Juggle The Numbers

A question I will often ask my Texas State/Local Government class is whether the national ranking statistics of state per capita expenditures on public education which show Texas in the bottom five consistently are relevant. Once I've explained what "per capita" means and how that makes big population states or small population states irrelevant we can get to the question.

The rankings are irrelevant for two major reasons. First, dollars spent does not equate with learning. Some of the regions with highest per capita spending offer the worst quality of educational performance. Second the cost of living variance between states mean that Texas might get considerably more educational bang for their bucks.

Here's a classic example of cooking the books:

Poverty Rate Peaks for Last Half Century

Once you consider the fact that "poverty" is defined by the federal government as an income level for families of one through four, you find the same problem as with school spending. An income level which would leave you destitute in San Francisco or New York City would have you living in middle class comfort in small town Texas areas.

If government wants to convince you of a problem, they set the statistics to support that contention. Want more poverty? Raise the poverty income level. Want poverty to go away, then define the poverty level at a much lower number. If you want to legislate welfare policy and redistributionist tax rates then crank up your poverty levels.

"Given all the unemployment we saw, it's the government safety net that's keeping people above the poverty line," Douglas Besharov, a University of Maryland public policy professor and former scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, told the Associated Press.

Hard to believe that gentleman is a university professor. Apparently he embraces the concept of a benevolent government providing for our wants and needs by dispensing magical government dollars. He doesn't know that government only has those dollars it takes from us in the first place.

In addition, 51 million Americans were uninsured, as the number of people with health insurance dropped from 255 million to less than 254 million -- the first decrease since the government started keeping track in 1987. The number would have been worse because 6.5 million fewer people got insurance through their jobs, but it was offset by a leap in government-backed health insurance. More than 30 percent of Americans now get coverage from the government.

Got that? Obamacare in action. 6.5 million people no longer get their insurance through their employer. 51 million now uninsured instead of the 33 million that was generally accepted during the debate. Must need more government healthcare, I guess.

Read the rest of that piece for some remarkable stories of people who have gotten themselves into unfortunate circumstances on their own volition. A "single mother of five" who is raising both her own children and her grandchildren--apparently it's a generational thing. A lawyer and mortgage broker who were "in the business of buying and selling homes" but suffered THREE foreclosures and are homeless.

It just makes me want to send a check to them this very minute.