Is the trickle down theory still working in todays economy?

The wealthy seem to get all the tax breaks and keep most of their wealth.
The working middle class in proportion pay more taxes, and pay the most, something has to change or it’s going to be the french revolution all over again.
But what??

IF, and that’s a big IF we lived in the capitalist society that was envisioned early on it may have worked. No chance in the 20th and 21st century. Too many monopolies and good ole boy networks. Don’t even get me started on how I saw stimulus money get spent.

It never worked. Ever. Unless your trickle down was yellow and stank of ammonia and asparagus.

But,but @Seek the conservatives go on and on at how well it worked,hell still working.

Yes… look how lively the job market is and how few of us are living in poverty.

You know, this amazes me -

I live near a town that has a large Victorian “Mansion District”.
As I understand it, at the time the area was platted out, it was determined that the people living there would be wealthy, and therefor able to give more to the community. The property tax rate was voluntarily raised within a defined area. I think they pay 10% more than anyone else in the city?

How contrary to today’s standards is that?

“I resolved to stop accumulating and begin the infinitely more serious and difficult task of wise distribution.”
Andrew Carnegie.
Who redistributed 90% of his wealth (13+ billion in today’s dollars) during his last years, including building 2509 libraries across America.

It doesn’t work today, and it didn’t work in the past. The rich get richer and the lower classes only get the shit that might trickle (or pour!) down.

The Gates Foundation redistributes America’s wealth, worldwide.

Buffett has pledged to give away 99% of his wealth to philanthropic causes.

To me it’s starting to look like the ‘few million’ people are the problem. Cheating the tax code to stay ahead of the Middle Class.

As been said before, I have never seen any evidence there was ever such a thing as trickledown economics. However, I cannot see whatever else is in play. If you tax the rich to hell to make it cushy for the poor and middle class, would that be any more of an incentive for them to create jobs? Would we have a whole new slew of laws designed to keep them from farming everything they can overseas? To me, economics would work better if more of a win-win environment was cultivated.

Wasn’t it Bush Senior who referred to it as Voodoo Economics?

@Hypocrisy_Central perhaps you would be more comfortable with the term “Suppy Side Economics”; same thing more elegant sounding name. It has been a staple in the Republican Party for many years now, the idea that if you allow the most wealthy members of society to have more, eventually some of it will trickle down to those less fortunate. Conservatives will, of course, deny that there was or is any such thing but the simple fact is that no matter what you call it, that is what it is.

We were fed this lie that hard work and dedication will payoff. That’s not true. There are millions of Americans who bust their asses working tons of overtime or two or more jobs just to get by – just to survive. Meanwhile the company for which they work continues to make record profits, executives for those companies continue to pull in salaries that were unheard of decades ago and every year they get richer while the rest of us work harder but get less. That’s trickle-down economics.

Employees aren’t valued assets, they’re expendable expenses. Where a company “projects” $30 million in revenue, only makes $25 million and that company sees that as a “loss.” And guess who suffers thanks to that “loss”? The employees. Now, if the company projects $30 million in revenue and makes $35 Million then, supposedly, that extra five mil will “trickle down” to their employees. Now, can you give a single instance where that has happened? Probably not because what actually happens is that the stock holders get a bigger dividend and the CEO and other corporate officers get bigger bonus’s and a hefty pay raise. Joe Assemlylineworker gets dick.

We here all these wonderful stories about how if the rich just had more, they would create more jobs. Well, they are making money now hand over fist and have been since Ray-gun was in office. They are reaping the benefits of tax cuts every year while our deficit grows larger and yet I do not see a surplus of jobs and I don’t believe you can point them out to me. We have a higher rate of unemployment now than when the rich were taxed at +90%.

When Reagan came into office in 1980, the top tax rate was 70%. After his first term, the top tax rate had been cut to 50% and by the time he left office in January of 1989, the top tax rate was down to only 28%. Revenue into the federal government was cut so significantly, basic programs could no longer be funded. Even with less money for the country to spend, Reagan decided to increase military spending and did so by decreasing domestic programs designed to help Americans.

Republican economic predictions have not panned out. We have been waiting over 30 years for Republican tax cuts for the wealthy to grow the economy and create jobs and I don’t see it happening in my lifetime. Perhaps, no not perhaps, It is most definitely time to go back to taxing the wealthy at a much higher rate. It can do no worse than the present method is doing.

TOTALLY agree @rojo but the wealthy will scream if you do that ,they will have no choice but to cut more jobs just to keep their stupid profits.

@SQUEEKY2 The wealthy always scream; it’s how they stay wealthy. They will cut jobs or not, according to their own whims. Of course they will demand tax breaks, and of course they threaten dire consequences if they don’t get them. Why should we placate them, like the spoiled children that they are? The evidence does not support trickle-down economics at all.

What are they going to do, take their toys and go home? Close every Walmart, every newspaper, every big-box store and every bank? Boo fuckity hoo. That just leaves plenty of open market share to be taken up by small local business.

They might actually create some jobs that way.

Still? You mean it actually ever worked in the first place? I mean, half the nation is earning $30k/yr or less; given that unemployment is ~5% as opposed to >35%, that’s…. unacceptable.

