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1985 vs 2015

Was America better off in 1985, or are we better off today in 2015?

  • 1985 was better overall

    Votes: 25 50.0%

  • 2015 is better overall

    Votes: 25 50.0%
  • Total voters
    50
I would also point out that its not like terrorism was not a huge problem worldwide in 1985 either:

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But the world in general is a much safer place today than in 1985:

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Unitedwestand13 said:
And if that place happened to be the heights of success would that be a problem.
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What I'm saying is there is a great deal more to this than schooling equals success. You're simply not going to change the situation all that much by making all kids go and learn the same things. Life just isn't that simple.
 
Peter Grimm said:
School isn't for everyone. Some people are more suited for physical labor, rather than thinking-type jobs. Somebody has to work at McDonalds. These are your people.
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I don't disagree we need other options available for people. Trade schools where kids learn a trade or skill use to be a viable option. We seem to offer less of that now and try to prepackaged everyone into this college track which is unrealistic.
 
imagep said:
I'm not a liberal, so don't accuse me of murdering you, although I suspect a few might like to.

No, productivity isn't bad, but under our current system, increasing productivity does little to increase the compensation of those who are below the 90th or 95th income percentile or so. It's been like this since the mid 1970s or so. Certainly reducing the number of jobs won't help this situation any, without something else changing in our economy.
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Which is a great argument for why throwing money at the lower/mid tier students is a waste, and why that money should be allocated to the best and brightest.... the ones who will go on to create new things, start their own businesses, come up with scientific advances, and generally grow the economy.
 
Peter Grimm said:
You can feel sorry for the thugs of society all you want, but the fact is that they are where they are because of the choices they made. Jail is exactly where criminals belong.

Now I do agree with you about one thing.... these people do hold the rest of society back when they are in jail. Which is why I am in favor of expanding the prison labor program.

Folks who didn't graduate high school, who chose a life of crime.... they may not be suited to school, but at least they can be useful picking up trash along the highway or making license plates, so forth.

Besides, the inexpensive labor is good for the economy.
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I am in favor of somthing else.

My ideal is to have a college proffessor give these kids an education and basically do it for free.
 
Peter Grimm said:
Are we followers or are we leaders?
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I'd prefer that they experiment somewhere else first, before we take the chance of destroying the good things that we have. But I would be all for some state, other than mine, eliminating public schools and passing out vouchers. It would be an interesting experiment.

We could look back to the history of public education in the US though. I literally know almost nothing about it, but it seems to me the reason that states started having public education, is because the private sector wasn't getting the job done. If the private sector was providing adequate education, then there would have been no reason for the states to start public schools.

It's the same with roads and infrastructure (I actually consider education as part of infrastructure). Libertarians like to argue that our roads would be better if they were privatized, but the reality is that if private companies had created an adequate road system, we would have never bothered to create public roads.
 
imagep said:
I'd prefer that they experiment somewhere else first, before we take the chance of destroying the good things that we have. But I would be all for some state, other than mine, eliminating public schools and passing out vouchers. It would be an interesting experiment.

We could look back to the history of public education in the US though. I literally know almost nothing about it, but it seems to me the reason that states started having public education, is because the private sector wasn't getting the job done. If the private sector was providing adequate education, then there would have been no reason for the states to start public schools.

It's the same with roads and infrastructure (I actually consider education as part of infrastructure). Libertarians like to argue that our roads would be better if they were privatized, but the reality is that if private companies had created an adequate road system, we would have never bothered to create public roads.
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Woah.... who said anything about vouchers? School is a privilege, you pay for it.
 
Peter Grimm said:
Right, and what I'm saying is that PLENTY of opportunity already exists for disadvantaged youths. You ever hear the saying "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink?"

That rings true here.

The opportunities exist. Some kids just choose not to take advantage of them. They choose not to graduate from high school. They choose to sell drugs or rob a liquor store. They end up in jail because of their choices.... not because of anything society has done.

I'm not interested in holding back the kids that actually WANT to study and WANT to work hard so that we can cater to these kids who don't have that ambition.

It's not fair to them.
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In all honesty, if those kids are dropping out, or if they are skipping classes, it's not holding anyone else back.
 
