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Your kids' ability to attend public schools is not predicated on your paying your taxes. You do not have to show your paid up tax receipts to enroll. You are not charged for them to attend.
Ok here goes again. If public schools are free why does it show me the amount I pay in school taxes on my BILL? It is is free I should not be getting a tax BILL that shows me how much of that BILL goes to the schools. I should not have to pay one dime towards the schools. Correct?
I know, I might say, better than many people on this board know, that taxes paid by parents do not totally fund public education.
I missed where anyone stated that property tax dollars are fully and solely responsible for funding public education.
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Those who argue that they are "paying" for the schools because they pay taxes are incorrect.
Then who (or what) does? What word or phrase other than "paying" would you prefer be used or better describes the situation at hand? "Contributing?" or "Forced to by law donate already been taxed money to?"
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To sum up, anyone who thinks because they pay taxes that they are paying for their kids' educations, and that if they didn't pay them their kids would not get educated, is mistaken, and possibly kidding themselves.
Then where would the money come from if taxes, of any kind, did not fund and pay for and support the public education system? The tree in the backyard at the Governor's mansion?
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A child can attend school even if his/her parents pay no taxes. This happens, as some have pointed out, when a kid from a homelss shelter, which is probably tax exempt, attends school in his/her attendance area. Forget this arguing over whether a kid from a homeless shelter can attend a school not in his/her attendance area (although that would be possible in Colorado). A kid from a homelss shelter can attend a public school. A kid from a public housing project can attend a public school. A kid in married student housing at a tax-exempt university can attend a public school. A kid living in a one bedroom hovel that has a low tax bill can attend public school and get the same type of education as a kid living in a McMansion, that has a high tax bill. Kids from 10 kid families get the same kind of education as kids from only-child families, even if their parents are paying the same amount in taxes.
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Paying taxes is not a method of paying tuition. Even in my state, which is on the low end of the per-pupil expenditure, it costs almost $7K/year to educate one child (on average).
Tuition is elective. Taxes, and what you pay and where the money goes to is not elective. Just because one does not make a choice to fund public schools through their property taxes nor can one control the amount allocated to the funding of public schools does not mean that tax payers do not pay for/fund/whatever (semantics) are largely responsible for the existence of public schools therefore tax payers pay for public schools. And any education gotten from one.
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The constitution of every state guarnatees a free public education. I told you how to google this in the body of my post.
If someone is forced to pay for something, whether they use it or not, it's not free.
Your kids' ability to attend public schools is not predicated on your paying your taxes. You do not have to show your paid up tax receipts to enroll. You are not charged for them to attend.
Ok, that is fine. But those who do pay property taxes ARE being charged for it. Therefore it is being paid for/subsidized by tax payers. It comes at a cost and the cost is headed off and paid for by taxpayers with some other funding from other tax revenues collected by again, taxpayers and typically with money that has already been taxed at some other level.
I think your bottom line is that public education is free but only to those who use it and do not pay taxes in any way, shape or form?
The federal constitution left anything they did not enumerate up to the states. Every state guarantees a free public education. I am not talking about procreation; maybe you've mixed me up with someone else.
I lumped the procreation issue in with free education because of the persistent claims from many parents not being able to afford private school for their children. The fact is: procreation is not a right, and if parents are unable to afford every aspect of their child's upbringing on their own financial terms, they have no business having kids in the first place. Furthermore, they have no right to expect taxpayers to subsidize these social services.
I think the confusion with some of the other posts relates to the phrase "free education". Yes, children in every state can receive free educaton ... but it's only free to the children. It's NOT free to those of us who are forced to subsidize it out of our property tax bills. Furthermore, school funding is not only limited to local & state taxes. Federal taxes are also involved in paying for public education. How do you think the Department of Education and the NEA are able to function???
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Originally Posted by jillz
straying from the topic of public schools below.....
I know people keep saying they won't be able to keep their health insurance. I have been keeping up with the health care debate and there has been nothing shown that you WON'T be able to keep what you currently have.
While you are correct to an extent, you are wrong if you take a look at the overall picture. While the government "public" health plan says nothing about preventing you from keeping a plan that you currently have, it also doesn't say that it will protect your choice to "keep" your plan. Individuals who are not naive will understand that if the protection isn't stipulated in the bill than there is no protection at all.