@Hypocrisy_Central We managed to do pretty well before 1980. Of course, all the multi-millionaires we had were only earning 30–40 times what the average worker under them made as corporate profits went towards things like expanding the company (with all the job creation that entails), increasing worker’s wages, and basically doing the things that Conservatives claim that our current system where >95% of all economic gains have gone to the top 1% while the middle class slides down into poverty.

Whether you call it “Trickle-down”, “Supply side”, or what have you, it;s interesting to note that it was discredited in the late 1800s when it was known as “Horse and Sparrow” economics. It’s proponents claimed that giving a horse more oats would mean that more would pass through the horse undigested, so sparrows would have more to eat. Anyone with more than three active brain cells recognized it as “Give everything to the rich and let the poor eat shit!”.

You are correct that things would work better if it were win-win, which is why so many of us oppose Conservatives so vehemently, especially those of us who have better math skills than the average third-grader along with enough reasoning ability to qualify as sentient.

@SQUEEKY2 That’s why we have rope; it’s hard to scream with a noose tightened around the neck. While it’s unlikely that we’ll go that route, there is enough historical precedent that the possibility cannot be totally dismissed.

@Seek Some have threatened exactly that. Of course, what they fail to mention is that doing so would put enough of a dent in consumer demand to further cut their profits. And if we close our borders as tightly as they seem to want them, little/none of that money would ever get overseas to where they have their corporate HQs or personal accounts. Of course, it’s not like they are consistent in their ethics or capable of any credible foresight….

Trickle down has proven such a naked economic fraud, that the people who invented and championed the term, wouldn’t be caught dead using it today. The term has become such a pejorative that it is only thrown around by those of us who regard it with the contempt it deserves. But that doesn’t mean it still isn’t advocated under a whole truckload of disguises. Anytime some big moneyed interest starts yapping about how this or that proposal of theirs promises “jobs and prosperity for the community”, you can pretty much rest assured that one way or another, the guy on the ground is gonna be screwed.

@Hypocrisy Central But that’s what trickle down promises. That’s what’s ALWAYS promised—the win/win. And there are as many disguised ways of stating it as there are billionaires to pimp it. Stuff like “a rising tide lifts all boats” or “what’s good for General Motors is good for the country”. I seem to recall that the trickle theory was actually derived from a quote by Will Rogers who recognized the scams of the rich for what they were. But what’s fascinating is that the term was picked up and parroted by Reagan who openly championed it as a cornerstone of Reaganomics. Despite the slickest of disguises, it’s always simple to pick out the underlying trickle down scam, because every one of them amounts to “give me the money FIRST and I’ll see to it that the little people are taken care of”. Often “give me the money” is hidden behind roundabouts like“cut me a tax break” or “exempt my lead mine from environmental standards” but it’s all the same deal involving the same cliches. And we all know the drill “jobs depend on it”, “good for the economy”, etc.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a litany of distorted history, misinformation, and lack of understanding anywhere before. First, Reagan never used the term ‘Trickle Down Economics’. That term was invented by the Democrats. Reagan’s economic plan, which included significant tax cuts, ushered in 20 years of high economic growth, an expanding workforce, low unemployment, and rising wages. Hardly anything that could be considered a failure. Obama’s economic plan however is marked with very low economic growth, a shrinking workforce, and shrinking wages. Quite a contrast.

The programs and legislation you want is inevitably misdirected. You want a higher minimum wage to redistribute the wealth from the 1% but fail to realize they don’t pay minimum wage. Apple, GM, Microsoft, etc. don’t have minimum wage jobs. The minimum wages jobs are low skilled labor typically used in small business (stores or restaurants). You want to use the tax code as a weapon to punish the rich but inevitably punish the middle class instead. You complain that big business is moving jobs out of the country so you devise ways to punish them all but insuring they will reinvest any earnings overseas rather than here in the States. The way to grow is by rewarding investment, not punishing it. Every time we pass some asinine legislation like Dodd-Frank we create thousands of new regulations that impact and discourage new business start-ups and raise the cost of entry for those businesses. The past 8 years of keynesian economics has stifled our growth and set us on a track diminishing returns.

Finally, I have to comment on the French Revolution that some seem to think is a way out of this mess. The French Revolution was 10 years of mob rule. I find it amusing that the first act of the French revolution was to storm the Bastille (the prison) and kill most of the inmates. That’ll show them. The leaders of the revolution were themselves beheaded during this Reign of Terror and the end result was 15 years of military rule under Napoleon. Now there’s a solution for you.

No one is looking forward to the arrival of the next French Revolution, but you can bet that it’s on a way if current trends continue. And before we begin glorifying the cognitively impaired Gipper, let’s discuss the 20 years of prosperity we should expect from the tax cuts of his protégée and devotee, Mr. Dubbya, as well as the Gipper’s effect on the national debt, the eruption of armies of homeless folks in the country, the exodus of the manufacturing sector, wholesale destruction of the pension system, the institution of lax regulation precipitating the greatest financial corruption scandal in the history of the country, etc, etc, etc.

@stanleybmanly “The term has become such a pejorative that it is only thrown around by those of us who regard it with the contempt it deserves.”

I think I liked it better when it was called “Horse and sparrow”.

