Quote (AspenSniper @ Sep 27 2015 08:35am)
The poor also dramatically worse grades in high school and college. I'm fine with free college as long as it's done on a reimbursement basis so that if you fail, you pay every dime. I liked Obama's free community college reimbursement plan because it requires i think a 2.5 or a 3.0 or something.
I agree with you on the points of tax loopholes and trickle-down nonsense essentially giving the rich money for nothing then hearing them whine when the poor get money for nothing. I just dont like anyone getting money for nothing personally...
The outsized significance of other socio-economic factors is the same at every level of education though. "The poor" are hungry in school. They can't hire tutors. They work as teenagers. Availability of every resource is obviously lower. All of it dramatically tilts the field towards the affluent as you would expect.
It's fine to not like abuse in the system, whether money is going to rich or poor or whoever "for nothing." But outside of the moral argument, the government makes huge expenditures and gives tax benefits to middle and low-income earners because that actually drives the economy in the way that giving more money to the affluent doesn't. It makes basic macroeconomic sense to direct assistance to the people who consume more if there's going to be assistance at all. From where I'm sitting, no one has a right to gripe about money going to "the poor" or anyone else when it's a massive economic driver (so long as abuse is kept in check),
especially the affluent. They're different from previous generaitons in that a lot of them owe their place simply to a silly economic theory that never panned out, so they're the last people who need to be clutching their pearls about "handouts."