Jessica Gross expresses concern and perplexity over the increasing income segregation of the US, with the rich living near the rich and the poor living near the poor.
She and her fellow NPR Liberal attribute it to rich people using zoning laws to keep out the poor, but then why is that the rich are so concerned to keep out the poor or even the not all that rich in the first place?
Because in liberal America your school depends on your address. You don't have to live within bus distance to Harvard to go to Harvard but the quality of the education your child receives K-12 depends on your zip code. If you gave parents the money instead of school administrators and allowed parents to choose address would become irrelevant, but that would expose bad government schools--and their loyal teachers union members--to competition.
There is also another overlooked element here, the way that changes in our criminal justice and mental health system since the 1960s has made it harder for local communities to set standards and to control crimes and acts of public disorder.
In short, I believe big government has created these problems, not the free market and not local prejudice. Remember, government helps insiders, not outsiders. Teachers, homeowners and lawyers are the insiders. The working guy that just wants to be able to send his kid to a better school that would cost less than the government is spending on "free" education, the mother that would like to be able to have the crazy guy wandering around her neighborhood smelling of urine and cursing to himself put in a hospital rather than have the cops ask her if the guy has actually tried to hurt anyone yet, they are not insiders. They are not helped by the government. Their only function is to express their gratitude for its beneficence and to pay for it. Suckers.
So what’s going on here? Why are more affluent Americans with children clustering together now than they did in the '70s? Presumably wealthy people have always wanted their kids to live in areas that had good public schools and low crime rates—what’s changed?
She and her fellow NPR Liberal attribute it to rich people using zoning laws to keep out the poor, but then why is that the rich are so concerned to keep out the poor or even the not all that rich in the first place?
Because in liberal America your school depends on your address. You don't have to live within bus distance to Harvard to go to Harvard but the quality of the education your child receives K-12 depends on your zip code. If you gave parents the money instead of school administrators and allowed parents to choose address would become irrelevant, but that would expose bad government schools--and their loyal teachers union members--to competition.
There is also another overlooked element here, the way that changes in our criminal justice and mental health system since the 1960s has made it harder for local communities to set standards and to control crimes and acts of public disorder.
In short, I believe big government has created these problems, not the free market and not local prejudice. Remember, government helps insiders, not outsiders. Teachers, homeowners and lawyers are the insiders. The working guy that just wants to be able to send his kid to a better school that would cost less than the government is spending on "free" education, the mother that would like to be able to have the crazy guy wandering around her neighborhood smelling of urine and cursing to himself put in a hospital rather than have the cops ask her if the guy has actually tried to hurt anyone yet, they are not insiders. They are not helped by the government. Their only function is to express their gratitude for its beneficence and to pay for it. Suckers.
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