I also think that it’s a perfet example of what happens when you cling to a theory that looks good on paper but breaks down when exposed to reality. You know how sometimes a small child will put popcorn into pancake batter to make self-flipping pancakes? Or jump out a second-story window with a bed sheet that they try to use as a parachute? It’s kind of like that, only with grown adults who should know better. And they are pushing us out the window.

@Jaxk “I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a litany of distorted history, misinformation, and lack of understanding anywhere before.”

Translation; you not only have never looked in a mirror, but you make sure that there are never any within 100 yards of you.

I will agree with you only as far as saying that there are certain things that, with a shit-ton of spin, could be used to “prove” Reagan was better at everything than Obama, but even experts are divided. And given how many people who know more about money than you or I ever will (Nobel laureates, multi-billionaires, etcetera…) side up against your rhetoric, and how often those who you’ve thrown your lot in with have either screwed up or outright lied, your credibility here is damaged enough to be unconvincing at best; you are, in the truest sense of the word, incredible.

“The minimum wages jobs are low skilled labor typically used in small business (stores or restaurants). ”

Proof that you haven’t actually seen any statistics other than the ones that prove your own bias correct, and also that you haven’t really looked at the BLS numbers. I’m not sure if you consider college-educated people are considered unskilled”, though I can see how you may consider anyone under the age of 45 “kid”. Look again. You’ll find a disproportionate number in the South and Midwest, and ~40% are over the age of 25, so I would consider them adults. (Young adults, but still adults.) Oh, hey, Table 6! Well, well… ~36% of minimum wage workers have some college, and nearly 18% have a Bachelor’s degree or higher!

More importantly, look at how many earn poverty wages despite earning more than minimum wage. Also look at how stock prices and corporate profits have risen without doing anything for the majority. Don’t take my word for it; I’m getting that info straight from the source. Many of us pay $12k/yr or more just for rent and utilities.

I’ve seen what happens with companies that do things the old way; they took their profits and split them between expansion and worker benefits the way you claim can only happen if the executive and investor classes are given 98% of the wealth. I’ve also seen them do it the way you want others to do but, if you are to be believed, do not personally do yourself with your own business. Were you lying when you said that you take care of your workers by paying them competitive wages, or are you, in fact, more fiscally liberal than you would ever admit? If you really were telling the truth, then you are so ideologically blinded that you are incapable of even seeing that what you support is free reign for those with far fewer morals than you.

Lastly. desperate people do crazy things that aren’t always productive. When bloodthirsty, they may not even care whose blood. And looking at the type of people that share your political views, I’m not sure the US military has enough guns to really be able to fight that fight, especially not if the US government itself is divided. And yet you not only poke the bear, but you sharpen a stick because your finger isn’t annoying enough. Now there’s a solution for you.

@Jaxk and I mean no disrespect, but I really would like you to respond to @jerv ‘s answer.

@Jaxk And while you’re at it, could you please explain to me how our monopolistic system promotes the sort of competition that leads to lower consumer prices (through thinner margins compensated for by sales volume rather than price gouging) and technical innovation? I never really understood that part of the plan, only watched as companies merged and progress slowed.

@SQUEEKY2 – I’ll try this one more time because I believe you are a reasonable person. I won’t however, get into another name calling match with @jerv . It simply distracts from the issues and never resolves anything.

The Reagan economy rebounded much faster and robust than the Obama economy. There seems little dispute about that. What @jerv referenced says as much. The issue seems to be that the recessions were different. I have no dispute about that, all recessions are different. The argument started as Reagan’s plan didn’t work, that the supply side economics failed. It obviously did not fail and in fact worked marvelously. Economic growth in the 80s averaged 4%, now it’s more like 1%. I’m not arguing that Obama should have done the same exact thing that Reagan did, I’m arguing that Reagan’s plan worked and Obama’s plan did not. I see nothing in @jerv‘s post that refutes that. In fact, I’ve been saying for many years now that tax cuts are not the way to go but rather stability is what we need. Stop continuously changing the rules and let business develop with a known set of rules.

As for his post on workers and wages, I’m not sure what point he’s trying to make. If you are sweeping the floor, that’s an unskilled job. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a High School drop out or have a doctorate in Nuclear Physics. Your paid for the job your doing. If we expect to take advantage of higher education, we’ve got to create the jobs that require higher education. Simply paying more for unskilled labor doesn’t get us anywhere and in fact moves us backwards. Having a nation of highly paid burger flippers won’t keep us at the forefront of the world’s economies.

I’ve lived and worked in the Silicon Valley for more than 30 years now and have seen numerous start-ups. Many successes and many failures. I’ve personally fallen into one of those two groups. What seems to be happening over the past decade is that when a new idea comes along, the creator sells off the start-up to a large corporation making himself and a few cohorts a ton of money. So why are they selling off instead of growing their idea themselves. Uncertainty! We have low interest rates but money is tight. We have a tsunami of regulations that create incredible costs to comply and in many cases, you don’t even know what you will have to comply with. Much safer to sell off and let the big guys do that work. Consequently we end up with fewer businesses, fewer jobs, less competition, and higher prices.

