what about poor children in the ghetto?

[BaalChatzaf]

Interesting that you mention "when the poor turn against the rich". So you think poor people should live along side of rich people and accept their lot and not make any trouble? Frankly, I'm surprised the poor haven't revolted like they did in the French Revolution. As long as the rich get richer and the poor get poorer we will not have a stable society.

Tom Edison was a poor boy who became rich, mostly on his own efforts. Bernie Madoff was a rich boy who became poor. In general, the lot of the poor has improved over time (in absolute terms). Their status in society may not have improved as much as their diet and health care, but that is relative standing, not absolute state of being.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[tjohnson]

since ye speaking in generalities, the 'poor getting poorer' is a myth - a long time myth...

Interesting way of discussing. OK, what you said is a myth.

[Darrell Hougen]

Hey guys, how do you deal with educational standards in this scheme? School 1 in the neighborhood could be teaching tiddly winks 101 and School 2 could be doing advanced calculus. You know, there are reasons things have evolved the way they have. Just because our systems aren't perfect doesn't mean they should all be abandoned in favour of profit motivated schemes. It's absolutely unbelievable that you think that the profit motive can solve all of mankind's problems.

It seems to me that a large part of your problem is a lack of faith in humanity. You seem to think that most people don't care about their children or are simply incompetent to live. I have a little more confidence in humanity and would rather not look at outlier cases as being representative of most people.

What makes you think that most parents would allow their children to go to a school that teaches tiddly winks and not calculus? Some parents may want a religious education for their children, but they still want their children to learn reading, writing, mathematics and history. And, parents are generally pretty good at monitoring their schools for quality and performance, especially if they are footing the bill. It is a lack of choice and a lack of responsibility for paying the bills that makes many parents apathetic.

I love it how some people blame the profit motive for all of mankind's problems. The profit motive is nothing more than the transferal of rational self interest to economic domain. Is it wrong for people to act in their own self interest? Is it wrong for parents, who care about their children, to try to obtain the best education possible for them?

It is actually the profit motive that makes efficiency possible. If one person sees another person making a lot of money doing something, he may say to himself, "I could make a lot of money doing that too." Or, he may see a way of doing the same thing more efficiently and reason that he could make a lot of money by doing it for a lower price. Then, in a free market, he may drive the original person out of business by substituting his more efficient business model for the other person's less efficient business model. And so it goes, as one person after another finds more and more efficient business models, sometimes based on newer technology, and sometimes just more efficient from a business stand point. The profit motive is, indeed, the means by which scientific progress and technological development is incorporated into the economy.

The process cannot occur without the profit motive. If a person, acting in his own self interest, sees that there is no money to be made by entering a particular field or undertaking a certain business, he won't do it. And if self interest is not the motive, then why should he care if doing something a certain way is more efficient than another way or not? And, since government doesn't care about making money, government can never increase efficiency. Government interference must and naturally does lead to inefficiency and stagnation.

Darrell

[Christopher]

Of course I believe that freedom of speech applies to schools. It's not selective. Parents have the right to determine what their children will learn. People have a right to their religion and they have a right to teach that to their children. BTW, are you saying you'd rather the government determine the curriculum????

Freedom of speech is not a greencard for saying anything, and I think that's what this discussion is really bumping up against. For example, freedom of speech does not give a man the right to scream "fire!" in a dark movietheater when no such threat exists. We all agree that children should receive some form of education. This, in essence, is protecting children just as we would protect children from domestic abuse. Equally, an education means learning something... an education is not any set of arbitrary assertions and fictions. True, there are different ways of looking at the world - through religion or science -, but it would be intolerable to see a child taught Sadism and forms of torture. And this here is where I think the misunderstanding between you two originates. Free speech is not a blank-slate right in education, but opinions to an exceptionally large degree (to the degree Ginny is thinking about them) is quite alright to teach.

Btw, Adam, thanks for your nice comments

[tjohnson]

I love it how some people blame the profit motive for all of mankind's problems. The profit motive is nothing more than the transferal of rational self interest to economic domain. Is it wrong for people to act in their own self interest? Is it wrong for parents, who care about their children, to try to obtain the best education possible for them?

Darrell, it's not "my problem", it's my position. I think it is wrong if acting in their own self-interest occurs at the expense of someone else, ie the children. It took hundreds of years to get religion out of schools and it was a great achievement. We shouldn't let that slip away.

[tjohnson]

And, since government doesn't care about making money, government can never increase efficiency. Government interference must and naturally does lead to inefficiency and stagnation.

Darrell

What do you call it when the government gives out tax breaks to people if they insulate their homes? Isn't that saving/making money? Isn't that increasing efficiency?

[tjohnson]

Freedom of speech is not a greencard for saying anything, and I think that's what this discussion is really bumping up against.

