Won't Somebody Please Think of the Children?
Jay
April 6, 2009, 1:30 pm

Let's get to the heart of the matter. American public schools are a disgrace. A big disgrace. You know it. I know it. And President Obama knows it, which is why he sends his own kids to an elite private school (Sidwell Friends, crazy name, right?) that caters to the Beltway establishment.

By the way, this is by no means an indictment against our tertiary education system. US colleges and universities remain the best in the world, which is why foreign elites continue to send their children to schools here for an education. This is an indictment against our secondary (high schools) education system, which has utterly failed in bridging the gap between primary education and tertiary education.

This isn't a big secret. Everybody knows our high schools are, on average, terrible. And it's a pretty big deal. Even if you do graduate high school, you don't learn anything useful. You can't make big money with just a high school diploma.

A subpar education not only prevents Americans from getting good jobs, but it disadvantages us in the global economy. The tragic irony here is that a growing number of Americans will then blame their inability to get good wages on things that have nothing to do with their personal inadequacy. They externalize the blame on immigrants, workers in foreign countries, China, and free trade agreements.

But this is America. We're the richest, strongest, in short best country on earth. Why don't we just throw money at the problem and call it a day? Well, we've tried that. It isn't working.

I've lived in the state of Georgia for the vast majority of my life. I went to K-12 here, and I'm currently attending Georgia Tech. Georgia also currently ranks 47th out of 50 states in SAT scores. Is the cause money?

Below is a chart of various states by per pupil spending.



The numbers were taken directly from a report by the US Bureau of the Census released in 2008. The data is from 2006. The 17 states + DC chosen are chosen by their average SAT score. The top 5, bottom 5, middle 5 were chosen. 3 other states, New York, Utah, and DC (yes, I know it's a district) were also chosen for particular emphasis. The national average is also included in the chart to serve as a reference point because not all 50 states are included for the sake of expediency.

As you can see, New York and DC spend much more per student. Utah spends almost a third of what New York spends per pupil. Do these figures translate directly into academic performance?



These numbers were taken from a report released by Georgia Education, a non-profit NGO dedicated to improving our state's public K-12 education system. The data pertains to 2006. The SAT was chosen because it is a widely used standardized test. Whether or not it is an effective measure of a student's intelligence or knowledge is outside the scope of this short.

DC is ranked bottom in SAT scores even though they spend much higher than the national average. New York is below the national average despite the fact that they have the highest per pupil spending in the United States. North Dakota has the highest average SAT score, but spends less than the national average. Utah has an average score significantly above the national average, but they spend the least out of all 50 states.

From the data presented above, you would be unable to find a pattern relating academic performance to the amount of money spent. This holds true for international rankings among OECD (read: rich) countries. While there appears to be a minimum amount of spending needed for a proper secondary education, the amount of money becomes negligible to test scores after a certain threshold.

But let's stick to the domestic data. What's the cost effectiveness of these states' spending?



I hope this chart makes it clear: there appears to be no relation of money spent and academic performance. Hopefully by now, I've convinced you of the fact, as the rest of this short will not deal with the cost/performance issue.

So if the lack of money isn't the problem with our public education system, what is? The problem is counterproductive regulation, mostly at the local and state level. Now that we know what the problem is, what is the solution?

My answer is school choice via a taxpayer funded student voucher system. Instead of people paying taxes to provide for a student's education, which is then delegated to a school within their residential district, people would pay taxes to fund a voucher that is tied directly to the student, and money in that voucher would go wherever the student enrolls.

So which groups have a vested interest against real education reform? There are three main ones: the teachers' union, local education system bureaucrats, and the upper middle class. Let me explain why:

The teachers' union has a vested interest against education reform. Why? Because a large part of the problem has to deal with teachers who simply aren't good enough or are outright incompetent. A voucher system would quickly expose underperforming schools, which are usually staffed by underperforming teachers. Students (and the vouchers attached to them) would go to a better public school, or a private non-profit school, or a private for-profit school that would suddenly exist.

One of the things that the teachers' union constantly pushes for is job security, even at the expense of teacher quality. In many school districts, it remains incredibly hard to fire a teacher. An illiquid labor market in education will ensure that incompetent teachers will thrive on the public's dollar.

Competition quickly weeds out the incompetent. The teachers' union does not like this at all. Because public education is tied directly to school districts, local schools essentially hold an education monopoly over the vast majority of the public, because not many people can afford to send their children to private schools on top of their tax burden.

This quickly ties into the second interest group, the education system bureaucrats and administrators:

As previously stated, local schools have a monopoly. This monopoly is monstrously inefficient. What that means is that the bureaucrats and administrators are great at wasting money. Underperforming schools are staffed by underperforming teachers because underperforming bureaucrats and administrators appoint those teachers. It's a vicious cycle of incompetence.

In every district of every state in the country, there is always a new corruption scandal brewing over funds that were misallocated, wasted, or outright embezzled by government bureaucrats and administrators in the local education system. You only have to read or watch the local news to find this out. While I don't have the hard data for this assertion, I would wager good money that states with higher per pupil spending have higher frequencies of administrative corruption in the education system.

The reason why these local monopolies exist is because every state (with the exception of California, go Proposition 13!) derives the majority of its education revenue from property taxes. This leads us to the third and most powerful group in the way of real education reform: the upper middle class.

This is one of the few actual occurences in American politics where the rich are actively screwing over the poor. The reason why the upper middle class actively opposes real educational reform is because the upper middle class makes money. They make enough money to afford expensive houses located in exclusive districts with a determination to keep the ordinary riff-raff out.

If you look at residential property values in various state districts, they tend to be the highest in areas with an extremely good public school. It might be hard to believe, but there are a few excellent public schools in existence. Most people don't go to them because most people can't afford to buy homes that are within the district that those schools exist in.

Let me inject a personal anecdote. I lived in a district with an excellent public charter high school. East Cobb (of Cobb County) was the definition of the upper middle class society. Median home prices in that part of the county are well over 300k, which is out of the reach of the majority of society. I attended an excellent public high school because my parents had high skill, high paying jobs that enabled them to buy a house in East Cobb.

If school choice existed, property values in these districts would plummet precipitously, erasing years of wages and salaries of the upper middle class. They have a vested interest in keeping the value of their homes high for obvious reasons. Voucher systems would also put an end to the highly shielded suburban communities that have been the hallmark of post white-flight America due to normalized housing prices.

Think that I'm exaggerating? While quoting semi-famous people really isn't a good debating tool, I do believe that this one is especially apt. Renowned playwright David Mamet once wrote in the Village Voice "any of us who has ever been at a zoning meeting with our property at stake is aware of the urge to cut through all the pernicious bullshit and go straight to firearms."

Successful countries and societies generally coast on their past achievements. The USA, in many respects, is no different when it comes to its public secondary education system. The increasingly globalized economy will eventually break the inertia holding back real education reform. It is my fervent hope that this happens sooner rather than later.