In @jerv‘s second response he complains about monopolistic practices. but if you raise the cost of entry to new businesses and force the new ideas to be sold, you end up with few competitive businesses. No new start-up and big businesses growing ever bigger by the day. We are creating this situation and complaining about what we’ve done. The solution is to create an environment where business can start and grow instead of punishing anyone that wants to create them. IMHO

Wow..I never heard of the “Horse & Sparrow” analogy…well, I’ll be damned, you mean I could be eating the horses shit here for those few extra grains of undigested feed? Glory be, my troubles are all over. lol

the horse & sparrow version of trickle down was a favorite analogy of the great and witty Keynesian economist, John Kenneth Galbraith. That guy consistently cracked me up. I can remember him discussing the realities of horse & sparrow with William F Buckley on Buckley’s tv program in that slow drolling voice of his. He was wonderful.

@Jaxk First off, I think you of all people should know that I like breaking people’s balls. If you think that’s name-calling, you should see how I treat my friends! I’m snarky. It isn’t an admirable personality trait, but c’est la vie.

Now to business…

From reading that, it seems that you actually agree with me on a few things. Reagan’s plan did have some merit. For instance, dropping tax rates while simplifying the tax code to eliminate loopholes that led to huge gaps between marginal and effective tax rates was brilliant. However, I also believe that it operates on a curve, thus it’s possible to have too much of a good thing. You said outright, “tax cuts are not the way to go”, so it seems that we agree that moderation is key.

Other nations have successfully done some things that Conservatives vehemently oppose for reasons that are empirically disproven by history. That has caused us to have problems that other nations have mitigated or outright avoided. I stand by my assertion that there were some things that Reagan got very wrong, mostly with regards to sustainability. I’m not claiming Democrats get everything right, but the fact that they are sometimes wrong doesn’t mean that Conservatives are 200% correct on all things the way you often claim.

Regarding wages, unskilled workers like floor-sweepers still deserve enough to live on. To do otherwise is to pass costs on to taxpayers while forcing government to expand to handle all the extra paperwork. I cannot see how that can be reconciled with a desire for lower taxes and smaller government, so it would appear that Liberals actually adhere to Conservative ideology better than many Conservatives do.

What you and many others miss is that paying a burger-flipper $15/hr doesn’t mean that they are as valuable as skilled workers like electricians or EMTs; it means that EVERYONE outside the executive/investor class is underpaid. It wasn’t that way in the mid-20th century when workers were paid well enough to create high demand that required expansion (and thus job creation). If you think an electrician is worth three times as much as a floor-sweeper, don’t pay the broom-pusher $7/hr; pay the electrician $45/hr!

We also seem to agree that over-regulation is bad. But that doesn’t mean that lax regulation is good; again, there is a middle ground. I also like to have consistent rules. That desire for consistency is part of why I can’t be a Republican; too many exceptions to the rules is, to my mind, actually worse than not even agreeing on what the rules are. But reality is full of exceptions to rules. The duck-billed platypus is a mammal that lays eggs, so even Mother Nature doesn’t always follow her own rules.

“The solution is to create an environment where business can start and grow instead of punishing anyone that wants to create them.”

Yep. Unfortunately, since some things don’t scale well, it’s really hard to find a good balance. Raising the cost of entry has all the problems you point out, but those large enough to have things like “Expected EPA fines” listed as an operating expense need some pretty harsh measures to keep in check. It’s sad that those measures often hurt or kill small businesses, especially as small businesses are the ones that create the majority of jobs, but a system that treats small businesses differently from large multinationals would be complex enough that I’m not sure that it’s even viable to attempt.

If you really want what’s best, then you’ll have to compromise. Those of us who disagree with you will too, so it’s not like getting less than 100% of what you want is utter defeat. You’ll have to concede that it’s possible for someone less Conservative for you to get at least some things right, and that Conservatives are human enough to be fallible; something that you personally have explicitly refused to do on numerous occasions, and seems to be a common trend amongst Conservatives. To be fair, Liberals are the same way, but that doesn’t make it right. (Liberals are also far less likely to invoke “divine right”, claim holy status and treat political differences of opinion as heresy/blasphemy, assert that they know more about God and Jesus than the Pope, or hole themselves up and have armed standoffs with the US government, but the psychology of partisan politics is a discussion that can be had another time.) Basically, you must have enough humility to recognize that you are not the smartest person, that humans are incapable of true impartiality or objectivity, and that your opponent being wrong doesn’t always make you right. Those last two are part of why I’m always on you; you keep me in check. Who keeps you in check?

@Coloma Back when Reagan’s plan was still just a campaign pitch, I did a little research. I found that analogy funny at the time as I imagined hungry sparrows becoming omnivorous and feasting on horse meat due to lack of oats. Given the growing civil unrest in recent years, it’s a little less funny now.

When they talk about ‘trickle down’ they really mean trickle up. The poor support the rich with their meagre contributions which together become a mighty river of affluence enjoyed by those at the top.

@flutherother Yep. Supply-side economics (under any of it’s various names) relies on an investor class to provide capital. The problem that we’re having as a result of a few decades of that is that those who provide capital achieved critical mass and cannot reasonably spend fast enough to outpace the return on their investments while those who don’t now have too little disposable income to create enough demand for it to be sustainable.

It’s not that the theory is totally without merit, merely that it’s been done to excess for long enough that there is no longer any pain-free way to rectify the situation. Couple that with the religious fervor of people opposing any attempt at rectifying who feel that the beast way to stop this beast is to give it steroids and PCP and you have… well, 2015 America.

