Keith hypothesizes:
1) That education should be universal,
2) That "user pay" is not acceptable, and
3) That house tax is a surrogate for family size,
from the above viewpoints, namely, were they ever valid, and are they
still relevant now. I suspect the ensuing debate will illustrate to us
some of the challenges we are facing with any LO implementation...Keith
== end quote ==
I was very surprised to learn that property taxes do not pay for my kids'
education. In Maine it (used to) cost $6,000 for one year of school. Two
kids for me times 13 years adds up to just under $160,000 in uninflated
dollars. Even if I live in this house for 50 years, I pay less than
$100,000 in my lifetime.
So, who pays? Businesses pay through their business property taxes, even
though they have no kids. I don't object to that, since they are
beneficiaries of educated citizenry. But it raises the issue of whether
the hypothesis that 'house tax is a surrogate for family size' is still
accurate, even if it was at one time.
There may be a deeper issue here, however, in that 2) 'user pay is
unacceptable' must refer to the 'user' as the parent, since the child is
not in a position to pay. Since the parent also owns the house, it would
appear that unless I am oversimplifying, 2) and 3) are in conflict with
each other.
--Rol Fessenden LL Bean, Inc. 76234.3636@compuserve.com
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>