I've got to admit it's strange that we're building schools in Afghanastan an Iraq, and cutting funding in our own country. This also shows that we're far from recovery. Every company, city, and state is continuing to lay people off.
The sheer blatant hypocrisy really does bother me though, either end of the political parties be it right or left the only people who just happen to get elected are those obsessed with empire building and military spending. I agree with the other posts in here, can you imagine what people and teachers could do with the education system if it actually got even a small percentage of the military funding? I'd actually be up for opting in education again if they did that but it will probably never happen. Japan are putting us all to shame by putting freaking android helpers in modern hospitals.
The thread Misthos started earlier today titled "ponzi pensions" indirectly addresses this situation as well. Many retired public school administrators draw enormous pensions and other perks which put an enormous strain on the overall budgets of any public school system. Add in all of the current highly paid administrators and other bureaucrats and you will quickly find that this fiscal black hole is easily identifiable. Of course, the media does a bang up job of only scratching the surface of this wasteful spending.
The result in many hard-hit districts: more teacher layoffs, larger class sizes, smaller paychecks, fewer electives and extracurricular activities, and decimated summer school programs. Well its about damn time ! I'm sick of paying $600 dollars a month to the teachers union just to live in my own house.
Yes, the result would be the military will have to start paying more to their soldiers, cause us peons would realize what a scam it really is, risking your life to fight for your home country; just to come back with no money, no job prospects, nothing but problems. Can't fool us if we are critical thinkers.
When talking about defense, keep in mind that about 70% to 80% of defense contracts are over budget and/or behind schedule. Also, it costs about $1million per soldier per year for Afghan. So, since most contracts awarded cost maybe 30-50% more, on a per unit deleivered basis, than the original awarded cost basis, the defense budget has to keep growing to keep these programs going. Also, with the surge in Afghan, more money is spent. If anyone did an analysis, I'm sure they would find that at least 25% of all federal contract spending was for cost overruns on a per unit basis, ie waste.
state Sen. Chris Buttars that Utah make a dent in its budget gap by eliminating the 12th grade. Big problem with this is how will the students get their free breakfast and lunch.
This is really saddening me. Laying off school employees and decreasing budget for education and health. What will come next?