And I do mean religious fervor. The Libertarian contingent of the GOP has been overpowered by the theocrats, as proven by a lot of red states having laws based on the Bible. You show me a socially liberal Republican and I’ll show you someone about to have their party membership revoked.

Has it ever worked? I think not. It was described to me as the rich pissing on the poor, I think that’s accurate.

You mean big horses pissing on tiny sparrows and drowning them. lol

A Little History:

Supply side economics first raised it’s ugly head in the U.S. during the ramp-up to the congrssional elections in the early 1890’s. It was introduced as the Horse and Sparrow Theory by the guess who Republicans. The metaphor was that the horses will eat the oats and the sparrows would come after and eat the leavings. The Democrats and populists such as William Jennings Bryant aptly described it as horseshit. Most economic historians today attribute the deep recession of 1896–98 to the implementation of Horse and Sparrow.

Hoover’s answer to the Crash of ‘29 was Horse and Sparrow, aptly termed “Trickle Down Economics” by popular comedian and Democrat, Will Rogers. Hoover attempt to implement Trickle Down resulted in deepening the Geat Depression, and he was voted out of the presidency in favor of Franklin Roosevelt. Our collective memory was longer in those days.

Nixon’s answer to the recession immediately after the Vietnam War was to freeze prices and wages, and he created more loopholes for the wealthy—essentially lowering their taxes. Because the Canadian economy is tied to ours, the Canadians experienced recession as well, only deeper. Pierre Trudeau’s answer (the father of the present, newly elected Canadian Prime Minister) to this was opposite of Nixons and Canada recovered much more quickly. Presidential candidate Ronald Reagan pushed it as Supply Side Economics, or Reaganomics, while his Republican contender, George Bush, Sr. called it Voodoo Economics.

George proved to be right. Reduction of taxes resulted in a reduction in services. For the first time, Americans began seeing homeless on the streets of small cities. School books were not replaced. Schools became and still are overcrowded in many places. Parks, bridges, highways and other infrastructure began to show neglect. State hospitals and many libraries were closed. Many institutions like prisons and community hospitals were privatized resulting in increased prison abuse and the sharp increase in hospitalization and health services costs that we see today. University tuition began to climb astronomically compared to costs previous to Reaganomics. As fuel costs went up (not directly related), there has been very little mass transit put in place in comparison to the need,

As economist Thomas Sowell writes:
“”There has never been any school of economists who believed in a trickle-down theory. No such theory can be found in even the most voluminous and learned books on the history of economics. It is a straw man.”

And here we are.

The theory goes that if you cut taxes to the rich, they will use that money to invest in industry and services, create new businesses, which will all create new jobs and those paychecks is the trickle they speak of. You don’t offer tax breaks to the middle and lower middle classes because, as a Reagan staffer once described it, tax breaks for the poor reward them for poor financial habits. “If you give tax cuts to the poor, they only spend it on food and shelter.”

The main problem with the theory, in my economically uneducated opinion, is that the wealthy aren’t stupid. They are either seasoned investors, or their money is handled by seasoned investors. If a country is in recession and there are better opportunities to place one’s money, then one will do that, and the money, and a lot of industry will leave the unhealthy country for better prospects where there is, for instance cheaper labor. And this is what happens.

And this is one of the many reasons why this theory doesn’t work for anyone but the rich—who avoid bad investments in order to stay rich.

@Espiritus_Corvus – Excellent story, the problem is that it is all spin. The facts simply don’t support your theory. The tax cuts were for everyone that pays taxes. If you don’t pay taxes, there is no tax cut possible. During the Reagan years, we did not lose revenue but increased revenue to the government. The economy (GDP) grew by more than 30% while he was president and government collected more than 30% of GDP. Meanwhile the share of taxes paid by the top 1% increased dramatically since the Reagan tax cuts. More tax revenue and more of it paid by the top earners, How do you spin that?

Your characterization of the school system is equally flawed. The Dept. of Ed was created in 1979 by President Carter. The US had historically been the most highly educated country in the world. Whether you blame the Dept. of Ed for the decline or not (as I do), you would certainly have to look at it as a failure. Education has declined rather than improved since their conception. Their entire operation (as with most government Bureaucracies) is intended to create regulatory nightmares that strip the schools of teachers and money to be replaced by Bureaucrats. They’ve done a fine job of that.

The movement of industry oversea did not start with Reagan nor did it end when he left. The regulatory environment in the States costs industry much more than wages do. And for the smart investor, investing during a recession is a very lucrative deal, everything is cheaper. The only caveat would be that we need an optimistic outlook. Reagan provided that which is why GDP grew so robustly. The lack of that optimism is also why we are growing so slowly now.

@Jaxk When a certain demographic goes from earning a small fraction of income to earning the majority of the income, then the only way to avoid that group paying the majority of taxes is to have a regressive tax plan. How do I spin it? Math. More precisely, mathematical literacy; something that America has apparently fallen behind on judging by the fact that so many support flawed plans for their simplicity even though the numbers don’t jibe with the hype.

That said, you are somewhat correct, but I ask you this; what use is increased revenue if it’s spent poorly and inefficiently? And if the things you cut spending on now lead to greater costs down the road, are you really saving anything by cutting spending? Actually, history has already given the answers to those two questions; funneling all wealth (including any increase in overall prosperity) upwards, and no. Now, if Reagan were a CEO doing a pump-and-dump, then he would’ve succeeded wildly, but I saw the bubble forming right around the end of Reagan’s first term. There are some things I really hate being right on.

