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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LindyBill who wrote (1498)	5/27/2003 10:22:59 AM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 793843

We both know that you were seeing the "Cream" John. One major lesson learned from the 20th Century, as exemplified on the "Commanding heights" rerun last week, is that State run businesses, especially if they are unionized, are a disaster, world wide. They all give the same excuses. I think my point is not getting made. Perhaps you understand it but the lurkers may not. There are to excessive generalizations in those two sentences of yours. The first is that the public school enterprise in the US is failing. My simple assertion is that it is not; that what's failing is the willingness of the political class to address the plight of some urban neighborhoods, not only education but economics, housing, you name it. By naming the problem in this manner, the possible solutions are different. By misnaming it, vouchers seem to be the answer. The second is that state run businesses in which the employees are unionized are a disaster. That is a case that has yet to be made. Let's look at education, because that's what we are talking about. Schools are, almost without exception, creatures of local government: the taxes to fund them come from local property taxes, the school boards that hire and fire come from the local population. In general, that arrangement is a success. There are definitely funding problems. As for unions, I fail to see the argument that unions are the source of any serious problems in education. Hopefully, they have done, as you think they have, raised the salaries for teachers. That's the only way education recruits good personnel. So I don't see your argument.