Editorial - 04 Oct 09
Post Office Not the Best Example of Government Inefficiency
I agree with the Baltimore Sun's Thomas Schaller that the U.S. Post Office isn't the best example of government inefficiency, and not the best analogy for those fearing Obamacare.
While the post office has a lot of flaws, I think America's public school systems are a much better example.
In the last 25 years, the United States has doubled per-pupil spending (adjusted for inflation). The US spends far more money on primary education than most other industrialized countries. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) 2008 Education at a Glance, the United States ranks number one internationally in annual expenditure on educational institutions per student.
Yet despite this incredible influx of taxpayer dollars, on a national level SAT scores are flat or have fallen since we started the huge influx of spending decades ago, and our international scholastic standing is embarrassing if anything.
For comparison, nations such as New Zealand and Korea spent less than half of what the USA spends per child, and outperformed our students in both science and math testing. England, Finland, Spain and Ireland spent 1/3 less than us, and also outperformed us (Finland was at the very top in both science and math literacy).
And the question of U.S. private vs. public schools isn't even close. Private and charter schools continue to drastically outperform their government run counterparts. There are more studies than could be listed on the Baltimore Sun's editorial page attesting to the test performance disparity between public schools and private schools drawing from similar demographics. In every grade level, in every subject, private school students on average perform better on standardized testing than their public school counterparts.
Without question, private schools in the U.S. and government run schools in other nations drastically outperform America's public schools. We spend more, and educate less. We spend too much time on condoms and bananas, and singing praises to the new president, and not enough time on reading, math, physical fitness and science.
I believe the public school system is a harbinger of what would occur should the health care system be nationalized. We will spend too much, and we will end up with one of the worst systems in the industrialized world, with unions, lobbyists the ACLU and government bureaucrats working together to ensure that the system is as bad as it could possibly be, and that there's no way out of the debacle for generations.
Editor - bethesite.com