As for schools, I agree that you can’t just throw money at education. However, that doesn’t mean paying teachers less than some broom-pushers despite their position needing extensive qualifications, nor cutting school funding so much that some teachers need to buy stuff out of their own pocket to do their job. But it seems that we both think massive reform is needed in education, and I just don’t feel like digressing down that path right now.

Regarding regulation, you are so Pollyannaish that I almost want to pinch your cheeks. You still really do trust humans to be moral, rational actors, despite mountains of proof to the contrary, don’t you?

It would be nice to suppose that the Department of Education was responsible for the decline in quality regarding the products of our schools. But it takes a great stretch of the imagination to imagine the slide correcting by simply eliminating the department. The one positive aspect of the “bureaucratic nightmare” is that it is there to examine as well as minutely document the ongoing dummification in “the land of the free”. I think there’s a more complex explanation for the declining quality in the nation’s schools. There are probably a whole slew of reasons, but a few of them are rather obvious. To begin with, there’s the “chicken or egg” question. That is “are the failings of our schools the product of an ailing society or is it the other way around?” Well it doesn’t really matter, because neither is up for improvement if either is allowed to persist. The thing I find striking isthat while we increasingly wring our hands over the

@stanleybmanly Actually, it’s quite simple; Liberals are wrong about everything, and the world would be a perfect place if we let Conservatives rule the universe.

Seriously though, I think that our ailing society, especially the recent rise of anti-intellectualism, is something that cannot be ignored. And looking at where education is the worst in our own nation combined with the affiliations of those who support self-defeating policies across the board without even really thinking about it while belittling anyone who even attempts any sort of critical thinking on the matter, as well as who benefits most from an uneducated general populace, I can take a few educated guesses on where the problems lie, as well as why we cannot fix them.

@stanleybmanly – Eliminating the Dept of Ed. (ED) Won’t do it alone but it would certainly help to reduce the requirement for most of the Bureaucracy. A Washington Times article shows that administrators outnumber teachers in many districts. When bureaucracies begin to grow they gain a life of their own and don’t stop growing unless some one takes positive action to stop them. It would appear that’s what’s happening in the schools.

From the article: “In the District, there are 13 students for every teacher, but only 10 students for every nonclassroom employee, the study says.”. Iis little wonder the cost perstudent keeps rising while the performance declines.

@Jaxk Every point you made in that post is valid. But like business, there needs to be at least some oversight. Granted, not nearly as much as we have, but I strongly suspect that if the DoEd went away, a fair number of children would never learn anything that isn’t approved by clergy. Looking at the teen pregnancy rates where they teach abstinence-only “Because that’s how God wants it” gives a hint of the problems that could lead to.

Did you ever take a biology class, or a “general science” class that covered biology? If so, which was mentioned more in the textbooks; scientific data, or Jesus? What I know of biology is things like genetics and fossil records rather than Adam and Eve.

I’ve seen quite a few school districts attempt to use taxpayer dollars to make their schools blatantly Christian, as well as other dogfuckery of that caliber. Because of that, I think that there is no getting around the need for some sort of administrative body to prevent that sort of abuse that happens even with all the bureaucracy and regulations we have now. Of course, the fact that it still happens only goes to prove your point that being bigger and costlier does not mean that it’s better.

Government doesn’t expand for fun; it expands because there is a problem that isn’t being handled well. Then it expands more when their attempts to fix things goes awry, but it doesn’t change the fact that if there weren’t some issues in our education system that weren’t being addressed properly then the DoEd never would’ve come about. Now, I know that some conservatives consider education to be something that government is constitutionally barred from having anything to do with, but they feel the same way about everything else too.

My point is, I cannot help but think it foolish, funny, scary, and sad that the ones who complain the most about regulation are the ones that are the reason we have regulations in the first place. I’m sure that Cain would have some very strong things to say in opposition to laws prohibiting murder. And just because a system is flawed, that doesn’t automatically mean that it’s inherently wrong, just as someone else being wrong doesn’t automatically make you right.

(I’ll give you a moment to try to get your head around that concept…)

I won’t deny that there aren’t some major changes needed. I’d like everything to be done better for cheaper myself. But I don’t think that letting the inmates run the asylum is the right answer for everything either.

As an aside, isn’t it possible that at least part of the reason America has fallen behind in education is that other nations have actually passed us? That they continued to improve while we stagnated? Or is it heresy to imply that other nations are capable of doing anything better than we do? If the latter, then we’re already on our way to becoming North Korea; a regressive nation left behind yet too egotistical to admit they are anything other than the best nation possible in every universe that could ever possibly exist.

If you’re so afraid that a Christian is in your school, give them vouchers so that they can attend a private school. Private schools cost half as much per student and have better outcomes.

Well, @Jaxk, that brings up issues of taxpayer dollars funding religion and all sorts of other headaches that I just don’t think are worth it unless it’s the only option remaining. Put another way, I think it better and more cost-effective searching for a different solution than to tie up the courts over the First Amendment implications surrounding vouchers.

