Spending More to Stand Still

Republicans and Democrats have voted for more education spending for decades with very little to show for it.  In fact, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) test results from 65 developed nations by the show that American student's academic performance has remained flat for 40 years. 

Writing for Reason.com Veronique de Rugy documents that if money were the answer, American kids should be on top of the world.  Only Switzerland spends more on K-12 education, yet our kids are barely in the middle of the pack academically.   Further, in 2009 inflation adjusted dollars, spending at all levels of government has tripled from $50,000 per student to $149,000 over the last forty years with nothing to show for it.  (See chart below by Andrew Coulson, CATO Institute)

With $14 trillion of debt, and a projected $1.65 trillion deficit for the current year, it might seem obvious that Washington might be looking at solutions other than the obvious failure of more money spent to maintain the status quo that isn't working.  However, amid all the calls for belt tightening and reform, Barack Obama's most recent budget calls for an 11% increase in education spending.

We refer you as well to the many articles have appeared in A Line of Sight about real education reform without just throwing more money that a system that obviously isn't producing results, particularly by William Moloney, former Colorado Education Commissioner.