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David makes some excellent points.<br>
<br>
I perceive the neoliberal landscape as a rigged market not a free
market, though.<br>
I agree that the Owners should not be free to abuse the people, and the
<br>
people ought to rise up. Unfortunately the people are still much too<br>
comfortable to lay down the 'mot俄 control.<br>
<br>
Teachers want a portion of the credit when things are going well. <br>
They might as well have their fair share <br>
of the calumny when the economy is maelstroming in the ma tong.<br>
<br>
The education system seems to be rigged toward dumbing down the pupil, <br>
rendering him incapable of critical thinking, and rewarding conformity.<br>
<br>
The failure of sociology classes to offer the intellectual equivalent<br>
of improvised explosive devices and the failure of the churches to <br>
truly rip the veil and enlighten seems to be a worthy target.<br>
<br>
I like the scene from Tommy where they get fed up with pinball and <br>
tear off the blinders, the earplugs, and pull out the cork. Some<br>
need to pull the cob as well.<br>
<br>
<br>
On 2011-4-18 3:24, David Green wrote:
<blockquote cite="mid:344817.69795.qm@web65405.mail.ac4.yahoo.com"
type="cite">
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<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal"><strong>Misguided
critics of public schools ignore fundamental economic realities</strong></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">David Green</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">It is conventional
wisdom that good schools are essential to a healthy economy. It’s true
that schools are responsible for the basic literacy, skills, and
educability of those entering the workforce. But it does not follow
that schools are in any significant way to blame for the dismal
economic outlook for most Americans. </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">Misguided
perspectives on the relationship between economy and education lead
critics to focus on daily activities and outcomes of teachers, parents,
and students. These critics avoid the fundamental nature of growing
economic inequality and its evolution over the past 35 years. This
inequality has absolutely nothing to do with the incremental successes
and failures of teachers and students, individually or collectively.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">The Pew Charitable
Trusts’ “Economic Mobility Project,” available online, clarifies the
evolving historical relationship between productivity and wages. Since
1945, the American worker has increased productivity by at least 2% per
year, relatively consistently throughout. This means that
efficiency—output per person-hour in the production and provision of
goods and services—has approximately doubled twice (quadrupled) during
this 65-year period, both before and after the advent of computers and
a high-tech-based economy.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">This historical
and structural increase in productivity—and hence both national and per
capita wealth—has depended on innovation, skill, and effort by
scientists, technicians, managers, business owners, and workers, both
in manufacturing and service sectors, public and private. About no
sector of the workforce can it be fairly said that its employees, from
“top” to “bottom,” have not significantly contributed to these
increases by both the quality of their minds and the sweat of their
brows. </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">From 1945 to the
mid-1970s, the median real wage for the American worker increased
commensurate with productivity—that is, doubling during that period.
Between 1974 and 2004, while productivity increased by 80%, the median
wage increased by 20%. From 2000 to 2005, productivity increased by
15%, while the median wage fell 2%; obviously that trend continues to
this day. This trend has been completely determined by national
politics and policies, and by neoliberal "free market" economic
ideology--not at all by schools.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">Almost all of the
increases in wealth that are generated by the labor of all workers have
accrued to the benefit of the upper 20% of the population. Again, none
of this, in any critic’s wildest imagination, can be attributed to the
failures of schools to educate our children, whatever the debatable
extent of such alleged failures.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">This
well-documented appropriation of wealth has little fundamentally to do
with computer technology per se, but with policies promoted by elites
during the transition from a manufacturing to a service economy. These
policies determined that private-sector unions would be effectively
destroyed, and that non-professional workers would be placed into
competition with low-wage foreign (and immigrant) workers. These
efforts, most identified with the Reagan era but supported by all
administrations since Carter, were well under way before the digital
transformation, although they have subsequently been abetted by this
phenomenon, as well as by the depredations of financial and bubble
capitalism.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">While American
workers have adapted to technological change, their organizational and
political capacities to materially benefit from their labor have not
adapted to the onslaught of neoliberal, “free market” ideology and
practice among those who rule our country, especially those in the
financial and speculative sectors. This leaves workers vulnerable not
only to the chronic appropriation of their wealth, but to the acute
misery caused by speculative bubbles generated by financiers that
result in the massive disappearance of housing wealth, increased
unemployment, Wall Street bailouts and profits, huge federal deficits,
and attacks on public employees and on the social safety net.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;" class="MsoNormal">Again, it is
misguided for public school critics, including educators themselves, to
focus on the “accountability” of teachers and the “personal
responsibility” of students. Many parents and children are acutely
aware of the dire nature of their economic circumstances and future
prospects—whatever their educational efforts and achievements—in an
economy with high unemployment and the most extreme inequality among
the developed nations. In relation to the poorest among us, such
criticism is accurately described as "blaming the victim." Such
criticism, whether from educators, university administrators, or
pontificating pundits, is ignorant and reprehensible.</p>
<br>
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<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><font
face="Tahoma" size="2">
<hr size="1"><b><span style="font-weight: bold;">From:</span></b> C.
G. Estabrook <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:galliher@illinois.edu"><galliher@illinois.edu></a><br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">To:</span></b> Peace-discuss
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:peace-discuss@anti-war.net"><peace-discuss@anti-war.net></a><br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sent:</span></b> Sun, April 17,
2011 2:00:02 PM<br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Subject:</span></b>
[Peace-discuss] DG in the NG<br>
</font><br>
AWAREist David Green has an excellent piece in the News-Gazette today.<br>
<br>
Unfortunately it's not online, as the N-G tries to recapture pre-modern
journalism...<br>
<br>
But our moles at the NG have cleverly managed to get David's piece into
the space normally reserved for the bloviations of the publisher - and
it's paired with an excellent editorial cartoon. Don't miss them.<br>
<br>
(David: post it to this list.)<br>
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