School funding
- Thread starter NickleDimer
- Start date
It has nothing to do with how he'll govern? Isn't that what we are talking about?
Obviously he WAS a "red blooded capitalist" when he owned his kitchen cabinet company, but you tell me how he should be described then. The list of new goods and services that he wants to be subject to sales tax is comical. Everything from cable TV to diapers to nursing home care to legal services to non-prescription drugs to college meal plans.
AND he wants to increase the state income tax, AND he wants to increase the sales tax, AND he wants to tax the shit out of Marcellus Shale.
All in the name of hundreds of millions of dollars in additional education funding, which in no way guarantees improved academic performance.
Yeah, he's a real capitalist. And you're calling me a dolt?
Here is the list, in case you are wondering:
Some of my favorites include but are not limited to "horses" and "flags."
Source: http://www.wtae.com/news/items-services-newly-taxable-under-wolfs-sales-tax-proposal/31593790
GENERAL/PERSONAL ITEMS
Some of my favorites include but are not limited to "horses" and "flags."
Source: http://www.wtae.com/news/items-services-newly-taxable-under-wolfs-sales-tax-proposal/31593790
GENERAL/PERSONAL ITEMS
- Candy and gum
- Personal hygiene products
- Newspapers
- Magazines
- Non-prescription drugs
- Caskets and burial vaults
- Flags
- Textbooks
- Catalog and direct mail advertising
- Airline catering
- Commission
- Horses
- Construction of memorials
- Uniform commercial code filing fees
- Investment metal bullion and investment coins
- Cable television
- Transportation
- Motion picture and video industries
- Other financial investment activities
- Real estate agent and broker services
- Legal services
- Specialized design services
- Scientific research and development services
- Advertising services
- Other professional services
- Employment services
- Business support services
- Travel arrangement services
- Other support services
- Waste collection
- High education
- Home health care services
- Other ambulatory health care services
- Nursing and residential care facilities
- Social assistance (including child day care)
- Performing arts
- Spectator sports
- Museums, Historical Sites and similar institutions
- Amusement and recreation industries
- Recreational vehicle parks and recreational camps
- Personal care services
- Death care services
- Dry cleaning and laundry services
- Other personal services
This is the correct answer, and it wasn't squarely addressed, so I'm quoting it again. More money for the poor schools, at least on an anecdotal level, doesn't seem to make a difference. We (NJ) have been spending TONS more money on our crappy schools than our good schools for quite some time now. And they are still crappy. They are just crappy schools where kids get graphing calculators for free, whereas in the good school districts people's parents buy them graphic calculators. But a bad school where every kid gets a free calculator is still a bad school. It's been pretty well studied that the education gap comes from things that happen outside school, like parental involvement and summer enrichment programs, and simply throwing money at bad schools doesn't magically make them better.
I see two "problems" it is addressing
1. Retirees HATE spending money on schools, and they generally consume less products anyway - so this shifts school taxes from home owners to consumers. I have 3 kids and live next door to a 75 year old widow. Our houses are probably valued at about the same price, so she pays as much for my kids to go to school as I do. If we shifted to a sales tax basis, she consumes far less than my family does on annual basis, and so the cost of school shifts more to me than she.
2. Individual towns can raise RE taxes to increase funding to schools, this shifts "control" to the state and puts a more natural cap on annual tax increases - again attractive to retirees who do not want to see their RE taxes increase at an increasing rate. If you're 75 on a fixed income with a desire to remain in your home - you no longer need to worry about the increase in value of your house and it costing you an increasing amount of your income.
(On a side note, Massachusetts has a law that limits annual RE tax increases by the town to something like 2.5%. Towns have to actually vote to override that, and can only do so under a limited basis)
What would be considered "taxing the shit" out of natural gas? Any tax above zero, like every other state (liberal big business wet blanket NY is excluded, of course)?
Gr8 question. It was a very flimsy article by the inky. I guess you can't do actual reporting anymore when most of your remaining staff is busy producing click bait (Buzz Bissinger says Chip Kelly is Tired oF Philly!!).
Sales tax on candy AND gum??
Wolf is like Stalin, Lenin and Trotsky rolled into one!
Spoiler alert: The good schools will still be good and the shitty schools will still be shitty. Chester Upland School District is in the top five in spending per student and it's ranked in the bottom five districts. Only ~50% of students graduate high school.
I know!! Especially since you ignored the other 87 goods and services that he wants to tax!!
But I forgot, he's a "red-blooded capitalist!!"
I love the idea of taxing nursing home care and college meal plans. As if paying for college and long-term care isn't expensive enough! Thanks Wolfie!
