Juan Williams

In response to the firing of Juan Williams, here are two wonderful videos of Jon Stewart:

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School Reforms

Does anyone notice a trend that when school's expect a lot from students/staff/parents, that there is always resistance? Michelle Rhee expected a lot from parents, students, unions, and teachers...and "also angered many with teacher layoffs, firings and a brusque style." She improved the student's test scores by expecting more.

Look at this trend in movies: Lean on Me, Coach Carter, Take the Lead. In all these based-upon-real-event movies, the main character expects more from the students...and parents and other teachers resists.

It seems like everyone expects the school leaders to wave a magic wand and everyone will be smarter...they just don't want to be expected to work for it.

We need more schools with backbones that say, "We are doing this in the best interest of the students. We are NOT going to back down when someone complains."

Bar Stool Economics

Bar Stool Economics
Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay $1.
The sixth would pay $3.
The seventh would pay $7.
The eighth would pay $12.
The ninth would pay $18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.

So, that's what they decided to do.

The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until on day, the owner threw them a curve. "Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20."Drinks for the ten now cost just $80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free. But what about the other six men - the paying customers? How could they divide the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his 'fair share?' They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer. So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.

And so:

The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).
The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33%savings).
The seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28%savings).
The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).
The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).
The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings.

"I only got a dollar out of the $20,"declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man," but he got $10!"

"Yeah, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man. "I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got ten times more than I!"

"That's true!!" shouted the seventh man. "Why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!"

"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison. "We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!"

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

The next night the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn't have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!

And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.

David R. Kamerschen, Ph.D.
Professor of Economics
University of Georgia

Response to Obama's Education Speech

Everyone seems to have an opinion on how to improve education.  President Obama recently put out an idea to extend the school year.   While that sounds really great, I don't think that in itself will improve education...especially since there are several additional factors in quality education.

One of my chief complaints about extending the school year is when can teachers have vacation?  Recently I posted this question on Yahoo! and people just went off on me since teachers have 10-12 weeks during the summer and other holidays scattered throughout the school year.  While people may have crazy ideas that teachers do nothing when they are not in school, my point is why can everyone else decide when they take a day off.  If a teacher gets married, they cannot have a three-day honeymoon unless it is scheduled around their work schedule.  Also, people have this crazy idea they can pull their students out of school to go on vacation; but they hold their teacher to a higher standard and even expect the teacher to adequately teach their students while they are absent.

While reading several responses on the Yahoo! thread, I also found out that many people assume that teachers work only between 9 am and 3 pm.  I have no idea where they came up with this work schedule; I believe students/teachers are normally in school an hour or two more than the assumed six hours.  Also, teachers have several other duties such as grading papers, parent conferences, lesson plans, student club activities, phone calls, normal HR tasks, paperwork, etc.  I find this idea that teachers only work while students are in the classroom as ridicules as saying that your local weatherman only works fifteen minutes because that is all you see them on television.

I also find the idea absurd that the teacher's union is the main reason for our education problems.  I believe Dave Glover's radio show best described the flaw in this.  When a caller mentioned unions, bad teachers, and an under performing school, Dave Glover wondered out loud, "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?"  He clarified by asking what would happen if you took all the teachers from the poor performing school and switched them with teachers from an excellent school system.  Would the teachers switch roles and the broken still be broken and the excelling school still excel?  I believe so since a highly supported teaching staff will actually improve itself while a broken system needs to fix the problems before just blaming the teachers.  Looking at the big picture, a students education is based on more than the teacher in the classroom; people need to look at the administration, government, and the parents.

While I am not a teacher, I also have my input on how to improve education:  Let's expect more from the students.  We currently don't want anyone to feel bad, so some schools are implementing a policy of the lowest score possible to be a 65%.  Some schools have a policy that students that get caught cheating can have an alternative assignment.  Some students assume that if they do no do the work, they can't get a zero for the assignment.  Some school districts allow students to miss weeks worth of classes and they can make up the work.  Some school districts even allow homework to be turned in during the next semester.  Some districts blame the teachers for their horrible school policies!

The most you can expect from a student is the least you expect of them.

Obstacle to Deficit Cutting: A Nation on Entitlements

Taken straight from Sara Murray's Wall Street Journal article:

Efforts to tame America's ballooning budget deficit could soon confront a daunting reality: Nearly half of all Americans live in a household in which someone receives government benefits, more than at any time in history. 

At the same time, the fraction of American households not paying federal income taxes has also grown—to an estimated 45% in 2010, from 39% five years ago, according to the Tax Policy Center, a nonpartisan research organization.

A little more than half don't earn enough to be taxed; the rest take so many credits and deductions they don't owe anything. Most still get hit with Medicare and Social Security payroll taxes, but 13% of all U.S. households pay neither federal income nor payroll taxes.

My General Thoughts About Education

In response to the Politico article "What do you think of Obama's education plan?", I wrote this:

Unfortunately, Obama's policy is the same as any other government official's policy.  We have administrative officials (whether superintendants, education commissioners, and politicians) who feel like the weight of the educational system is on their shoulders.  So, instead of relying on the teachers to do a good job, these non-teaching suits make policies and tasks that take away the teachers attention away from the classroom.  This is their way of saying they did something…whether good or bad.

