Tuesday, July 01, 2008

Education Spending

Brad Delong, in listing the "half dozen or so deeper and broader tides" of the "true history of the U.S. since 1980," includes this supposed trend:

3. The failure of American taxpayers to support their state and local governments in expanding funding for public education--and the impact of reduced public education effort in sharpening the distinction between rich and poor.
Failure to expand funding for public education?



Figures from page 15 here ("As seen in the bottom row of Table 2, real expenditures per pupil more than tripled over this period.").

4 Comments:

Blogger sean said...

Prof. DeLong is not normally much troubled by facts, especially given his ability to delete the inconvenient ones.

9:57 AM  
Blogger brad said...

Yes: This cohort of white males is the first in American history that will not have more education than their fathers did...

12:10 PM  
Blogger Richard H said...

How does per capita support of higher education track over that period? I know spending on "lower" ed has risen over the years, but I keep hearing that government support of higher ed is declining. Is this decline a fiction also?

1:14 PM  
Blogger Stuart Buck said...

Even if Brad's contention about the "cohort of white males" were true (and I have no reason to take his word for it), that's completely different from the contention that the American people since 1980 have refused to support expansions in funding for public education. That contention was just false, as stated; perhaps Brad could modify it to read, "People have only expanded school funding by 50% [or whatever] in real terms, rather than by the 70% that I think necessary," but that would have a different ring to it.

4:53 PM  

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