Our Next President?

[dcarrigg]

Re: bureaucratic overhead

Oh, interesting. I'm friends with a local teacher the next town over (far from inner-city environment), who often describes work. IIRC, she described them as basically office workers interjecting mandated busy-work into curricula rather than folks working directly with students. But this is also a high school. So maybe it's different at lower grade levels.

Still, part of me has to wonder if you couldn't reduce the non-teacher staff by 50% and increase the teacher staff by 50% and get better outcomes through smaller class sizes and whatnot. There'd be enough left over to fund a significant teacher raise too.

[jk]

Re: bureaucratic overhead

don't know what a reading interventionist does in a classy district like wilton, but i have a patient who has that kind of position in an inner city school. he earns his money pulling the most difficult kids [both behavioral and educationally] out of class and working with them in small groups. whether it's successful with the kids he works with i don't know. otoh, i would think that getting those kids out of the classroom lets the teachers run their lessons much more smoothly, for the benefit of the other kids.

[dcarrigg]

Re: bureaucratic overhead

Lol, how many man-hours do you think went into designing that budget infographic? Gotta figure at least one accountant, one graphic designer, one assistant, and a couple meetings with top officials and executive assistants.

Glanced briefly at the 2016 line. 3.5 million for administrators, 3 million for clerical workers, and another 8 million for "other" who don't fit in the teachers, aides, custodial, instructional, nurse, therapists, coaches, or substitutes lines. Another million for reading interventionists, who afaik are pretty much just there to hassle teachers and mess with their lesson plans. Another million in overtime, which teachers don't get. Another 2.5 million for contracted professional services, which I'm assuming is where the lunch ladies are. A million to transfer special education out of the district. I'd guess another 5 million in fringe to these folks.

And there you have it. Not counting any teachers, janitors, coaches, counselors, supplies, operational costs, or capital costs, you've got $25m in annual expenses. More than what all the teachers cost combined. Mostly for things like making infographics or pushing paper.

[Polish_Silver]

bureaucratic overhead

You're not wrong. . . .The people actually teaching the kids probably are adjuncts and technically "independent contrators" earning $3k per class with no benefits. But the administrators and coaches are in the meetings with the presidents when the budgets are being made, and the professors are not ....

I was recently coming through the Wilton school district budget, and it has all the traits you describe.

Salaries are about 60% of total cost, but classroom teacher salaries are less than 1/3 of the total cost.
(it seems like they should be at least 70% of total cost)

So a kindergarten class costs $600k to run (I am not making this up) and I don't think the teacher gets anywhere
near $200k/year.

I would like to see a budget from 50 years ago to compare the bites taken by the same line items.

[dcarrigg]

Re: Our Next President?

But most of the cost is born by taxpayers. I'll bet if you add that, it is not that much less expensive the private colleges.

Both health care and education in this country need a serious overhaul .


Colleges in canada are 1/4 the price of USA.

You're not wrong. It's something of a shell game. Canada is still cheaper. But even the private colleges tend to charge international students about double what they charge Canadians. With the Ivies etc. in the US they tend to redistribute so kids with poorer parents might pay nothing while others might pay a lot. Either can still be a good deal, or can be terrible. Depends on how you game it.

The thing is, it's not like Canadian universities generally pay professors a lot less up there or have much larger class sizes. It's all in ancillary stuff and administration. In the US, the assistant basketball coach of a team you've never heard might be pulling in a cool million per year, and the assistant vice deputy dean for technology transfer initiatives might be pulling in $200k. The people actually teaching the kids probably are adjuncts and technically "independent contrators" earning $3k per class with no benefits. But the administrators and coaches are in the meetings with the presidents when the budgets are being made, and the professors are not. So whatever they think's important flies. Not totally different than a corporate board meeting or a fancy DC fundraiser. Most surefire way to move up in heavily administrative systems is to get yourself in the rooms where decisions are made. Most surefire way to move down is to be excluded from them.

[Polish_Silver]

Re: Our Next President?

It's interesting, because if you spin it around a little, the influence of the private side of those things would never have been accepted in the past either. .

Right. It's the sacrifice of individual liberty to state and corporate interests.
Like the mandatory health insurance. Both the ridiculous cost
and the mandatory private sector participation are equally unacceptable to libertarians and socialists.

The fact that the country is not even discussing, let alone solving this problem , really scares me.

[Polish_Silver]

Re: Our Next President?