The majority of schools that fail do so because the kids going to these schools are getting very little at home and their communities are failing. That's where it begins.
it doesn't make sense because the primary reason that students don't learn is because they don't apply themselves and they have no parent engagement in the process. funding is not the issue - placing proper value in education is the issue.
from my perspective govt. should be as local as possible whenever possible - so the people can be most involved and aware of the decisions that impact them the most. govt by and for the people.
everybody knows that the real decisions in life are made by those that control the money - controlling the "spending decisions" and not really the actual budget takes some control out of your hands.
burrsie - that is what we should be addressing in a more positive fashion - helping out those communities.
the money is determined by a formula, the budget is still decided by the local school board. This has no impact on the ability of the local school board to spend the money. They are looking at the formula to collect. It has zero impact on the school board's ability to allocate resources. I see no change in this regard. I'm sure there is also language that ensures no one actually loses funding. Again, this is about who pays what, not how it's spend. There seems to be confusion here. This has nothing to do with local decision making. ND tried to make a point in his initial post and had it wrong. This isn't redistribution and they aren't taking any power away from local decision makers. See TD's post above on how you can collect funding for schools. This is simply to move away from just home owners and spread the increase funding coming into the system.
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once you start having money collected at the state level instead of the local level you begin to climb the slippery slope of wasting still more of your tax dollars. Adding a level of bureaucracy makes things less efficient/ wastes money. It also opens up to the eventual abuse at the state level - law makers grabbing the cash for other purposes - redirecting it to their own districts/special interests.
No thanks - it is fine the way it is.
Why does anyone in their right mind want to lose more control of their tax dollars?
When it was time for a new high school in our district it went up for a vote - the people were in favor of raising the local taxes to build a new school - that is how things are supposed to work. if you are concerned that having too many retirees will lead to a No vote - then you hold the vote over the winter when they are on vacation in Florida.
PS: This is the same reasoning for why we don't need a Dept of Education at the federal level - they add NO VALUE to the process of educating people in this country.
As I understand in this case, they have need more money. So the answer is to soak the homeowners or spread it around. The problem stems from the fact the Gov is saying they need more money and somehow that solves anything within the education system. Regardless, the taxes I'm sure are not collected locally. They are still collected by the state. It's not as if every local podunk township has a guy who sits there in accounts receivables doing the property taxes. The state collects and sends the money back out. Nothing is changing in this regard. I'm all for local control etc..but I would bet this is a talking point based in no actual reality to how this process functions. Wo actually collects the taxes is meaningless. Whether it's a guy in Harrisburg or a guy in your Podunk town is not relevant. The property taxes are still going towards the schools period. This is about getting more money to feed the beast. They are not going to take the property tax dollars and allocate those somewhere else. They are still using those funds, but simply looking to get more. The element of local control is how the decisions are made to raise the funds. Those will still be local decisions. You guys are getting hung up on the actual collection, which again I'm sure is done by one person at the state level and then sent out to localities. If not, that's very inefficient and how it should be done. Every level lower of politics is ripe for more corruption. This is trying to get more funding not maintaining status quo. The resident's are not facing an option where the state is saying do you want more funding. There isn't a ballot initiative to build a school in your town. This is entirely different. The Gov is saying, the STATE is taking more funding for education, how do you want to pay for it. Key point that's being missed. This isn't about building a new school in your town. This is about pumping up state coffers for education. So the answer could be for the GoPers in the state to simply tell the Gov to pound sand and vote against his budget. However, I'm not sure of all the specifics in this case or what powers the Gov is PA has if that happens. My guess is school districts are all receiving some form of state aid in additional to property tax dollars and that's what they are fighting over. What is that "other" and who pays for it.
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It's almost like they're coming off 4 years of a republican governor that slashed state education funding....
So that's your way of ackowledgING school funding isn't some local issue decided by tj e community. I rest my case
I don't allow my mortgage company to pay real estate taxes, I send a check in every quarter for these taxes. I did this when I was a resident of PA (Lower Merion) and now as a home owner in Massachusetts. In each case, I mail / mailed my taxes to the local town hall. It does not flow to the state.
It's a blend. Local taxes are capped unless they pass a public vote. The state portion is a mystery, subject to the whims of lawmakers.
If by "slashed", you mean "not adding the one time federal stimulus funds to the state budget permanently", then you're correct.
Puh-leeze. How dare you not swallow whole the Wolf campaign propaganda sponsored by the teacher's union? You're going to have an angry mob of part time working liberal artists at your throat if you keep up that line of thought. "we work nearly 185 days a year!!"
However, classroom spending (ie all non-pension fund contribution expenses) are still below the pre-stimulus levels.
I wonder if once you reach a certain level of funding per student, you start seeing diminishing returns.
Not sure. I'd imagine that there's a base level of teacher comp and classroom support below which you can't attract competent staff.
If only whitecat could show up and answer all these questions.
If only whitecat could show up and answer all these questions.
Despite what's been said, more incoming money does not equal a better school. If they come from bad circumstances and/or a family that doesn't value education, there is a very small chance that they will take school seriously. You could give the Chester district a blank check, it wouldn't matter.
Chester is the exception to the rule. In general, more spending = better students. Because higher income districts generally spend more. And income is the biggest predictor of student performance.
Is this true? What's your source?
I understand that money can't fix the problems in blighted neighborhoods but I find that statistic surprising. Where does it go?
The Commonwealth Foundation.
For the record, that was for 2012-2013, the latest info I could find.
For the record, that was for 2012-2013, the latest info I could find.
Household wages are down since Obama took over so it appears education funding in PA is on a similar path.