Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#191

Post by kansface » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:40 PM UTC

handrous wrote: post #98

kingsuper20 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Schools are controlled primarily by state and local governments, which are not universally controlled by Democrats but split along typical red state/blue state lines: Looking at the uproar about Critical Race Theory, it appears that even the deepest red states have school hierarchies run by the blue. In addition, the Department of Education and other federal agencies are a thing.

> it appears that even the deepest red states have school hierarchies run by the blue This is definitely not the case. Consider: unless consistently-"red" legislatures and governor's offices are putting "blue" people in charge of their educational departments, it couldn't be the case. Further, in many states, individual districts play a major role in deciding the course of education, so even if that were the case, "r…

I don’t buy this argument for a couple of reasons. The first is that you have to look at the percentage of candidates for the job from each tribe. Just like really blue cities are inevitably at odds with their really red tribe police officers who inevitably live in the suburbs. Similarly, public universities in red states have no choice but to hire really liberal professors because like 95% of professors vote Democrat and the remainder vote libertarian or green, etc. You could try convincing the professors to go be police officers and vice versa, but neither is actually interested in the other job.

Secondly, these sorts of policies often come from the bottom up, from students or teachers. Administrations often roll over out of self preservation or apathy.

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#192

Post by andechs » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:41 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #90

kungito wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like what?

Elections? Healthcare? (Continuing to push Medicaid expansion onto states that don’t want it?) Child care? Education?

In order to send representatives to the European parliment, the EU requires that representatives be elected in fair elections: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_European_Parliament_elect...

Part of being a member state of the EU requires having access to some sort of public healthcare system: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Health_Insurance_Card

This isn't "over reach of federal government" - it's ensuring that the citizens of anyone who wants to be part of a certain association have certain basic rights.

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#193

Post by flavius29663 » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:42 PM UTC

silvestrov wrote: post #132

iammisc wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In a lot of European countries, a robust social safety net is the great equalizer. You don't get locked up to work in order to afford healthcare, food, etc. - and are thus more free to take chances. That is a great explanation in theory, but simply does not work out in practice. In order to support the safety net, the EU has to impose several regulations that remove the ability of people to 'take chances', such as…

> higher taxes on business Denmark + Norway: 22% Sweden: 21.4% Finland: 20% Germany: 15% Nederlands: 25% France: 25% USA: 21% (but 35% until 2017). So the tax argument does not hold, especially for the period before 2017. Birth rates are also the same: https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/total-fertility... > the EU is not particularly excellent at any Odd that there are so many EU countries at the list of mo…

The corporate tax might be nominally higher in the US, but the cost of doing business is definitely higher in Europe. When you have to pay 55% to the state if an employee has a salary above 100k, that will seriously hinder your ability to hire top talent, retain them, and motivate them (why work harder if it will go down the tax drain?)

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#194

Post by renewiltord » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:42 PM UTC

iammisc wrote: post #105

wayoutthere wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy hell dude, are you calling the working class lazy and the professional class hard-working?! This tells me you don’t have a lot of contact with the working class. The working class busts their asses while most software devs I know work about 2 hours a day from their couch in pajamas. Someone who works at a warehouse or fast food joint is a much harder worker than a software architect. Probably also working 60-80…

Americans glorify hard work while undervaluing efficiency. For example, I often hear fellow Americans brag about how many hours they put in or how intense their work is. This is true all the way from the blue collar trades to the most white collar (management consultants are notorious for this). In reality, it's better to use fewer hours to accomplish the same goal. There is no inherent value in applying more time to…

Thank you. This glorification of hours worked is a completely pathological mode of operation.

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#195

Post by heresie-dabord » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:43 PM UTC

clarkmoody wrote: post #178

Education and schooling are different things. There is a lot of schooling going on. I can't say the same for education.

Citizens in a democracy need to learn to how to participate in a democracy. Citizens in a capitalist system need to learn how capitalism works. Citizens in an engineering economy need to learn engineering.

There is a little of the latter happening.

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#196

Post by mgh2 » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:43 PM UTC

Education is worthless if there are no opportunities. In Argentina, there are PhDs as cab drivers.

Opportunities are correlated to how well authorities run the country.

There is some data trying to pinpoint relationships with other factors:

GDP, corruption, and religion, etc. https://m-g-h.medium.com/in-data-we-trust-2978dacc8c22

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#197

Post by dragonwriter » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:44 PM UTC

kingsuper20 wrote: post #30

zozbot234 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> while also chronically underfunding schools Schools are not underfunded in the U.S., they waste money. Big difference.

It's remarkable how much the per capita, inflation corrected cost per pupil in California has gone up in 50 years. My own elementary school (not in CA), has double the amount of staff with the same pupil head count, plus I don't doubt that the salaries have risen faster than inflation and/or GDP improvements. OTOH, teachers were famously poorly paid in days of yore.

>>It's remarkable how much the per capita, inflation corrected cost per pupil in California has gone up in 50 years.

Is that adjusted for national or local price levels?

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#198

Post by renewiltord » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:45 PM UTC

doytch wrote: post #26

whb07 wrote: post #15

Controlling education is a political life source for the Democratic party in the U.S. One of the largest, if not the largest, unions is the teacher's and they are a major donor to the Democratic party. Thankfully, the one good thing about the shutdowns has been the ability for parents to observe a couple things: * how little the school system cares about the child * the indoctrination and political ideas being passed…

I'm not American, but the core flaw that I've never had explained away for me in voucher or "school choice" systems is how "bad" schools get better. E.g., school in my district is bad. They don't have enough resources, or their teachers are bad. People begin taking their kids out of the school which means the school now has less money. Assuming they could fire teachers at will, they can't even now afford the "better"…

You don’t. You kill the school at some point. Some organizations become so dirty they cannot be cleaned. So you allow people to select into better organizations and you let these die. Then you ensure that those administrators don’t all end up together in a new school.

Schools suffer from the same Too Big To Fail. We have to let them fail and let parents have free choice.

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#199

Post by dragonwriter » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:47 PM UTC

zozbot234 wrote: post #10

John23832 wrote: post #7

Two parts: First, I think the ability to DO THINGS is the great equalizer at this point. Being a do-er lifts you out of poverty (or at least out of poverty's worst resting state). Being a do-er expands your network. Being a do-er prolongs your life (people with jobs/daily activities tend to live longer healthier lives). The best part about this is that technology has made it easier to become a do-er. You don't need a…

> while also chronically underfunding schools Schools are not underfunded in the U.S., they waste money. Big difference.

> Schools are not underfunded in the U.S

Most first world countries are well above the US’s 5% GDP in public education expenditures; schools absolutely are underfunded in the US.

It may also be unusually poorly administered, but this isn't like healthcare where US public spending is on par, as a share of GDP, with other developed countries despite doing far less with it.

Re: Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’?

#200

Post by renewiltord » Wed, Jun 23, 2021, 5:47 PM UTC

techrat wrote: post #96

refurb wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better than the current “sunk cost mentality” of public schools where poor schools have more money thrown at them until someone finally realizes its not a money issue. It’s literally the opposite of efficient use of funds. You want to shift more money to the better run schools not the worst run schools.

Decades of Republican ratfucking the education system isn't a reason to add more overhead to a starved system by privatizing it. > Better than... We know what deregulation does. Texas' energy issues is a great example. People forget that regulations don't just magically exist to inconvenience the glorious free market... Regulations are written in blood.

Haha no. Lots of regulations are just written in vegetable oil. The US regulated marriage between races using anti-miscegenation laws. Written in blood my ass.

There are two kinds of great fools in the world: those who say regulations are always good and those who say regulations are never good.