Nah, I hadn't. What brings you back to politards after your vacation?

hey goofy go troll in a different thread

You quoted me above. FWIW let me state that I think public schooling is one of the few "good" things the government could provide. I think our government does it terribly and that the best fix would be some sort of charter school/voucher for private school system.

First of all, looking to the 1800s (when there was no public schooling) and noting the lack of innovation isn't fair. This comparison is widely different because technologies were much less advanced back then. Via the internet, one person can now reach an almost unlimited number of students.

But anyway:

http://xinkaishi.typepad.com/a_new_s...eas_unlik.html

This is a private tutoring system in Korea where educational efforts put forth by parents are much greater than the U.S. The article is also available in the Financial Times but requires a free registration. It cites an individual who has made over $2million in tutoring online.

And while it doesn't fit into the "traditional" model of education there could easily be schooling that doesn't require a kid to be in the classroom until he's 17 or 18 (or whatever it is).

Re: the price issue. Saying price is oversimplifying it, which was my fault. The actual total amount of money spent in our country on educating students would likely be lower. Now these costs are currently mostly born by higher income individuals who pay a higher percentage of income tax, property tax, etc. But I'm sure that on average public schools, on average (ignoring the $40k+ Exeter type schools), spend a lot more per pupil.

I suspect that a private school would do at least as good of a job as the public schools are on less money. While tuition would be higher, you can then reduce the tax base via the amount of money put into our educational system each year. The fact that this wouldn't primarily benefit low income consumers is arguably a big problem -- which was why I said above I'd be fine w/ some sort of voucher/rebate program.

THIS x100. Then you cite countries whose GDP per capita is less than 1/10th of the U.S. as somehow evidence that countries without public education systems are abject failures. This isn't a fair comparison at all

public schools and standardized tests stifles innovation
what if you applied the same principles to food?
govt take your money create the rules for which foods are deemed "safe" and then distribute them fairly and for "free". oh wait we are already halfway there...hfcs canola oil wheat and big industry farming ftw.
or housing?houses are decidedly more expensive then education..i can find many examples of state intervention in the housing markets that resulteted in disasters but i can not find any true success stories.

the best we can hope for when govt regulate is pretty much doing as good a job as private agents but with more money.
school vouchers for the first say 5-10 years are the least evil though, they might in theory provide a more equitable society but i still don't like the idea of the state paying for the education and hence ultimately decide what should be taught and what should not be taught.

I'm not talking about relatively quality outcomes. You guys are making fairly specific falsifiable predictions about what would happen in the absence of government provided education, etc.

As support for that, you're using the now standard super-simplified microeconomic argument of competition causing innovation and lower prices and magic happy funtime and all that. Do the laws of Austrian economics not apply to Africa, South America, etc.? Because we don't see the things you claim we would see.

There isn't a vibrant market in 3rd party seal of approval companies in Congo.

P.S. I do enjoy the entire exchange here. Loosely paraphrased.

Me: "It seems like eliminating public education would be terrible. Look at the places that don't have it now."

Taso/you: "You can't look at those places, they are terrible!"

Me: [stare]

its people like op that should be banned from 2+2 or else not allowed to post until its reviewed as he is obviously an idiot

I blame his public school education fwiw.

i wouldn't suggest #2 unless we're also going to stop the drug war.

I understand your position Fly, and I do think it'd be a worthwhile question to examine. The question you are now implying (which you already have an answer to, due to the immense amount of research you've either conducted yourself or have read on the subject (I'm sure its incredibly extensive)), is:

Are the people in (the Congo) in such a poor condition as a result of not having a public school system, OR, is their not having a public school system a symptom of a different illness, of which poverty may be said to be another symptom?

i think the difference here is that we are starting with a different set of initial conditions when we talk about eliminating government here in the states. we already have a stable, well educated society; obviously this is more conducive to a libertarian "utopia" sort of thing than just saying "zomg look at the congo they don't have schools or hospitals so AC obviously doesn't work."

of course garbage in = garbage out, so yeah, clearly letting a bunch of maniacs run wild in the congo isn't going to help schools get built; but if we eliminate some forms of government here in the states i don't see how it follows that we'll all start running around with AK's murdering people for food/drugs/blood diamonds/whatever they fight over in the congo. maybe there is a transitional period in which we need government to promote the aforementioned institutions, then those institutions can hold up on their own with minimal interference. (yikes, is it just me or do i sound a little bit like marx?)

also, the internet is a pretty ridiculous game-changer imho, and we haven't even begun to see how it will change our society here in the first world, much less how it might improve impoverished nations. imagine how african countries might develop with good internet access. who needs a multi-million dollar school when you have practically all the world's knowledge at your fingertips? it seems pretty inefficient even in this country for us to go about business as usual when there are many better ways to learn.

I know, it makes no sense at all. Which was exactly the point. Because it's exactly analogous to your own post. Nobody on the market side has said that the "best" solution (for whatever arbitrary choice of "best" you make) will necessarily be the "winner" in the market.