I don’t know what that “better solution” is, but I have a pretty good idea of what the solution isn’t. Besides, wouldn’t a voucher system require massive amounts of administration with all of the cost-efficiency that we’ve come to know and love? Even thinking about it casually for a few seconds points out enough massive deep-rooted flaws that I can’t help but feel that there’s a better way.

That said, we do agree that the system needs reform, and that children can get better educations cheaper than what our public schools give under the current system.

@Jaxk If you’re so afraid that a Christian is in your school, give them vouchers so that they can attend a private school. Private schools cost half as much per student and have better outcomes.
Why stop there? Would not turning the whole school system to a voucher system increase schools and education in the long run? If every school from K-12 were voucher be it private or public here is what it could offer:
• Smaller classes.
• Schools seeking to hire and retain better teachers, the better the teacher the more the students (with money attached vis the voucher) will want to attend there.
• Schools will invest more in their infrastructure; a bright, clean and safe campus will attract more students (with money attached via the voucher) to desire attending there.
• Schools will invest more in updating or having music, arts, science labs etc. those things will attract more students (with money attached via the voucher) to desire attending there.
• Schools will not desire to hang on to ineffective teachers. They will be a toxin scaring away students and the voucher cash attached to them.
• Schools in poorer neighborhood will be more in parity with those in affluent neighborhoods.
• Schools will have to be up on their game because they will have to compete for the money not just sit back and watch it roll in just by having a head count; poor schools that don’t make themselves attractive or have a curriculum that attract students will die out.

Free marketing the school system would be the best thing for it; you don’t have one cell phone company charging people up the wazoo because the other less expensive ones keep everyone in check.

@Hypocrisy_Central That seems like a better solution in many respects. While I can see some flaws, they are more matters of vagueness that could be addressed rather than anything objectionable. After all, it’s an internet post and not actual legislation, so we can just gloss over the tedious pile of pages full of “Heretofore…” and “Whereby…” that overpaid people toss around to justify their salaries and just stipulate that it is at least possible that a plan based on those bullet points could be feasible. I’m not up for that sort of discussion right now, but I could see myself rolling with this.

As you might imagine, I do have a slight problem with free market idea of primary education, but more as a matter of consumer protection than anything. Honestly, I don’t trust an unregulated free market to do what’s best for society because I feel history has proven how abusive that is, but I don’t really trust government regulation for pretty much the same reason @Jaxk doesn’t; costs too much and doesn’t work well enough.

Still, it is something that could be fleshed out into a workable solution. My only real issue with it is that filling in the details would probably require compromise from both sides, and I’m just too cynical to see that happening in Congress any time soon. We’ll see if the circus leaves town after this next election, but I just don’t see this (or anything else) flying with the group of clowns we have in there right now.

@Jaxk That bureaucratic overload isn’t the reason for the failure of the schools anymore than the scab on a wound is responsible for infection. The failure is more about the necessity for those bureaucrats. By this I mean that we increasingly place responsibility for solving the country’s social failures on the schools. This is particularly true for the expanding numbers of schools serving those at the bottom of the economic barrel. The schools are merely the one place where societal shortcomings are out in the open. It falls on the schools to provide everything from kids’ primary meals to mental health care, to in many instances the ONLY interface with what passes for health care. These stresses on the schools continue to climb. Consider for instance what the words “duck and cover” mean today compared to the purpose for which the slogan was coined. And vouchers aren’t going to save us, because another one of those hidden trends defining our crumbling society is the precipitous drop in the status of teaching as a profession. The country today is in effect an economic combat zone. It is a place where the rewards are slim and infrequent for those saddled with the anvil of idealism. We live in an age when the unspoken consensus is that “teaching is for losers” and we should expect the predictable results from such a universal mindset.

Just think about it. What smart person is going to assume 70–90 thousand dollars worth of debt for an “opportunity” to teach in an inner city school? That debt by the way is another one of those signs of our crumbling as a society.

Vouchers will only benefit the people with the resources to have their child schooled at “not-whatever the place with a bus route is”. School choice is already ridiculously competitive, but it’s not low income inner city residents that are benefiting, it’s middle class and higher citizens who either have major family support our can hire a “nanny” to effectively chauffeur the child to a school 20 miles away.

@jerv

“Well, @Jaxk, that brings up issues of taxpayer dollars funding religion”

Not to worry, the Supreme court has already ruled on that issue.
Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, 536 U.S. 639 (2002)

@Jaxk The Supreme Court has also “settled” Obamacare, yet attempts to repeal it continue. Based on that, I must disagree with you and maintain that vouchers would still clog the courts despite that ruling.

But of course you would.

@Seek Vouchers will only benefit the people with the resources to have their child schooled at “not-whatever the place with a bus route is”. School choice is already ridiculously competitive, but it’s not low income inner city residents that are benefiting, it’s middle class and higher citizens who either have major family support our can hire a “nanny” to effectively chauffeur the child to a school 20 miles away.
So, if the current situation only benefits those with the bucks, nannies, and drivers to get their little nippers to school, to do nothing, even if radical, will assure they will remain the only ones to benefit. The other people I guess are to be content to be stuck in underperforming schools or even dangerous ones, hoping to get enough education to get them a floor job at the big box, or a spot in the army.

@Jaxk Yep. But we’ve already established that I’m not nearly as trusting as you are.

