Why, in the USA, is local education funded with local property tax ?

Off-topic
1

In parts of the USA, where there are lot’s of school age kids, in a town with low property values, lot’s of things become sub par. From the local property tax base, extracted from low income home owners, each town must pay for police, fire, and schooling.

This seems like a bad system to me. The overcrowded, under funded schools then graduate students, or as likely don’t graduate them, into a community that want’s to spend all it’s extra $ on the police force, and prisons.

To break this " under funded- bad school outcome link" , a federal program to help provide a base level education to kids in all communities by an “school district payment”, seems to me to be the answer.

I am guessing that a lot of you are not aware that local schools in the USA are funded by town property tax.

My point is that this leads to under funded schools, so there has to be a better way.:slight_smile:

2

Why not switch where taxes are being taken from? Take it from income tax then? Either way, the quality of the school is going to equal the quality of the area because of people’s dislike of tax raises.

3

I think this will be really hard to change

No one says the tax laws make sense, and fewer understand them.

Funding fire and police locally makes a lot of sense to me. Local residents are way more knowledgeable about their communities needs then a pinhead in DC .

Some towns have lots of children, and really low $ in local taxes. It is all thrown into the same town budget.:frowning:

School funding should be separate from town funding sort of. Not totally separate, I think having super schools in Beverly Hills, while dirt poor towns have so so schools, using federal subsidies, would be a huge improvement over the school system in the USA now.

I am not saying all schools should be equally funded . I would like to see a way to fund schools in poor communities, at a base quality level, that many communities can never achieve using local property tax.

4

people complain a lot about taxes, i am guilty of it too believe me, but without taxes the government couldn’t pay for anything. all the presidents and stuff say they are going to lower taxes but they can’t because we need taxes to fund things that people want. it’s funny how people want things but won’t sacrifice for it.

5

Nat’l average I just saw is around $8700 per student for an elementary and secondary education.

Thats right, the home-owning neighbors who live around you spend almost 10 grand to send you to school. In NY it’s 14K.

a quick cut-n-paste:

1. Effective local control of schools depends on local funding of schools.

Local property tax funding of education gives all of a community’s residents, not only the parents of school-aged children, an incentive to monitor the local public schools and see that they provide a good education. Homeowners in districts with successful schools are rewarded with rising property values, whereas residents in districts with unsuccessful schools experience falling property values.

Each resident has an individual incentive to either support the status quo if it is producing good results, or work for change if it is not. Local property tax funding thus gives school personnel an incentive to provide high quality and efficient schools. School districts also must compete with one another or risk losing students, as well as tax dollars, to better-performing districts.


2. Financing schools with local property taxes is more fair than relying on statewide taxes.

Property taxes, because they are calculated according to property values, take into account the quality of local schools more effectively than can statewide taxes. Moreover, because property tax rates are set locally and often by referenda, they reflect the ability and willingness of local taxpayers to pay for public schools. No statewide tax–be it a statewide uniform property tax rate, or an income- or sales-based tax–could be as fair.

3. Support for public schools is stronger when control and responsibility for funding are in local hands.

A family that wishes to invest a high share of its income in educating its children is willing to pay more for a house in a highly perceived school district. In a system of local property tax finance, such families are accommodated: They pay more for their house, but they get to send their children to a high-quality school.

If the burden of school funding shifts from local property taxes to a statewide tax, families would be taxed for schools at the same rate regardless of where they live. Families that place a high value on education may choose to live in a school district with low property taxes and only average public schools, and then compensate by purchasing computers, paying tutors, or otherwise investing in education-enhancing items for their school-aged children. Or they may move their children from public schools to private schools to get the higher quality of education that the public schools could no longer deliver. Both reactions would undermine the public school system by lowering support for higher levels of funding and by lowering enrollments.

Both of these reactions occurred in California between 1980 and 1990, when reliance on state aid rose by 21.4 percentage points. Spending per pupil rose only 6 percent, and the share of students attending private schools jumped 56 percent. New Hampshire, by contrast, did not increase its reliance on state aid. Spending per pupil rose 25 percent, and the share of students attending private schools fell by 11 percent.

6

Yeah, why is it funded by any kind of taxes when it costs twice as much to fund public schools as it does private schools?

I have to admit, funding it by property taxes is much better than funding it through a federal (or soon, international) income tax where far away some bureaucrats use their stolen funds to coerce local schools to conform to their demands. The fact is that currently funding is only partially through property taxes and a lot is federal and state funded now (I think my state called it property tax relief). We went from the best schools in the world to where we are now, which is very low for industrialized countries.

Yup, imagine for a moment what a free market education system would entail… yeah, I know it might be hard for some that are used to the idea that only the government can provide such through the use of force, but try to imagine it. This may help: What If Public Schools Were Abolished? - LewRockwell

I got a little sidetracked to reply to this thread, as I was watching the RNC convention tonight, or shall I call it the “Country First” convention, where at least with that slogan, they are being frank that they care more about country instead of the people. How about “Individual Liberty First!” instead. What a “change” in deed. To bad that kind of “change” is not being offered this election cycle by the anointed presidential candidates.

Revolution takes time… but hopefully we can speed things up.

7

I would guess that this has something to do with special ed. When you need 1:1 student assistance or classes with a 3:5 students to staff ratio the cost goes way up. This drives up the cost/kid in public schools, not a problem you have in private school. The cost/non-sped kid ratio in public schools is probably pretty close to the cost/private school kid.

8

I agree with JJUGGLE ON THIS ONE: Part of it has to do with all the waste that’s allowed by government run crap, and part of it is just turtle crap.