Yes, freedom of speech goes back to the days when you could be beheaded for sedition. In scientists at one time could teach their theories because it went against established religious order. Freedom to speak out against the establishment is one thing but freedom to teach dogma as if it were science is deceit and taking advantage of innocent children.

[Darrell Hougen]

I love it how some people blame the profit motive for all of mankind's problems. The profit motive is nothing more than the transferal of rational self interest to economic domain. Is it wrong for people to act in their own self interest? Is it wrong for parents, who care about their children, to try to obtain the best education possible for them?

Darrell, it's not "my problem", it's my position. I think it is wrong if acting in their own self-interest occurs at the expense of someone else, ie the children. It took hundreds of years to get religion out of schools and it was a great achievement. We shouldn't let that slip away.

Acting in one's rational self interest is never acting against or "at the expense of" the interests of other people. There are no conflicts of rational interests.

The existence of other rational people is a benefit to one's own self interest. Acting in a manner that is detrimental to them is ultimately, to act in a manner that is detrimental to one's own self interest. Therefore, it is never in one's own rational self interest to act in a manner that is detrimental to the legitimate interests of others.

Getting religion out of schools might be thought of as an achievement, but replacing it with the religion of the state is not. Replacing one irrational set of beliefs with another is not an achievement.

Darrell

[Darrell Hougen]

And, since government doesn't care about making money, government can never increase efficiency. Government interference must and naturally does lead to inefficiency and stagnation.

Darrell

What do you call it when the government gives out tax breaks to people if they insulate their homes? Isn't that saving/making money? Isn't that increasing efficiency?

If people could save money by insulating their homes, why would a tax break be necessary?

Darrell

[Darrell Hougen]

Just remember that are plenty of fundamentalist/evangelical churches that already operate private schools, and would love a situation in which they could teach their children without having to include evil secular humanist ideas such as evolution and the age of the universe, and that the United States was not founded as a Christian nation that needs to return to its roots, and would think that lack of accreditation by bodies recognized by those evil secular humanist people is a good thing. Similar result with Islamic madrassas, Chasidic cheders, and "everything good came out of Africa" Black Pride schools.

I don't want to repeat everything that I said to GS, so let me just say that replacing traditional religions with the religion of the state doesn't accomplish anything. You may not like schools teaching students creationism (and neither do I) but I don't like them teaching students socialism and multiculturalism either. Replacing one irrational set of beliefs with another doesn't accomplish anything.

Darrell

[Darrell Hougen]

If, in order to maintain a well-functioning industrial-informational society in which Objectivist values can survive and prosper, a majority population at some education level is required, and if private enterprise cannot successfully achieve this level of education within the required population, then there is a legitimate argument for public education at some level.

The way to do this is simple: begin with choice. The cure for government corruption is more choice, more choice, more choice. Reduce the resources used in public education slowly; at the same time give more freedom to private institutions such that competition can begin in earnest. Continue this trend of allowing private education a stronger and stronger position while equally diminishing the resources into public education. Over time, either public education will disappear through this reduction plan entirely, or some social destabilization will occur as a result of this plan, and so it is a small step back to supporting the minimal education that is required by government immediately prior to where destabilization began to occur.

I would argue that a completely private, voluntary system would work just fine. However, if you want a solution that is more palatable in the current political climate, I would suggest vouchers. And, I wouldn't suggest going at it piecemeal. If the private schools are going to have a chance to succeed, they need to be able to compete on an equal footing which means they need to have just as much access to funding as the public system.

Some will argue, rightly, that there is no right to take people's money and spend it on vouchers. I agree, but I am looking for a politically possible solution. In the long run, if we can change the culture, the vouchers could be phased out in favor of a totally voluntary system.

Families should receive one voucher per year of a fixed amount for each child which must be spent on education. If the voucher is not enough for the school they wish their children to attend, they would have to make up the difference. If the voucher is more than enough, they could keep the rest. The refund system is necessary to create a true market in which competitiveness is rewarded. In order to prevent some small fraction of people from abusing the system just to get the refund, schools would have to have their students tested on a yearly basis to make sure they measured up in certain core areas like reading, writing, mathematics, science and history.

Also, because of the history of arguments over separation of church and state in this country (the USA) the schools receiving vouchers would not be allowed to teach religion during school hours or require attendance at religious training or ceremonies. The only exception would be the normal attention paid to such subjects during history, philosophy or comparative religion classes.

That is my suggestion.

Darrell

[tjohnson]

Acting in one's rational self interest is never acting against or "at the expense of" the interests of other people. There are no conflicts of rational interests.

So if a parent or teacher decides it is rational to teach creationism how does that not conflict with the child's rational self-interest? The poor child will grow up with it's ability to rationalize impaired and may never recover.

