Stephen
Kershnar
Education Spending and the
Middle-Class-Parent Test
Dunkirk-Fredonia Observer
Dunkirk-Fredonia Observer
January
23, 2017
New Yorkers who just paid their
taxes have got to be wondering why they let their schools spend beyond any
sense of decency.
Consider the spending orgy. Emma
Brown writing in The Washington Post
report that in 2013, the U.S. states’ education spending averaged $10,700. This
is generous. In contrast, New York spends $19,800, $9,000 more per student than
average. This is outrageous.
To
see this another way, consider that in 2013, New York school districts spent
$59 billion on the public elementary-secondary school system. Only California
spent more ($66 billion) and it has nearly twice as many people. All this
spending accomplishes little. Nationally,
the Education Week Resource Center found that New York’s schools are at best average
when compared by math and reading proficiency in the 4th and 8th
grades.
Even
in this big spending state, Dunkirk and Fredonia hold their own. A 2016
Education Week Research Center analysis of federal data found that per student
Dunkirk spends a piggish $25,200 per student. Fredonia is less piggish, but
still plenty piggy, at $21,500 per student.
Someone
has to pay for all this spending, which unsurprisingly leads to a weighty tax
burden. The U.S. Census Bureau (again using 2013 numbers) found New York to be
among the select few states that spend more than $55 on schools per $1,000 in
personal income.
New Yorkers’ generosity can be seen
in that fellow citizens in effect give the average family with two children
$40,000 a year. This gift is rarely accompanied by gratitude. When was the last
time you heard a mother of three children thank her fellow citizens for the
nearly $60,000 in benefits her family was given? You are more likely to hear
her complain about some benefit she thinks her children are entitled to, but
didn’t receive. When the complaint comes from an unwed mother without real
income, this is a bit much.
Here is a rule of thumb for when
school spending is an unjust burden on taxpayers. If most middle class parents
would not spend their own money for a school with all the bells and whistles, it
is wrong to force others to do so. On this test, if most middle class parents
would not pay an extra $9,000 a year for a school that has gym, shop, art,
music, drama, etc., then taxpayers shouldn’t be made to do so. The same is true
for afterschool drama, music, and sports programs or for the army of extra administrators
as well as the nurses, guidance counselors, psychologists, and so on that drive
up school costs. The underlying idea here is that if the person who most loves
a child and stands to benefit from her success does not think a school with all
the fixings is worth the money, neither should taxpayers.
Even if the amount of money spent on
schools were reasonable, it is worth considering whether more of the spending
should focus on core subjects, specifically, English, history, math, and science.
It is an interesting question whether the array of programs and employees
lessen the focus on the most important subjects.
A
common objection to the above line of criticism is that regardless of whether
they have cheap parents, the discretionary programs benefit children. Because
children should be our priority, the spending is worthwhile.
One
problem with this objection is that it is unclear whether these programs would disappear
if they weren’t in the public schools. Many children do not receive free or
subsidized food and yet eat well. Similarly, many sports and arts programs
would exist in the private sector were they not paid for by taxpayers. Travel
teams in soccer, hockey, and wrestling and private dance studios are often very
well coached and run, and are at least as good as their public school counterparts.
If the concern is for the poor, then they could be subsidized directly in the
way that Medicaid, food stamps, and free school lunches do so. Surely, this is
more efficient than making taxpayers pay for recreational activities of
doctors’ and lawyers’ kids.
A second problem with this objection
is that not every benefit is worth the cost and it is far from clear that outside
of the core curriculum, government-school programs in states like New York and
California are worth the cost. Were the money spent on such programs returned
to taxpayers or, perhaps, spent by the government elsewhere, it would do quite
a lot of good. Whether it would do more good than the current spending on discretionary
programs in government schools is an empirical question and not that one can be
answered merely by citing a benefit to students.
The real problem with the spending
level, though, isn’t whether it is displacing private programs or making the
world a better place, it’s the sheer weight of school taxes. Were New York to
have excellent schools, rather than mediocre ones, taxes would still be too
damn high. People have their own projects in life. They want to have children,
buy houses, invest in their own businesses, give to charities, or work fewer
hours. Forcing them every year to hand over thousands of hard earned dollars for
other people’s children is unreasonable, especially when the money is spent guidance
counselors, golf coaches, school psychologists, additional administrators, and
so on. Many people would rather spend their money on themselves and there’s
nothing wrong with that.
For
some people, their property tax burden costs as much as their mortgage. For
some retirees, taxes painfully cut into their income. For all but the wealthy,
property taxes in New York are obnoxious. The fact that parents of school age
children seem to ungrateful for how hard their neighbors had to work to pay for
their children to go to a school with all the bells and whistles just pours
salt into the wound.
New
York needs to reduce school spending to a decent level.
