3 ms·

I'd love to pay teachers more -- if I were appointed Dictator of the United States, I would also (at least) double their salaries. But how would we actually go

I'd love to pay teachers more -- if I were appointed Dictator of the United States, I would also (at least) double their salaries. But how would we actually go about achieving that goal in the actual world we live in? Well, we'd have to raise taxes[2], and a solid third of US citizens would veto any raise in taxes for any reason whatsoever, and another 50% or so would veto raising teacher salaries on tribal affiliation grounds (I'm assuming a fair amount of overlap between these groups), meaning, you probably have at least a solid plurality against the idea[1]. Not to mention the difficulty of how a city like Stockton, CA (now bankrupt) could achieve such a goal. I hate to be so pessimistic, but I tend to believe that anything beyond tinkering with the margins of the school system is unlikely and probably politically impossible. [1] For example, in Austin, TX, 2/4 of the last round of AISD bond initiatives passed, by very slim margins. And Austin is a rather liberal city. http://www.traviscountyclerk.org/eclerk/content/images/election_results/2013.05.11/Official/20130511aisdcume.pdf http://www.traviscountyclerk.org/eclerk/content/images/elect... [2] Edit: or cut other things, in which case we're back to the same debate that's more or less immobilized our country for the last few years, thus illustrating my point.

MarcScott 13y ago
Have a look at these charts and ask yourself whether tax increases are really necessary, or whether a few cuts might do the job. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/01/07/everything-chuck-hagel-needs-to-know-about-the-defense-budget-in-charts/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/01/07/e...
matula 13y ago
The problem with the AISD bonds was the school district getting cocky and assuming they could ANYTHING through. There were inconsistencies and vagueness throughout the proposals, and I think voters are finally getting tired of AISD's "just throw money at the problem" attitude, with no real plans for making low-performing schools better. IMHO, if we want to fix our education system, we need to cut the ties between funding and property values. Also, Democrats in office should probably get over the hard-line "no vouchers" position. With vouchers, they could also increase schools' funding to give them a better chance at competing. Of course, Republicans won't allow for the increased funding or "robin hood" funding. So yeah... we're screwed.
- jbooth 13y ago
  The problem with vouchers is that they effectively de-fund public schools in the way they're implemented. Private schools will take the best students, hurting the school's funding next year and leaving them with a per-capita more expensive student base. Plus, the private schools create other burdens on the town without paying for them (parking, bussing, policing, etc). Maybe democrats should be a little less hardline but just expanding vouchers willy-nilly won't fix anything about the opportunity gap facing kids today.

MarcScott 13y ago

Have a look at these charts and ask yourself whether tax increases are really necessary, or whether a few cuts might do the job. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/01/07/everything-chuck-hagel-needs-to-know-about-the-defense-budget-in-charts/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/01/07/e...

matula 13y ago

The problem with the AISD bonds was the school district getting cocky and assuming they could ANYTHING through. There were inconsistencies and vagueness throughout the proposals, and I think voters are finally getting tired of AISD's "just throw money at the problem" attitude, with no real plans for making low-performing schools better. IMHO, if we want to fix our education system, we need to cut the ties between funding and property values. Also, Democrats in office should probably get over the hard-line "no vouchers" position. With vouchers, they could also increase schools' funding to give them a better chance at competing. Of course, Republicans won't allow for the increased funding or "robin hood" funding. So yeah... we're screwed.

jbooth 13y ago
The problem with vouchers is that they effectively de-fund public schools in the way they're implemented. Private schools will take the best students, hurting the school's funding next year and leaving them with a per-capita more expensive student base. Plus, the private schools create other burdens on the town without paying for them (parking, bussing, policing, etc). Maybe democrats should be a little less hardline but just expanding vouchers willy-nilly won't fix anything about the opportunity gap facing kids today.