The furloughs haven’t much phased in yet, and the economy doesn’t show obvious signs of sequester drag yet. It’s early, however, and anecdotal signs of trouble (brown shoots?) are showing up, like this one from an Indiana paper (h/t: SP).
At least two Indiana Head Start programs have resorted to a random drawing to determine which three-dozen preschool students will be removed from the education program for low-income families, a move officials said was necessary to limit the impact of mandatory across-the-board federal spending cuts.
Got that? A lottery to see who gets kicked out of preschool? That’s how we’re building the future? Really? That’s a better way forward than closing the carried interest loophole or lowering the housing subsidy to the most affluent homebuyers?
Columbus resident Alice Miller told WTHR-TV that her 4-year-old son, Sage, was one of the children cut from the program. She spoke about how the program has helped her son advance academically and socially…“He loves school,” Miller said. “I don’t know how I’m going to tell him he’s not going back.”
If that doesn’t break your heart, you might want to get to the emergency room to see if it’s still there.
Indiana with it’s Republican super majority is on track to becoming the first state to eliminate public education. They are expanding the voucher program and removing ever larger sums from the public schools. It is great conservative field experiment in the free market, will the magic of the market place create good schools for all income brackets or will it, as some might predict just make good schools for the upper incomes and lousy schools for everyone else?
Fortunately my daughter is older so I can watch this experiment unfold with a more detached view.
Compare them to Illinois or California. Democratic controlled states. Let’s see who does better in public education. Seen the news out of Chicago lately?
Programs for the “poor” will always face the hatchet of government shrinkers, who believe that these benefits are not absolutely needed by the poor, and only should be available to the “better class folks”, who can afford them.
History best illustrates this in medieval society run by the Second Estate (nobles and lords), who had the power and land, the Third Estate of public officials and tradesmen, and the peasants on the bottom. As long as the suffering was on the bottom, nobody else seemed to complain, including the First Estate (clergy).
Just as today, public services available to all were rarely curtailed, but anything designated for the poor was invariably the first economy suggested.
Same phenomenon as Charter schools. States have limits on charters. This results in lotteries to see which children get in. Here the issue isn’t federal funding. Seems like a great way to improve education without spending more.