Who will join POTUS nominee Biden on the Democrat ticket as VP?

Well I’ve gotta say I have not been super impressed by the public education system in the US, and especially its entrenched interests that seem to be keeping out any innovation that might not be in the teachers’ interest (charter schools, vouchers, watering down gifted programs or magnet schools). Government run means it’s more susceptible to the whims of politicians, whether that’s an untested and bad new common core program or the fad that discipline is racist, both to the detriment of students who want to learn and get no alternative unlike they would in a more free market framework. Add to that that colleges seem to be trending towards replacing the SAT with a skin tone test, and I’m not super hopeful.

That said, the virus has the potential to really shake up education, so there’s a chance everyone can learn, for example, from the county’s single best zoom lecturer for a given 6th grade lesson, and put all the poor and mediocre teachers back on grading duty instead of failing to teach well and hurting the next generation.

South Korea has a mixed approach closer to this via their rock star tutors.. One comment was “There should be no need for private education”, alluding to the public schools not doing a good enough job. Perhaps that’s backwards tho, and the right way of thinking about it is to let the free market solve the resource allocation problem and give each parent govt funds to spend how they think best on their child’s education. This will defund underperforming teachers / schools, something our current union and government backed framework seems incapable of fixing.

This would be similar to a free market in health insurance with a minimum subsidy based on income ala Obamacare but applied to everyone. Healthcare is a bigger mess, so I won’t strain the analogy to vouchers too much, but there are similar issues.

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Is that the reason when she arrived she couldn’t get enough meat? She craved meat as often as possible. Meat was not available, or rarely, to most folks.

By the way, you ask "what is the point of your story? So why reply? I certainly could care less about your opinion. (I know I took it from your site) That will not happen again!

I do not disagree with you on this. Sure, there are probably better ways to fund public education. The point is that at the end it is still public, i.e., funded by the society via taxes. A social program. It allows children to obtain education regardless of their family’s financial situation.

Yeah, I think the main issue to make social programs work is to not screw up the incentives. A free market in goods and services with a tax supported minimum benefit let’s everyone allocate their resources in their own best interest while rewarding the best providers. This is the difference between public schools and vouchers, or an NHS style government run healthcare vs a subsidy towards buying your own private healthcare. Getting the government out of the means of production seems to be the main thing.

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You say vouchers get the government out of the means of production, but a voucher is still an incentive, and the government still has to decide how to determine which provider is “best”. And most likely the providers would not survive on their own without such incentives, so in a sense the government is still in control. I think Sweden uses this in their education system and it seems to work well enough.

Are you saying that what we have now is socialism, but a voucher program is not? A fine distinction for economists to argue. I think it’s a combination of capitalism and socialism. A nuance.

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No, the people give their vouchers to the provider they like best, the government just comes up with the money for the voucher and pays whoever it’s given to. So the point is to get the government out of the business of deciding what’s best for you and letting you decide that for yourself. That rewards the best providers with more money (to work harder, expand, incentivize the best people to do the job, etc), while the worse providers can’t make a living ( if no one will give them vouchers for their poor service) and have to get a job doing something else.

Whether the schools you’re picking to give your voucher to are run by the government (as public schools are now) or private schools or some hybrid matters less than having a free choice that aligns incentives properly.

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You are correct. And I think that’s what they do in Sweden.

My main point is that it’s a social program made possible by a government.

Wait - Are you saying that most Republicans are part of the Greatest Generation and the early Baby Boomers? Do you mean the same people who won WWII, helped to keep America great, put Commander Armstrong on the moon, and made the Russian Communists squeal uncle.

Ever write for Pravda? TASS?

Huh? Are you saying they’re just right?

And finally, I find it pretty cheap and less than genuine to pull one part of my sentence. Any monkey can pull pieces to make it sound like something other than what it was. As an example …

Finally. One down and 4 billion to go. :laughing:

ETA: To be clear, The Greatest Generation and Baby Boomers also created nuclear power and plastics. They also failed to take down the Russian Communists when it was most expedient. Baby boomers, in particular, could have done a much better job of raising their kids. Instead, it seems that many expressed their love by “protecting” their kids and not allowing them to take risks. This may be why so many now see a boogie man around every corner … or every sniffle. :laughing:

Regardless of @shinobi 's reaction, I thank you very much. It’s been a terribly long day, and I needed a big belly laugh before hitting the sack. Thank you.

I don’t recall your political affliction, but your sense of humor runs toward Liberal. :wink:

Your entire long post with a per-sentence break down about a different subject does not invalidate the main point of Bend3r’s post – that you were wrong about “most Republicans are busy working”.

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Now you just bragged about your public education, which I’m sure included English … well, I think it may have included English grammar. What do you call “or”?

Oh, and thank you for replying, as I had hit the 3 replies limit, which despite previous suggestioin, seems like a hard limit to me. Maybe I’m overlooking something obvious, but the warning message doesn’t seem to allow for posting the fourth, offending, reply.

Really? I’m sure there are scores of surveys designed to show this, but I suspect people would like the opportunity to improve their ROI.

Wouldn’t that be funded by property owners? At least in most of the states where I’ve lived, property taxes were used to fund schools.

A way out of taking responsibility for your writing? :wink:

They might, but firstly Social Security is not an investment, and secondly we know that most people are poor investors. Even professional investors are poor investors – most actively managed funds underperform the market. Medicare is not an investment either, and I’m sure nobody could even come close to matching that performance – we barely put anything in and could end up taking out a whole lot more.

Sure, property taxes. Paid directly by property owners in owner-occupied and unoccupied housing and indirectly by renters in rental housing.

I’m so glad that you recognize that.

Still waiting to see that public education put to work. :wink:

The dead contribute but don’t make withdrawals. Like SS, part of the returns to survivors are paid for by taxes of working people who died before retirement age. This is why “Medicare for All” starting much younger is so phenomenally expensive.

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The issue is that a system like this would likely increase inequality. It’ll be private schools for everyone basically. If you give every family with kids similar funds to spend on education, high-income families can afford to plunk tons more money into it to get the best education they can buy. In turn, that will create higher disparity between schools who get the best teachers via higher pay and weaker schools who get the more mediocre teachers for lower pay. It’s not hard to guess who will be able to send their kids to the best schools by spending way beyond the allocated school funds.

P.S.: This seems to be quite far off topic from Biden’s choice of VP so I apologize for that.

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Not to worry. Your post is fine. With Kamala now on the ticket, this entire thread is more or less just free wheeling. Of course on topic posts remain welcome, but they are no longer required.

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You’re trying to justify it, which isn’t the point. The point is, everyone contributes the same (proportionally), and everyone receives the same benefit (proportionally).

The objections come when everyone receives the same benefit regardless of their contribution.

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Well free market would be just having the parents use their own funds as they choose. Taxing everyone else and unequally redistributing it to (only) benefit parents with the most children is socialist, right?