[ginny]

GM, it is unfortunate, but parents teach their children all kinds of nonsense. Freedom of speech involves tolerance for idea we strongly disagree with, not those with which we are agreement. How is your desire to forbid someone a religion education different from the Spanish Inquisition which forbid all religions except the one it liked.

Ginny

[Darrell Hougen]

Acting in one's rational self interest is never acting against or "at the expense of" the interests of other people. There are no conflicts of rational interests.

So if a parent or teacher decides it is rational to teach creationism how does that not conflict with the child's rational self-interest? The poor child will grow up with it's ability to rationalize impaired and may never recover.

Just because a teacher or parent decides it is rational doesn't make it so. One might ask whether it is rational to "rationalize."

How do you know that the child won't recover? How do you know that if you teach the child socialism and multiculturalism, he will recover?

Your argument is basically that, because parents might make poor decisions for their children, the government should make the decisions for them. But, if people are incapable of making good decisions and if the government is composed of people, then the government is also incapable of making good decisions. The difference is that if private individuals make poor decisions, only a few people are hurt. If the government makes poor decisions, everyone living within it's jurisdiction (and possibly, some people outside of it's jurisdiction) are harmed.

In the long run, groups of people that make poor decisions in a free society will shrink in size and influence. But, if the government makes poor decisions, there is no escape.

Darrell

[Selene]

Folks:

Very well reasoned post.

"If the private schools are going to have a chance to succeed, they need to be able to compete on an equal footing which means they need to have just as much access to funding as the public system."

This is a difficult issue. My instincts say that should not be a criteria used for competition.

However, I am open to changing on this issue.

One of the difficult issues that the "system" is going to immediately, knee jerk react with is that there are Federal Mandates to:

a) mainstream special education students;

B) bi-lingual education;

c) the whole line of gender unspecific forced equality; and

d) the entire sports equality-equity programs.

Therefore, since a special education child allows a district to receive anywhere from twice to three times more in funding for a special education student I can see law suits galore.

I think that we go with the voucher and lets go at it.

Adam

[Philip Coates]

> Your argument is basically that, because parents might make poor decisions for their children, the government should make the decisions for them.

And his argument is that the government, which produes illiteracy, innumeracy, new math, ditches phonics, doesn't teach world history, produces kids who can't write a simple English composition and instead of doing religious indoctrination, does politically correct and left-wing, socialist to marxist indoctrination makes BETTER curriculum decisions?

OK, I'm bailing out on this topic of the alleged "market failure" if you allow private education -> if the opposition [mostly GS in this case] is entirely unaffected by reflecting carefully on the whole host of provocative points made on this thread or doesn't have the time to reflect or acknowledge any of them with "well, you have a point there" or at least "I have to think about that some more", there is little chance of persuasion.

[Darrell Hougen]

"If the private schools are going to have a chance to succeed, they need to be able to compete on an equal footing which means they need to have just as much access to funding as the public system."

This is a difficult issue. My instincts say that should not be a criteria used for competition.

However, I am open to changing on this issue.

My concern is that the statists and socialists will try to sucker pro-freedom groups into some kind of compromise situation in which private enterprise is seriously handicapped and has a hard time succeeding. Then, when the private schools predictably fail to do as well as the public ones, the statists and socialists will jump up and down and claim that private schools are a failure.

This is not just an idle fear. I've seen things like this happen. We have charter schools (that are really public schools) that offer alternatives for students in our area, but most of them don't perform as well as the public schools in our area. Why? Part of the reason appears to be that some of them are aimed at students that aren't doing well in the public schools, so they are starting behind. They may have students that are difficult to educate with any system. But, those are the schools that the school board has allowed to go forward. The school board turns down applications from schools that want to skim off the best students (and offer them a superior education). They also seem to have some funding constraints. The result is that the charter schools don't perform that well and they make the regular public schools look good.

Actually, we do have one school in our area, D'Evelyn, that uses a lottery to choose its students (under mandate from the school board) that uses a traditional curriculum and is one of the best performing schools in the district and the state. Unfortunately, we couldn't get our kids into the school because of the afore mentioned lottery and the district refuses to replicate the model at other schools despite the fact that there is always a waiting list.

No. What we need is a complete free-market system, or as close to one as we can get using vouchers, so that schools can compete and those that are successful can expand by opening more schools or franchising their ideas. I would imagine that over time, a few outstanding systems would spread themselves throughout our society giving us high quality affordable education. Every once in a while, a new competitor might enter the market place, making better use of new technology or new ideas and spread rapidly like a new restaurant chain.