And on top of that, the scenario you were describing wasn't even a market scenario. So it's doubly nonsensical.

Why are burger flippers making more than minimum wage?

Yes, exactly. It's the same as the standard "zomg somalia" objection where you change four xillion variables but pretend ONE is actually responsible for the differences in the results. It's the oldest, dumbest trick in the book.

Do you think the soccer moms of america would be lining up to get their kids into factory jobs if child labor laws were modified?

So the answer is that Austrian economics only works on white people?

You guys still don't get it. When your theories are contradicted by the facts at some point you may want to roll all the way back to some of those first principles. Maybe the free market won't solve every problem.

It's uncanny how similar the rhetoric here is to pure Marxists, now that you mention it. When their chosen ******ed fringe utopian philosophy was tested and failed, well, those people did it wrong. It wasn't pure enough. Conditions weren't right.

OK, so maybe it failed in 1920s Russia and 1940s China and 1960s Cuba, but now so many things have changed it'd totally work here. You just need to convince people of the merits of working together.

Oh wow, I'm shocked, Fly tried to turn this into a race issue.

Our theories aren't contradicted by the facts. Sorry Fly.

Oh yeah, I forgot to talk about my second favorite part of the ACist zeitgeist, the intense upper-middle class myopia. You can also see that in the post about education getting better for the top 80% and worse for the bottom 20%. Since your typical ACist only contact with that bottom 20% is asking them to supersize a value meal, **** them.

pvn, prior to the existence of child labor laws, it was not the children of the landed aristocracy slaving away in mills.

I don't really think any of this is true. I guess public education/health safety looks good to some people, but without competition how the hell can you make a judgement of what things would be like without it? Now at this point, everybody is so used to living in a culture where this stuff is standard that they don't even think twice about alternatives because they have never known anything else. And now, the output is just inefficient government crap, yet people walk around like there was never another way to have that service provided.

The purpose of these discussions is to show people that there is indeed another way and to get some ideas flowing about non-violent methods of production. Really, that's all AC is in favor of (imo): getting to a state where people understand that violence is not the best way to solve problems, and then from there people can think of other ideas, and those ideas can compete in the market.

I'm not sure if there's a term for what I'm describing...but somebody posted a good description one time...something like: "What would happen if you eliminated all the places of worship, holy books, and religious presence overnight? Some sort of chaos. On the other hand, if you actually discussed the issues with everybody, you could just show them where they are going wrong, and over time you'd clear them out (you can see it happening already)."

AFAIK, AC is similar to that scenario, except religion = violence. But then there's always that guy who goes, "Well people are ****ing violent, haven't you studied history?" and I never know where to go from there, besides, "Yeah bro, haven't you? Look what violence got us."

That's what the Marxists say, but they are wrong.

When you're like "without government interference X, Y, and Z will happen because that's how the market works," if I can be like "well in Somalia there's no government interference and X, Y, and Z didn't happen," you can't be like "I meant without government interference but only after the government enforces law and order and provides an educated workforce and builds a functioning infrastructure, don't be silly".

The laws of economics are universal. If the Kid-Sized version of Austrian economics is true, in the absence of a government-imposed health code we should see market-based inspection/regulation efforts along with the lower prices, higher quality, etc. We haven't. Ever.

Basically, what attracts not-very-bright people to utopian theories like ACism and Marxism is that they can never be falsified. There's always variables that explain why it didn't happen like they said.

The Republic of Congo has public education:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educati...c_of_the_Congo

Guy whose name is a line, you're still not getting it. What if ACism isn't a better way? I know it makes you feel smart to have everything figured out, plus you get the moral high ground as well, but are the things you believe true?

I mean, really? I mean, those things have been around forever and also are everywhere, so really the only way to make that judgment is to ask some people of middling intelligence on the internet. The ONLY WAY. History books? Who needs 'em?

This is my favorite part of ACism. The patronizing, self-righteous tone coupled with a jawdropping ignorance of history and social sciences.

Knowledge of history, which you have incredibly little of, is useless without an understanding how to apply the knowledge, which you don't have at all.

dude, shut the **** up. The only reason I read this part of the forum is to try and figure **** out, and I post so rarely because I have enough humility to know that I don't have it all figured out and that it will take me a long ****ing time before I could even comprehend approaching that point. I just don't see what you are proving to anybody by throwing around those cute little insults into every post you make ITT.

How about you say what you mean instead of making baseless assertions ("HISTOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRYYYYY!"), and actually show us what history you're referencing instead of accusing people of arrogance? Trust me, I'm willing to listen to anything and I will do the best I can to make sure I'm getting it right. I've taken the time to put some of my thinking out there for people to critique, and all you can do is tell me I'm an ignorant, arrogant *******. I'm willing to accept that I'm in error if somebody shows me where I'm going wrong. Taking shots at people is not what I mean.

Whichever burger flippers you are referring to, it would be for the same reasons that, say, doctors also make more than minimum wage. I.e. scarcity of that skill in a given area, too many higher-paying employment alternatives for people with that skillset, etc. Most burger flippers do make the minimum wage, obviously.