Culturally, yes. Geo-politically... I don't know. Economically, no. People in 1985 were much more optimistic, because they were busy destroying the future for the people of 2015. Hence why our economics currently suck. Americans are, on the whole, better people now. Our country is, however, more overtly ruled by the super rich, who used the economics and politics of the 1980s to consolidate their power and have been doing so ever since.

So, thanks a lot, people of 1985, for creating all the problems that the people of 2015 will have to spend their lives solving.
 
Unitedwestand13 said:
That is the thing these kids need to be taught. They teed to be taught how important it is to actually learn, and some of us have to make every effort to teach them.
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Ultimately, that has to come from them.
 
Unitedwestand13 said:
That is the thing these kids need to be taught. They teed to be taught how important it is to actually learn, and some of us have to make every effort to teach them.
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Well I admire your efforts. Your heart is in the right place, even though I think you're running a fool's errand because I don't think a lot of these kids are teachable.

I'm all for you doing what you want as a volunteer to educate these kids on the value of an education. I'm NOT for any additional tax dollars being spent or funneled in to these schools, however.
 
Peter Grimm said:
If my smart kid is in a class with your stupid kid, and the teacher has to slow down the curriculum to cater to your dumb kid, then your kid is dragging mine down.

That's kinda what's going on, on a much grander scale.
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When my kid was in public school, they had different class levels. So the "cookie bakers", as my son called them (because that's all they did), were not in the same class with average kids or bright kids. And in any community there will always be a few brilliant kids who maybe should be at a special school, or home schooled. Nothing about having public schools prevents that. In my county, we have lots of public schools, and quite a few private school - take your pick.
 
US Conservative said:
No, I mean school choice. Why would you deny people such an important choice? I thought liberals were for liberty?
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I'm all for school choice, but not so much for that choice being made by affordability.

In my state, we pretty much have school choice. You can chose for your children to go to the public school assigned to them, or you can chose for them to attend any other public school, as long as you fill out a waver form and provide transportation, or you can chose for your kids to go to private school.

A friend of mine has three kids, one was apparently "too smart" for the public school and went to a private school, the other two went to private schools. The oldest, one of the two who attended public school, got a full ride scholarship to a prestigious private college, I never kept up with the other two kids.
 
Peter Grimm said:
School isn't for everyone. Some people are more suited for physical labor, rather than thinking-type jobs. Somebody has to work at McDonalds. These are your people.
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I really don't know why you feel like you have a need to insult others.

Anyhow, I would like to think that even people who work at McDonalds can read and do a little math.

Heck, after graduating college, my first job was as a manager trainee for McDonalds.
 
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imagep said:
I really don't know why you feel like you have a need to insult others.

Anyhow, I would like to think that even people who work at McDonalds can read and do a little math.
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It wasn't my intention to insult anyone. Our economy needs people to work service jobs such as at McDonalds. Those aren't gonna be your Harvard grads - would be a bad allocation talent.

Just like on a football team, you're gonna have your superstars, and you're gonna have your backups. Not an insult to say that someone needs to shovel the coal.
 
US Conservative said:
Sounds like distorted propaganda from someone with a dog in the fight.
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The propaganda being passed around is that people have freedom to choose without exposing the fact many of these schools either get to freely chose who will come through their doors or the schools that drop students that don't meet the bar. That is called school's choosing and that also further creates social stratification.
 
imagep said:
When my kid was in public school, they had different class levels. So the "cookie bakers", as my son called them (because that's all they did), were not in the same class with average kids or bright kids. And in any community there will always be a few brilliant kids who maybe should be at a special school, or home schooled. Nothing about having public schools prevents that. In my county, we have lots of public schools, and quite a few private school - take your pick.
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Here thats no longer done because its presented (by teachers) as unfair-they say that being around high achieving kids will provide a roll model. Except it hasn't worked.

I was lucky enough to be in honors classes. I teach a technical trade now, and these kids (18-25 generally) can't even read.
 
Henrin said:
What I'm saying is there is a great deal more to this than schooling equals success. You're simply not going to change the situation all that much by making all kids go and learn the same things. Life just isn't that simple.
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So when kids turn 5, do we aptitude test them and pretend like the results will accurately reflect their abilities at age 18?

Or do we assign kids to schools based upon family income or class stature?

Do you think that there are groups of children who we shouldn't even bother to try to teach? And if so, at what age to we cull them out of the education system and send them to work camps?
 
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