Hypo: how does making more vouchers for schools 20 miles away from poor neighborhoods help poor neighborhoods?

” The other people I guess are to be content to be stuck in underperforming schools or even dangerous ones, hoping to get enough education to get them a floor job at the big box, or a spot in the army.”

Yeah, that’s not a workable solution. “Content” may mean “feasting on the entrails of one’s oppressors”, and you can only kill so many before you run out, making it truly unsustainable. The sad irony is that those who yell the loudest about the right to have 100-round drums of APDS for their assault rifles are the ones fighting so hard to SUSTAIN the oppression, but then again, judging by the statistics, many of them don’t really see much need for education at all in the first place.

I guess that we just have to admit that economic segregation is problematic.

@Seek Hypo: how does making more vouchers for schools 20 miles away from poor neighborhoods help poor neighborhoods?
One, they will have vouchers too. It means that those who are willing to make the effort to travel 20 miles away will not be going to the school in the poor neighborhood, which means that student takes his/her voucher bucks with them. So, the poor neighborhood school has to get leaner and meaner for the time being to improve so that the student losses the desire to travel 20 miles away and hang with the school that is near to them. If the school in the poor neighborhood actually gets creative and inventive and comes up with something unique, then the students from the school 20 miles away will want to come there bring their voucher bucks with them, making the poor school richer, so if they are smart, they can reinvest it into the school to make it even better. So, what have you got to improve things using the system that is not really working now. I have answers, I want to hear yours, and not just take it from the rich; where or how is it going to be used?

Hypo, you don’t have kids. Let’s talk real talk.
” willing to make the effort to travel 20 miles ” should be “able to make the effort”, and here’s why:

School starts at, say, 8:00 am. So does your job, which is a 45 minute commute away from your house during rush-hour traffic. You’re a single parent, and your mother lives three miles down the road. She’s disabled and can’t work, doesn’t have a car, but she can watch your kids for you when they get off the school bus at 2:30 pm, three blocks away (luckily, right between your two houses). You get off work at 5:30 pm.

Enter the voucher program. You have the option to send the kids to school at an A-rated school 20 miles away – the other direction from your place of business – for free. Only, there’s no bus. There’s an early-care program for kids whose parents work, but it starts at 7:30. The latest you could physically drop the kids off yourself would be, what, 6 AM? So that won’t work.

Then after school care – the kids would have to stay with someone until you could pick them up. Enter the school’s after-care program. It’s only $75 a week per child. Oh, wait, that ends at 6:00, with a $10 charge per minute the parents are late picking the child up. You can see how infeasible that would be.

***

The school in the poor neighborhood is poorly performing because it can’t afford to pay for better teachers/extracurriculars/field trips/after-school tutoring because it’s poorly performing and performance is tied to budget. The kids who could escape to better schools already have.

^ ” willing to make the effort to travel 20 miles ” should be “able to make the effort”, and here’s why:
I never said it would be a cure all for everyone. However, there is a very renowned private school here in this area, catholic ran, but that is not a problem for those who send their kids there because of the top shelf education. Those who really want their kids to go there their kids get there, be it this is high school level, but they take a bus to BART, take BART to where they get on another bus to get them to campus, and some travel nearly 20 miles if not slightly more.

The school in the poor neighborhood is poorly performing because it can’t afford to pay for better teachers/extracurriculars/field trips/after-school tutoring because it’s poorly performing and performance is tied to budget.
In this area parents and such seem to tie the money to head count and property taxes, which is why schools get very nasty if your kid is truant too often because they lose money when his/her butt is not in a class, regardless if they are learning anything. Poorer neighborhoods have lesser property taxes so any school in that district has less money. If the money was attached to the student and not the land, it would be evened out, a school in a poorer neighborhood with 560 students would take in or receive more than a school in a richer neighborhood with 475 students. The way it is now, the school with lesser students can still be receiving more money than the school with more students because of a wealthier area, which means what? They have more to spend per student than the poorer school which already had too little to spend for students. Having equal cost attached to the student and not the land would correct that, then there would be money for those extras you mentioned.

A change in how school funds are distributed by the State would, I agree, go a long way toward helping. Continuing this ridiculous voucher program will not.

Also, you have no idea how much I would love to live in an area with decent public transportation.

@Seek As one who grew up in the only city (population ~23k at the time) in the county and has spent much of their lives where public transportation literally does not exist, I get that.

@Hypocrisy_Central Try a mile long walk down a dirt road to get to the mailbox, then hitchhiking the other 19 miles because mass transit just isn’t a thing. That would be a bit closer to my experiences.

Basically, the poor in those places have a choice; either work or get their kid to school. The two are mutually exclusive. Some kids are lucky enough to have two parents, and a few of those even have one parent earn enough to live on that the other parent can actually get their kids to school, but exceptions are too common for me to consider that the norm.

Still, helping out only the urban poor is better than what we have now, so good effort.

BTW, those who put their 6-year-old kids on the city bus to get to the BART station to catch another bus… does the voucher cover the bus fare, or is that an extra burden that those who earn less than those who typically send their kids to private school must bear? I mean, a round-trip from where I live to downtown is >$7, so that’s about $150/month. Even when I was singlehandedly earning more than about half of all US households, $150/month was a pretty hefty expense.