Does the USA need a perestroika?

[Kasz216]

highwaystar101 said:

mrstickball said:

highwaystar101 said:

HappySqurriel said:

Although the United States really needs major reductions in government spending (after all the municipal, state and the federal governments are all spending far more than they take in with little benefit for their citizens) I'm not so sure I would follow the example of the USSR ...

I know I'm going way off topic from the thread here, but this is my 2¢.

As an outside observer the main problem I can see with the United states government spending is not that it is too high, but that it is far too inefficiently spent.

For example. It seems as though regardless of how much money they plow into the school system, the results don't seem to reflect the investment. This graph shows that in 2003/04 the graduation rates were not consistent with the expenditure per students. It appears as though if this is the problem, then the question shouldn't be about how much is spent, but rather how efficiently and effectively it can be spent (With an eventual aim of controlling and limiting what is spent).

 

Welcome to America, Highway. I am glad you see this.

Even on a state level, it's very telling. Expenditures don't match results for students. Some states spend 30-40% less on education per student and provide the same results as a state that spends 20-30% over.

And here are graduation rates:

Notice there's no correlation between graduation rates and funding? Some areas spent much, get little (NY), some spend little and get much (UT) and some are in between.

I agree, that's exactly what I think. A sure sign of inefficient government spending is a lack of a correlation of results with regards to investment. Be it Education, Healthcare, Libraries, anything really.

I mean if I take your example of the lack of correlation between states, there are some cases which defy logic. Looking at Utah, it has the lowest funding per child of any education district, and yet it achieves one of the highest rates of graduation. But conversely New York has the highest funding per child of any education district, but achieves low graduation rates.

What does that tell a lamen like me?

It tells me that the Utah board of education are working in a far more efficient and effective manner, where as New York just seem to be bleeding money and achieving very little.

I can't pick out any specific factors that are causing this, but I can imagine that it is down to good management, healthy internal politics, consistent generation of good ideas and a few other factors. In a perfect world New York would be looking at what Utah is doing to make it's education system work so effectively and look at how some of Utah's ideas can be adapted to benefit their own education system.

 

Also. Am I right in thinking that the USA has a general nationwide curriculum and states have similar education goals?

There is some corerlation here... just not what you'd expect.

 

Note how almost all the really awesome states are in the Northern Midwest.

In otherwords... far away from Mexico and New York.  Lots of people immigrate from Mexico often illegally.  Lots of people immigrate to New York.

Families of immigrants tend to not perform well... they try stuff like teaching classes in spansih.  Doesn't seem to help...and only worsens the budget problems leaving states like Califonia in horrible disrepair.  That's what happens though when you have dozens of kids who should be in the 8th grade by age but are in the 4th grade in ability... really there should be less focus on age and more on ability.

Though those states do have their efficency problems as well... and there is a tendency to only "throw money" at the problem.

This money is usually spent getting teachers or on the teachers union so they can get "good" teachers to come to poorer neighberhoods... when the reality is you need to spend more on having more buildings, seats and other stuff... and not just spending a lot on teachers.