Submitted by Jim Quinn via The Burning Platform blog,
It appears a few children were left behind.
The Department of Education was created in 1979 and now has an annual budget of $73 billion, with 5,000 government bureaucrats roaming its hallways. When you include all Federal, State and Local spending on public education it totals about $700 billion per year, or $13,000 per student. The Department of Education was created to improve the education of our children.
After 37 years and trillions of dollars “invested” in our children, see below what they have achieved. The public school teachers who have been on the front lines for the last 37 years work 9 months per year, earn above average salaries, get awesome benefits, and have gold plated pension plans – all at the expense of taxpayers. And look what they have accomplished.
The tens of millions of illiterate drones think they deserve $15 per hour because it’s fair, even though they can’t count to fifteen or spell fifteen.
STAGGERING ILLITERACY STATISTICS California
- According to the 2007 California Academic Performance Index, research show that 57% of students failed the California Standards Test in English.
- There are six million students in the California school system and 25% of those students are unable to perform basic reading skills
- There is a correlation between illiteracy and income at least in individual economic terms, in that literacy has payoffs and is a worthwhile investment. As the literacy rate doubles, so doubles the per capita income.
The Nation
- In a study of literacy among 20 ‘high income’ countries; US ranked 12th
- Illiteracy has become such a serious problem in our country that 44 million adults are now unable to read a simple story to their children
- 50% of adults cannot read a book written at an eighth grade level
- 45 million are functionally illiterate and read below a 5th grade level
- 44% of the American adults do not read a book in a year
- 6 out of 10 households do not buy a single book in a year
The Economy
- 3 out of 4 people on welfare can’t read
- 20% of Americans read below the level needed to earn a living wage
- 50% of the unemployed between the ages of 16 and 21 cannot read well enough to be considered functionally literate
- Between 46 and 51% of American adults have an income well below the poverty level because of their inability to read
- Illiteracy costs American taxpayers an estimated $20 billion each year
- School dropouts cost our nation $240 billion in social service expenditures and lost tax revenues
Impact on Society:
- 3 out of 5 people in American prisons can’t read
- To determine how many prison beds will be needed in future years, some states actually base part of their projection on how well current elementary students are performing on reading tests
- 85% of juvenile offenders have problems reading
- Approximately 50% of Americans read so poorly that they are unable to perform simple tasks such as reading prescription drug labels
(Source: National Institute for Literacy, National Center for Adult Literacy, The Literacy Company, U.S. Census Bureau)
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All that's needed now is a "Mission Accomplished" banner and this is yet another perfect example of the failure of government intervention.