Don’t throw even more money at education
November 20, 2006| By Nathaniel Ward
“After twelve years out of power, what will Democrats seek to accomplish in federal education policy?” asks Heritage education expert Dan Lips.
Liberals in Congress, Lips explains, have been quick to attack President Bush for allegedly under-funding education. In truth, spending too little on education has hardly been one of this administration’s flaws. In fact, overall federal education spending in 2006 was more than double what it was in 2001, as Heritage’s Brian Riedl noted earlier this year (read the full report on the growth of spending in PDF format).
But has this new federal largess actually accomplished anything? “Unfortunately,” Lips argues, “there’s little reason to believe even these dramatic funding increases will lead to improvements in student learning in American schools.” He points out that even though federal K-12 education subsidies have doubled since 1970, student performance is little improved.
And what of recent increases in the number of students receiving subsidies to attend college? It’s the same story. “[A]s with K-12 spending, there’s little evidence that federal spending on higher education is achieving its objective. Quite simply, college tuition is becoming more expensive each year.”
Lips concludes by cautioning liberals not to use their control of Congress to throw more money at education. “Calls for more funding for public schools and subsidies for college tuition may be popular on the campaign trail, but simply increasing federal funding for education is not the answer. If it were, we should have seen better results by now.”
Nathaniel Ward is the Editor of MyHeritage.org—a website for members and supporters of The Heritage Foundation.
