tax system that we use for education is not equal and is failing us as a country. If we want to maximize the ability of people we should give the most people the best opportunity that we can.

Prrometheus 18y ago
DC is regularly one of the top 3 school districts in the country in terms of per pupil spending. I don't think you would want to send your children there. There are fundamental incentive problems with public monopolies. When you have a group of dedicated, wealthy, involved parents, these negative incentives can be overcome. However, the system fails your average person, and it surely fails those who need the most help even when a lot of money is spent on them. Those of us who advocate market reforms simply want the incentives of the system to be a help, rather than a hindrance. But we're radical right-wing nazis who hate children and eat puppies, so I don't think our plans are going to be implemented any time soon. Also, it's funny that we are characterized that way in the United States, when such right-wing countries as Sweden and the Netherlands already have universal school vouchers that can be spent on private schools.
- tptacek 18y ago
  DC spends more on administrative costs and less in the actual classroom than most other school districts. The fact that DC's money is misspent does not automatically mean that the problem isn't money. And sure, one good way to raise money for the DC school system would be to streamline their administration.
  - Prrometheus 18y ago
    I agree that DC public schools misspends its money. But I am not very interested in how can we fix the problem in just this particular time and place. I am more concerned about what incentives of the system cause this problem, and what new incentives would keep this problem from recurring in other times and places. It is easier to look at a particular district and point out what they are doing wrong (cronyism, graft, etc.) than to build universal policy that improves the system as a whole. "There are a thousand people cutting branches for every one striking at the root", and all that.
    - tptacek 18y ago
      So, that makes sense, but your original argument appeared to be something to the effect of, "money isn't the solution; we've tried money, for instance in DC, and it hasn't worked". That argument is wrong. It's akin to saying, "penicillin isn't the answer to infection; we've tried it, for instance by putting it on an altar and praying to it, and it hasn't worked". I'm not engaging with the rest of your argument.
      - Prrometheus 18y ago
        The evidence that I've seen suggests the correlation between school spending and educational achievement is weak. There may be specific districts that we can target as being underfunded, and money might help those districts. But untargeted increases in education spending seem unlikely to help. After all, there are very well funded districts in the United States that are horrible. That would be my main argument. Then I wandered a bit.
russell 18y ago
In California the public schools are funded mostly by the state with some additional money for wealthy districts grandfathered in. Still we have the disparity. Wealth districts have volunteer parents, fund raising, and voters willing to approve special bond issues. The poorer districts tend to be poorly run, wasting more money. They have less community support, fewer volunteers, etc., etc. There are individual schools in poorer districts that do extraordinary things, but usually it's the case of an extraordinary principal.

davidw 18y ago

Ok, so it's probably not a money problem, although perhaps it's not allocated well. And while we may agree that the unions are sort of a hindrance, many other countries have heavily unionized teaching systems, and still do better, so I think it would be wrong to pin everything on that. So what is it? I wonder if it's a cultural thing. I remember how important it was during high school to not be seen as a "nerd". In Italy, my friends can't really relate to that sort of mentality - it doesn't really exist there like it does in the US. Doing well in school is basically seen as a good thing. Maybe it's not foremost in everyone's minds, but it's not something to be derided either.