Secondly, how can the private sector compete against a government plan? The answer is that it can't because the private sector doesn't have the Fed to simply print cash when it goes bankrupt. The introduction of a public plan will in turn shrink the private sector health industry as individuals who currently have a private health plan gravitate towards the public plan because they cannot afford the insurance premiums PLUS the higher taxes that they will be forced to pay in order to make the public plan plausible.
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Originally Posted by jillz If one won't be able to keep what they have AND the gov plan is INFERIOR, then I can totally see the issue. But that remains to be seen.
No it doesn't remain to be seen. It is already apparent when you compare private schools to public schools. If parents were able to "opt out" of paying the educational component of their property tax, many more middle class families would have a "choice" as to which educational system they wish their children to attend. We all know that Democratic legislation provides everything BUT "choice". The fact that the liberals in this country are stressing "choice" leads me to believe that is the very virtue that will be neglected in this so called health reform plan.
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Originally Posted by jillz If the gov plan is BETTER than what I currently have, I will gladly switch. If the gov plan isn't great and I can purchase supplemental at a reasonable rate to cover anything extra special I want, I don't see a problem with that. As *I* have been very upfront about, I want nothing for free, I just don't want to have to choose between housing or health insurance (which I would have to do if I were to pay the entire cost of my health insurance).
The problems with private health insurance have nothing to do with the lack of a public system. They have to do with doctors having to charge exorbitant amounts in order to cover their malpractice insurance and their high tuition fees. The high cost of healthcare also has to do with illegal immigration exploiting the good graces of our country which in turn drives up the cost of not only our healthcare system but our educational system as well.
Now I will not end this post with criticism without providing solutions that will directly fix the problems at hand. Although, I doubt any politician has the courage to fight for and pass the following laws I am about to propose:
1. Change the country's citizenship status from "law of the land" to "law of the blood". What does this mean? It means that individuals no longer become citizens of this great nation by simply being born on US soil but rather must be born to at least ONE US citizen in order for that child to be a US citizen.
2. Change English from a "de facto" language to the "official" language of this nation. This in turn will prevent all healthcare documents from being printed in any other language but English which will in turn lower administration fees(interpreters will still be provided for an additional fee).
3. Birth certificates and social security cards will be replaced with an Identification booklet like most other nations already have. It looks much like a passport with a picture ID, thumbprint, AND biometrics which prove without a doubt who you are. This sort of document is extremely difficult to forge.
4. An independent committee should be formed to evaluate physician success rates with patients. If it ever falls below 90% then the physician should lose his medical license. This committee will be paid for through low $30/month insurance premiums that Japanese physicians currently pay and prevents lawyers from driving up the health insurance industry's cost.
I am sure there are many other ways to improve our current healthcare system without introducing a public one. Currently, 40 million Americans are uninsured, most of which that can afford to buy into the current system but choose not to and others who are illegal immigrants who are unfortunately included in this statistic. In reality there are only 10-15 million Americans that do not have healthcare and cannot afford it. I have no clue as to why we are debating on radically changing our healthcare system for less than 5% of the population.
I lumped the procreation issue in with free education because of the persistent claims from many parents not being able to afford private school for their children. The fact is: procreation is not a right, and if parents are unable to afford every aspect of their child's upbringing on their own financial terms, they have no business having kids in the first place. Furthermore, they have no right to expect taxpayers to subsidize these social services.
I think the confusion with some of the other posts relates to the phrase "free education". Yes, children in every state can receive free educaton ... but it's only free to the children. It's NOT free to those of us who are forced to subsidize it out of our property tax bills. Furthermore, school funding is not only limited to local & state taxes. Federal taxes are also involved in paying for public education. How do you think the Department of Education and the NEA are able to function???
If you look at the link I provided about funding public K-12 education, you will see that only about 8% of the funds are provided by the feds, motly for Title I, things like that. The feds do not have a huge role in K-12 education. DOE is part of the federal govt. and the NEA is a union, supported by union dues.
If you look at the link I provided about funding public K-12 education, you will see that only about 8% of the funds are provided by the feds, motly for Title I, things like that. The feds do not have a huge role in K-12 education. DOE is part of the federal govt. and the NEA is a union, supported by union dues.
For all you conservatives who are screaming about Socialism, do your children attend public schools?
nope, never have and never will
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