Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
A good example is education. Until 1880, education was not compulsory in England, and until 1891 it was not free. I'm sure, however, that today most people would consider it a fundamental duty of the government of a country to provide an educational system, and access to education to be a "right".
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One of the ways the USA differs from Europe and much of the rest of the world is that the US has an extra layer of Government. The United States of America is exactly that, and federation of Governmental entities called States, which theoretically have the sovereignty of an independent nation but who have united together for certain functions like the common defense and interstate commerce.
In reality what we have is a constant struggle between state governments and the federal government for control (power) over the population and thus the purse strings.
The layer of government that The USA shares with the rest of the world is the local government, cities, counties, parishes, etc. In most of the country, public education is relegated to local governments and paid for with local taxes. Oversight is given to state and federal bureaucrats, ostensibly to insure “equality” but that’s another issue too.
Get to the point, wodin!
The point is; Hawaii is the only state that public education is funded and managed at the state level, and it is completely out of control. The Department of Education’s budget is a very large fraction of the entire State budget, the Director of the DOE is the only department head that is able to challenge the Governor and prevail. There is an elected School Board which is largely a paper tiger with no teeth. And the quality of education in Hawaii, depending on who does the survey is typically in the lower five or ten in the nation.
Conversely, Hawaii has some of the finest private schools to be found anywhere. One of them has produced the incumbent President of the US, and another provides excellent
free primary education to native Hawaiian children.
Get to the point, wodin!
The
REAL point is, the more that Governments get involved with service, the lower the quality of that service. Do you REALLY want your health care managed by bureaucrats?