Originally Posted by Garage Dog 65 (Post 449905)

‘Invest’ in 'decent' Education ???

I don’t see how continuing to pour more and more money into the education system will in any way fix the actual problem(s). Check around and see how much of every tax dollar heads to education from your county, state and national taxes – and everyone still says our education system is terrible. I don’t see how that’s possible unless the money isn’t spent correctly – and a lot isn’t.

How has the curriculum for K-12 changed that much over the years? Science and technology yes – but the basics haven’t changed that much - Reading/Writing, Math, Chemistry, Physics, History…

And now we’re talking about how every kid has the right to a college education – read that as free by the way… Not sure who gets to pay for that.

Root Cause: These days we refuse to look at the actual causes of problems and seek to fix those because everyone is so entrenched in their ‘sides’ positions and theology and fight to maintain ‘their’ ground. There is no low hanging fruit anymore, very few easy decisions. There are big, difficult decisions that need to be made and put into effect – but the country is so divided I really don’t see much progress being made in any direction.

Originally Posted by syborg tt (Post 449911)

I have a friend that worked in the local High School as a Teacher. The school paid for his/her Masters and when he/she graduated they automatically received a $25,000.00 increase in salary. This increase put his/her salary in the 6 figure mark which really seems high for a High School teacher.

I'm not saying that he/she didn't deserve the salary but if you take a school that has over 100 teachers in it and you add up all of the big dollar salary's and the fact that we also pay for the pension & continued education.

Eventually we are all going to be broke paying property taxes and income taxes.

Originally Posted by Mkelcy (Post 449898)

I'm not sure I understand why you want to go after "entitlements" rather than, say, bullet trains or military spending.

I'm going to retire in a few years, with some savings both after tax and tax deferred. My savings are probably enough that I might be hit by your desire for a need test on benefits that I will have paid for for over 50 years. Why is that the best way to reduce the debt?

I doubt (but hope you are!) that you're earnings on savings will get you into the 1% category where I think the needs testing should be done. If you're going to make $300 or 400K in interest in retirement kudos to you. If that's the case you would be on my side of this discussion.

Moreover, I don't see anything in the Republican plans that looks like a needs test, all I see is across the board cuts. Again, why is that the best way to reduce the deficit, particularly while resisting any change to the top tax rates?

You seem to be like a lot of people and just believe what you read or hear on TV. BOTH sides are going to the extreme before they come back to some agreement somewhere closer to the middle. Don't believe the "facts" or talking points just because they're forwarded in the headlines. Its called posturing.

Tax savings for the 1% aren't going to be immediately recirculated in the economy because the 1% simply don't need that money day-to-day; tax savings for the 99%, on the other hand, are likely going to be spent and help the economy.

The 1% ARE the economy.... and what happens is that when they stop spending YOU don't have a job. They'll be fine - you will suck. "You" doesn't mean you personally but an overall you. I agree that I won't miss a beat if I'm taxed higher -- and I've personally stated that I don't mind a tax increase at all. But you aren't reading well or listening well. What has been said time and time again is that people are FINE with tax increases on the top earners - BUT!!! BIG BUTT!!! It SHOULD come with some controls or reductions in RUN AWAY SPENDING.

I agree there's a lot of government waste but most of what people are talking about here (Solyndra, Obama phones, Medicare disability payments) is down in the budgetary noise. If you want to reduce the deficit, increase taxes, reduce military spending and invest in this country (decent education, infrastructure and, yes, alternative energy), so we can increase GDP and, as a result, the taxable base.

Originally Posted by Z10ROD (Post 449762)

:willy: so ya'll don't support POTUS ?

Originally Posted by Mkelcy (Post 449898)

I agree there's a lot of government waste but most of what people are talking about here (Solyndra, Obama phones, Medicare disability payments) is down in the budgetary noise.

Originally Posted by Garage Dog 65 (Post 449943)

We spend way too much money for such a small return on investment. (If public education were run like a business - most of the leaders and staff would get canned)

How can other countries that do turn out these great engineers, doctors and scientists do it at a fraction of the cost that our system does? I doubt it's because their teachers are raking in massive salaries.

We focus on the wrong stuff. It's not that I don't believe education is one of the most important fuels for our country/economy to be competitive - it's that we jack up the dollars spent every year for education without even a reasonable increase in how the system and the student performs. Every year the politicians run on the goal of increasing education spending and seldom to never talk about devising ways to ensure the system’s performance improves and accountability for the dollars spent.

Basically the fundamental problem with government when it gets away from the 5 or 6 things they should work on (defense, borders, etc…) – and get themselves into areas like Education where they perform poorly at best.