Mr. Gomes

Alan Gomes wrote:
And to those whining about a tax rebate for home schooling, how about for
those who have no children? Shall I get a rebate for the 30 years I've
been paying property taxes for schools I'm not using? Or the roads *I*
don't personally drive on, or the Fire Department *I've* never personally
used, or...get the point? Public education, as with all social services,
benefits *society as a whole* when done properly. We all reap the
benefits, we all pay the costs. We all have a responsibility to get out
and do something when it's not done properly. Look at voter turnout and
tell me how involved people are in society.

Keith Hughes


Ummmm...in the context of the thread, the silly point was offered that home
schoolers should be "consistent" in their philosophy and not seek any
services from the public school system.

'Silly' how exactly?

Some of us pointed out that there is
no inconsistency in this at all, since those who home school pay into the
system through taxes and are entitled to get something out of it.

Therein lies the fallacy. You are not entitled to "get something out of
it", you are entitled to *participate in* it. My wife and I, by virtue
of being childless, *cannot* get anything out of it, yet we support the
system equally along with the 'users'. You seem to be misconstruing the
purpose of a social program. The sufficiently affluent have always opted
out of social programs, yet they have always been required to support
them. The point is, *Society* has determined the structure and number of
the social systems it supports (nearly a truism), the purpose being to
advance the needs and goals of society as a whole, not to address
individual needs. By virtue of being part of society, we are all
required to support society.

Indeed,
whatever services a home schooling parent would receive is far less than
what has been paid in.

Again, your taxes support societal needs and desires. Save for sales
tax, there is no quid pro quo relative to taxation.

Now, even if there were a "rebate" for home schooling, that money would be
used to eduate the children in question, though outside of the public
system. This would still provide the alleged societal benefit you are
touting above.

To an extent. Also, to the extent that money is withdrawn from the
public system by those who, with voucher money, can afford high cost
private schools, the public system is further impoverished, and the
education of those left behind suffers accordingly. Even in a well run
system, there will be a large fixed overhead that is not proportional to
the number of students (e.g. facilities, maintenance, utilities,
administration, etc.). As dollars are withdrawn from the system, a
higher proportion of the available dollars goes to support this
overhead, and the dollars/student drops accordingly. A net loss for
society IMO.

Unless, of course, the real issue isn't whether children
receive an education but whether it is the government doing it?

It appears that your wife is 'doing it'. Is she the government? "The
Government" is merely a mental construct we use for convenience. It does
not exist as an entity. It is 'us', and as we nurture it, it is healthy
and productive, but as we neglect it, it grows weeds or lies fallow.

BTW: My wife is a public school teacher in So. California. She's a great
teacher but it's a really crappy system--massively top heavy bureaucracy,
wasteful, poorly run, etc.

There are a great many wonderful teachers out there. I'm glad your wife
is one of them. But the system will remain "massively top heavy
bureaucracy, wasteful, poorly run, etc." as long as people continue to
be mentally lazy and talk in terms of "they", or "them", or "the
guvumint", to conveniently divorce themselves from any personal
responsibility for either creating, or solving, the problem. Again, look
at the voter turnout in this country. Can we really expect parents that
are too lazy to even vote, to put adequate effort into rearing and
educating their children?

Granting that we cannot abolish the public
education system entirely (my personal preference), we support vouchers as a
good compromise.

Well, this is a basic matter of philosophy. Abolish the public system,
and only the affluent will be able to afford decent education. And I'm
not defending the performance of the extant public school system. It
*will* however, work well with parental participation. It happens in
*MANY* places.

As for vouchers, again, they benefit the affluent, but at the cost of
impoverishing the public system. AND it's another bureaucracy, AND it
will still require tax money, AND it will still disproportionately
disadvantage poor states/counties/municipalities unless federally
administered, etc. Hardly a panacea to my mind.

And I'm sure you'll easily find a great school that you can afford with
*only* the voucher money. One at which your wife would be happy
teaching...with the concomitant salary and benefits package of course.

And as for the teacher's union, we got her out of that
years ago (though we are obligated to pay a relatively small amount of dues
that goes to the collective bargaining portion, but nothing that goes to
support their political agenda).

Historically, labor unions have played an invaluable role in forming our
society, and establishing basic human rights (i.e. labor vs. servitude).
Laudable accomplishments. They have also been a source of graft and
corruption, often on a grand scale, and thus need policed just as does
the government. Given the history of union accomplishments, the right to
unionize should clearly be protected, IMO. The 'right to work' should
also be protected, IMO. Personally, I've never been in a union, and
detest the "union mentality", at least as stereo-typified (i.e. 'it aint
*my* job, call a ______[insert trade]'), it's stupid, wasteful, and
counterproductive.

Bottom line, if you don't want "the government" involved in education,
then stay away from *MY* tax dollars - they, like yours, support society
at large, and you don't get "line-item abdication" for societal
responsibilities. You want to use private schools, great. You want to
home school, great. I have no problem with either. But *IF* tax dollars
are used for education, they should be used for the maximum benefit to
the maximum number of students, irrespective of socioeconomic status.
Vouchers don't do that. A reorganization of how public education is
funded, administered, and evaluated could. But it would be a lot more
work, and lacking sufficient motivation (i.e. angry voters), congress,
legislatures, and school boards aren't going to do it.

Keith Hughes

Ok, Keith. You win. I'm convinced. The public school system produces such a
massive societal benefit that no amount of taxation to support it is
excessive. Without it we'd have a society of kids who could not read or
write and who are in general functionally illiterate, who could not do
simple math, and who had no knowledge of world history or even of the great
books of western civilization.

Oh, wait! That's what we presently have *with* the public school system.
Quick! Someone raise my property taxes so we can throw some more money at
it!

Well, it's been fun playing. Gotta get back to life beyond usenet. So go
ahead and have the last word and I'll see you around sometime--maybe on the
water. (A feeble attempt at getting back to something sailing related
here....)

--Alan

On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 18:17:40 UTC, "Alan Gomes" wrote:

Ok, Keith. You win. I'm convinced. The public school system produces such a
massive societal benefit that no amount of taxation to support it is
excessive. Without it we'd have a society of kids who could not read or
write and who are in general functionally illiterate, who could not do
simple math, and who had no knowledge of world history or even of the great
books of western civilization.

Oh, wait! That's what we presently have *with* the public school system.
Quick! Someone raise my property taxes so we can throw some more money at
it!

A pathetic strawman setup - that's not what he said, as you well know,
but you don't know how to address what he did say.

Just to summarise/simplify it for you and the other 'public bad,
private good' folks, he did say:
the system has flaws;
it won't be fixed by opting out with your money;
it is the result of people (parents in this case) opting out with
their other resources, like participation.


Well, it's been fun playing. Gotta get back to life beyond usenet. So go
ahead and have the last word and I'll see you around sometime--maybe on the
water. (A feeble attempt at getting back to something sailing related
here....)

--Alan

Chris
--