The above kind of situation can only develop if the private educational institutions can compete on a relatively level playing field. It won't develop when private businesses are forced to operate under enormous disadvantages. Imagine what would happen if a government car company entered the market and the government regularly gave it enough money that it could offer standard cars for free. How could a private company compete? The private companies, if any existed, would only produce high performance cars for the upper end of the market. That is exactly the situation in education today. Only the wealthy send their children to expensive private schools and a few religious people choose to educate their children at home or in small groups. There are also some Catholic schools still around. But who can resist the draw of "free" education? It's the death of the private market and it perpetuates mediocrity for the same reasons that government always perpetuates mediocrity.

Darrell

[Selene]

Darrell:

Make my day. I am almost certain that your school district receives Federal funds. Access their budget on-line and see what Federal Tittles the funds are coming into 1) the district; 2) that "lottery" school; and 3) your children's school. Could make your fact pattern extremely interesting for certain "approaches".

"Actually, we do have one school in our area, D'Evelyn, that uses a lottery to choose its students (under mandate from the school board) that uses a traditional curriculum and is one of the best performing schools in the district and the state. Unfortunately, we couldn't get our kids into the school because of the afore mentioned lottery and the district refuses to replicate the model at other schools despite the fact that there is always a waiting list."

Adam

[Darrell Hougen]

Make my day. I am almost certain that your school district receives Federal funds. Access their budget on-line and see what Federal Tittles the funds are coming into 1) the district; 2) that "lottery" school; and 3) your children's school. Could make your fact pattern extremely interesting for certain "approaches".

There probably are some Federal funds coming into the district, but most of the funding comes from property taxes and state income and sales taxes. Since my children attend public schools and D'Evelyn is a public charter school (with a special charter that was granted before the charter school law), I would imagine that all of them are receiving basically the same amounts of money per student from all sources. Actually, I wonder if the Federal funds go directly to the district or go through the state.

Darrell

[tjohnson]

Just because a teacher or parent decides it is rational doesn't make it so. One might ask whether it is rational to "rationalize."

How do you know that the child won't recover? How do you know that if you teach the child socialism and multiculturalism, he will recover?

So who does decide what is rational, you? I have never heard of a school teaching socialism and multiculturalism.

[Philip Coates]

> I have never heard of a school teaching socialism and multiculturalism.

What about the things I listed? Only a few hours ago on this thread?

Never read any of the books, articles, op eds, or newspaper stories on what's wrong with the public schools? Or on how they have declined? Or on how children can't answer the SIMPLEST questions about American history or any of a range of other subjects?

COME **ON** GS !!!!

[tjohnson]

GM, it is unfortunate, but parents teach their children all kinds of nonsense. Freedom of speech involves tolerance for idea we strongly disagree with, not those with which we are agreement. How is your desire to forbid someone a religion education different from the Spanish Inquisition which forbid all religions except the one it liked.

Ginny

I guess you mean GS, not GM. The difference is I am against ALL religion, I'm not saying one is better than another. Again, there is a difference between having different political ideals and confusing science and religion. I heard once that a state legislature in the US passed a law that said Pi was equal to 3 because it said so in the bible.

[Selene]

Make my day. I am almost certain that your school district receives Federal funds. Access their budget on-line and see what Federal Tittles the funds are coming into 1) the district; 2) that "lottery" school; and 3) your children's school. Could make your fact pattern extremely interesting for certain "approaches".

There probably are some Federal funds coming into the district, but most of the funding comes from property taxes and state income and sales taxes. Since my children attend public schools and D'Evelyn is a public charter school (with a special charter that was granted before the charter school law), I would imagine that all of them are receiving basically the same amounts of money per student from all sources. Actually, I wonder if the Federal funds go directly to the district or go through the state.

Darrell

"I would imagine..." Negative on guessing, imagining or thinking that someone would have found out by now. Discover. Follow the Federal Tittle Monies. http://www.ed.gov/policy/elsec/leg/esea02/pg51.html

Adam

[Darrell Hougen]

Just because a teacher or parent decides it is rational doesn't make it so. One might ask whether it is rational to "rationalize."

How do you know that the child won't recover? How do you know that if you teach the child socialism and multiculturalism, he will recover?

So who does decide what is rational, you?

"Rational," in this context, means logically related to the requirements of man's existence and prosperity.

I have never heard of a school teaching socialism and multiculturalism.

You've never heard of a school treating all cultures as equal? You've never heard of a school running down the great industrialists by calling them "robber barons"? Must I go on?

Darrell

[Darrell Hougen]

"I would imagine..." Negative on guessing, imagining or thinking that someone would have found out by now. Discover. Follow the Federal Tittle Monies. http://www.ed.gov/policy/elsec/leg/esea02/pg51.html

Adam

I'm not really sure where this discussion is going.

Do you agree that it is dangerous for freedom loving people to agree to a program that puts private schools at a serious competitive disadvantage?

If you agree with that, then I think we are in basic agreement.

Darrell