Well, they're from UC Berkeley, iirc. Definitely among the left-most campuses in the US. But far from among the most expensive. Tuition's like $14k per year. Average student loan debt there for graduating seniors is under $20k. In this day and age, not bad for a top-25 university.

But most of the cost is born by taxpayers. I'll bet if you add that, it is not that much less expensive the private colleges.

Both health care and education in this country need a serious overhaul .


Colleges in canada are 1/4 the price of USA.

[dcarrigg]

Re: Our Next President?

I think it all depends on how you measure it. People are allowing/wanting much more federal intervention in ways that would never have been accepted in the past, anywhere in the
left-right spectrum.

The fed involvement in financial markets, the massive "security justified" privacy invasions, mandatory subscription to private sector health insurance, wars to supposedly
protect us from terrorism.

It's interesting, because if you spin it around a little, the influence of the private side of those things would never have been accepted in the past either. The massive effects financial markets, tech company privacy invasions, health insurance companies, and maybe even terrorists (this one's more questionable) have on the lives of average people has greatly expanded as well. People are dependent on financial markets for retirement, dependent on tech companies for information & communications, dependent on health insurance for medical care, etc. As more and more mundane daily activities are converted from non-commercial to commercial interactions (what they call "the service economy"), dependence on intermediary firms that facilitate these things necessarily increases. As dependence increases, the matters necessarily become politicized. At least I think that's how it goes.

[Polish_Silver]

Re: Our Next President?

The Overton window has been shifted significantly since about 1980. An Eisenhower Republican set of policies is now considered radical leftist by many.

I think it all depends on how you measure it. People are allowing/wanting much more federal intervention in ways that would never have been accepted in the past, anywhere in the
left-right spectrum.

The fed involvement in financial markets, the massive "security justified" privacy invasions, mandatory subscription to private sector health insurance, wars to supposedly
protect us from terrorism.

[vt]

Re: Our Next President?

Study history. The baby boomers were the millennials of the 1960's.

SDS was far more radical than Antifa. the left was strong.

What happened? Nixon was elected in 1968 and 1972.

Neither the left or right will prevail. A centrist fiscal conservative, social liberal will defeat the left and right that run both parties now.

[shiny!]

Re: Our Next President?

Saez has a pretty good class on the effects of top rates. You're right that it's not as high as the top-line number suggests. But there were also many more brackets. The effects as a share of total US output are like this: Not as big as it sounds, but still meaningful. The effect of the Reagan tax code is obvious when you look at it like this:

Dang! Look at that jump after the Reagan tax cuts! Thank you, DC.

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Our Next President?

If you're not paying attention to DSA's platform and AOC, you're missing the zeitgeist. As someone of the LGBT persuasion and thus very connected to Leftist thinking and those gosh-darned "millennials", my read of the pulse is that a centrist Democrat is not electable anymore; a milquetoast democrat will just lose to Trump. A Democrat will win based on their ability synthesize enough of the DSA/AOC's Green New Deal and Stephanie Kealton explanations of "debt doesn't matter" MMT to fund it into a digestible platform that appeals to under 35's and enough red staters to flip the electoral college.

That's a pretty good observation Morgasbord. For a long time now the Democratic party has run as "Republican light".

[dcarrigg]

Re: Our Next President?

I find it laughable that the people advising and writing Warren's Wealth Tax are employees of universities that benefit from exorbitant tuitions and student loans and they are citing student loan debt relief as a reason for creating the proposal.

I wasn't born yesterday.

Well, they're from UC Berkeley, iirc. Definitely among the left-most campuses in the US. But far from among the most expensive. Tuition's like $14k per year. Average student loan debt there for graduating seniors is under $20k. In this day and age, not bad for a top-25 university.

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Our Next President?

Here's an article that's a bit hopeful for Warren and makes some interesting points.

http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/mile...next-president

Could Elizabeth Warren Be The Next President ?
first published 12/13/14
Early Friday evening Sen. Elizabeth Warren took to the Senate floor and gave a plain-spoken, barn-burning speech that could make history and put her into serious contention to be the next President of the United States.
There are only a handful of political speeches that have such historic impact....

[Slimprofits]

Re: Our Next President?

I find it laughable that the people advising and writing Warren's Wealth Tax are employees of universities that benefit from exorbitant tuitions and student loans and they are citing student loan debt relief as a reason for creating the proposal.

I wasn't born yesterday.