For those people who say that unions are the problem, getting rid of the union will not solve any educational issues.  In fact, the only issue I see with the union is that they cannot easily remove an ineffective teacher.  To compound that problem, the schools then make policies (like TPS reports) to make up for not firing teachers.  For instance, in a local district a teacher was getting a divorce and lived in his classroom instead of finding an apartment.  Instead of firing the teacher, the district spent $$$$ to rekey all the schools.  This just an example of how schools make bad and broad policies to cover-up bad actions.

I believe the way to make education better is to ask the teachers what they need to help teach the students…I doubt many will say to spend more money.  They will mention that they want support/backing from the principals, counselors, and superintendant.  They will mention that they want parents to be more involved.  They will mention that they want to spend more time teaching and less time doing paperwork.  They will mention that they want an effective attendance policy.  Some teachers will say we need to expect more from our students.  Most teachers will even say that there needs to be a better process to remove ineffective teachers.

Personally, I don’t like the idea of basing a teacher’s salary on how well the students perform.  Some classrooms are filled with brilliant students while others are filled with special-needs students while others are filled with gang members.  This policy is similar to basing your salary on how well your neighbor’s students perform…you have some influence—but not a whole lot.

Finally, remember that the most we can get out of our students is the least we expect of them.

How much do you owe?

According to this website, the national debt is $12,691,221,577,248.59 or about $41,191.12 per person...but not everyone pays the same amount since there are several tax brackets. Here is a simple breakdown of how much each person pays in taxes based upon their income level:

	Number of Returns with Positive AGI	Income Taxes Paid ($ millions)	Group's Share of Income Taxes	Income Split Point	Average Tax Rate
All Taxpayers	141,070,971	$1,115,504	100%		12.68%
Top 1%	1,410,710	$450,926	40.42%	> $410,096	22.45%
Top 2-5%	5,642,839	$225,367	20.20%	> $160,041	20.53%
Top 6-10%	7,053,548	$118,139	10.59%	> $113,018	12.66%
Top 11-25%	21,160,646	$171,443	15.37%	> $66,532	9.43%
Top 26-50%	35,267,743	$117,368	10.52%	> $32,879	7.01%
Bottom 50%	70,535,485	$32,261	2.89%	< $32,879	2.99%

Source

Using simple mathematics, we can calculate how much each group must pay to reduce the debt to zero.  Of course, this does not include any corporate taxes…but then it doesn’t include any state or local taxes.

	Number of Returns with Positive AGI	Group's Share of Income Taxes	Owed
Top 1%	1,410,710	40.42%	$3,636,319.13
Top 2-5%	5,642,839	20.20%	$454,315.06
Top 6-10%	7,053,548	10.59%	$190,542.46
Top 11-25%	21,160,646	15.37%	92,182.48
Top 26-50%	35,267,743	10.52%	$37,856.59
Bottom 50%	70,535,486	2.89%	$5,199.88

The Federal Governments Owns or Controls How Much?

Fifty-one percent of the private economy is today owned or controlled by the federal government. Before September of 2008 and for all the previous history of this country, one hundred percent of our economy has been private as America.  But since September 2008 with the TARP bailout, that was under George W. Bush, that was $700,000,000,000; from that point forward we watched government take over one industry after another. We purchased, the government, purchased large banks, the largest insurance company in the United States, AIG, Freddie and Fannie, the secondary mortgage market, which means the United States government now owns over fifty percent of all private home mortgages. We still own Chrysler and GM the largest car companies. We own the student loan industry and now we control the health sector which is another eighteen percent of the economy. You add all that up, 51 percent of the economy is now owned or controlled by the federal government.

Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann on 97.1 FM Talk on 3/29/2010.

Reason Saves Cleveland

Reason Saves Cleveland With Drew Carey is an original Reason.tv documentary series airing the week of March 15-19, 2010.

Featuring sitcom legend, Price Is Right host, and proud Clevelander Drew Carey, each 10-minute episode investigates and analyzes the problems that turned Cleveland from the nation's sixth-largest city in 1950 into today's "Mistake By The Lake."

Like all too many American cities, Cleveland seems locked into a death spiral, shedding people, jobs, and dreams like nobody's business. When it comes to education, business climate, redevelopment, and more, Clevelanders have come to expect the worse.

Is a renaissance possible? Of course it is, but only if the city's leaders and residents are willing to learn from other cities such as Houston, Chicago, Oakland, and Indianapolis. And only if they're willing to try new approaches to old problems.

Reason.tv's Nick Gillespie narrates and talks with educators, elected officials, businesspeople, policy experts, and residents from all walks of life. Reason Saves Cleveland maps a route back to prosperity and growth not just for Cleveland but for other once-great American cities.

Reason Saves Cleveland with Drew Carey is written and produced by Paul Feine; camera and editing by Roger Richards and Alex Manning; music by the Cleveland band Cats on Holiday.

Conservatives vs Progressives

The different world views that we have between progressives and conservatives is that liberals believe that their definition of freedom is entitlements while conservatives define it by limited government.

Missouri Senator Jim Lembke on 97.1 FM Talk on 3/26/2010.