Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: $Revision: 1.6.2.16 $; site inmet.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!harvard!think!inmet!janw
From: janw@inmet.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Re: Experimentation and Danger
Message-ID: <28200279@inmet.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 6-Nov-85 23:35:00 EST
Article-I.D.: inmet.28200279
Posted: Wed Nov  6 23:35:00 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 9-Nov-85 06:32:55 EST
References: <344@pedsgd.UUCP>
Lines: 132
Nf-ID: #R:pedsgd:-34400:inmet:28200279:000:6904
Nf-From: inmet!janw    Nov  6 23:35:00 1985


[Bob Weiler bob@pedsgd]
Bob: your constructive criticism is much appreciated. After  sticking
my neck out with specific suggestions, I expected flames.

> In article <28200239@inmet.UUCP> janw@inmet.UUCP writes:
> { An assertion that social experimentation goes on continuously,	}
> { a criticism of US education in the 60's and 70's, and  		}
> { a ...             proposal for further experiments in response to	}
> { Frank Adams assertion that social experimentation is DANGEROUS	}

> I'd like to disagree with slighly about US education having lived through
> it. Mostly it wasnt too bad, alot of it was a waste of time, and anybody
> whos parents encouraged them to read and learn managed to do pretty well.

Of course I exaggerated, especially in  the  Cultural  Revolution
comparison.  One  can  well see you've survived it. Still, school
education clearly went downhill in that period, as witnessed by
the  average  test scores. This should be set against enormous
increase in money appropriations. Clearly someone did something
wrong.  That many individuals and even whole schools survived al-
most intact, I can quite believe. For the individuals, you  your-
self  give  one explanation: family. I should guess that probably
*good* schools survived best, while mediocre became bad, and  bad
became terrible. This is just a guess, based on the assumption
that good teachers (and well-prepared students) can adjust better
to  new requirements. E.g., New Math isn't a bad idea in itself -
provided you have really good teachers.

And then don't let us forget the general point: it was the  wrong
kind  of  "experiment";  it would still be that, even if, by wild
chance, it had succeeded. Montessori and Suzuki are  examples  of
the *right* kind of educational experimentation.

> >- change environmental protection rules on the highly  successful
> >  West German model: pollute if you wish, but *pay in proportion*.

> Would like you to define "highly successful" in this context.

Well, if you have so much heavy industry in such a small area,
you've got to be successful if the place is still habitable.
US problems are easy compared to theirs. But people who have
lived there assure me it is not just habitable, but very 
attractive. Hence the epithet "highly".

> Personally I prefer "dont you dare pollute, but if you do pay  in
> proportion".

But everyone pollutes, to some extent. So if  you  prohibit,  you
must set thresholds. And then industries with political pull come
and prove that a higher  threshold  is  necessary  to  them,  and
*they*  are  necessary  to  the country. Also, they gain by going
*up* to the threshold. Also,  criminal  prosecutions  are  messy.
All  that  is avoided if you scrap the prohibition and set a high
enough fee. Then the  corporations  hire  engineers,  instead  of
lawyers and lobbyists, and start figuring out how to save on that
fee. Or else they put their money in cleaner enterprises. And  if
this  contributes  to  the  decline  of  smokestack industries, I
wouldn't mourn.

> >- gradually replace income tax with consumption (sales) tax.

> As long as consumption includes the buying of companies, stocks, bonds,
> or real estate,  and exempts some minimal amount for food, clothing,
> and shelter, I'm all for it. What do you do about goods purchased in
> other countries?

 I would rather exempt certain *kinds* of goods completely than a
fixed  amount of anything - because I don't like the state poking
its nose in people's purchases.  I  would  exempt  food  staples,
basic  medicines, rent and fuel. As for goodies purchased abroad,
there seem to be only 2 solutions: nothing (which is what  states
with  sales  tax do) or an import duty. The first is simpler, but
if such imports really undermine the system, you might be reduced
to the second. A lot depends on geography: e.g., Luxembourg could
hardly afford the simpler solution. I wouldn't  tax  purchase  of
companies etc. (real estate maybe) because it penalizes commer-
cial activity (just as income tax does). Don't kill  that  goose,
collect  the golden eggs at the rear end. Why should a company
changing hands be an occasion  for  taxation  ?  Does  unbroken
record  with  a  single  owner somehow deserve a reward ? Let the
economic blood circulate freely. If the government is out to soak
the  rich  and the corporations, let it tax their harmful activi-
ties (like pollution), not their useful activities like playing
the market.  All this, putting libertarian arguments aside.

 (As to why sales tax is more libertarian than income tax, I see
two reasons. First, the government won't know as much about the
individual; second, the individual won't have to fill those forms,
that is, be engaged in involuntary service to the government.
Theft may be bad but slavery is worse.)

> >- limit the length, in letters, of new laws.
> >- let jury, not judges, decide what a law means. (This would 
> >  promote a rule of law instead of the rule of lawyers).
> >- make any new law pass revision by a jury who must unanimously
> >  agree they understand it.
> >- adopt a sunset law for all government agencies, regulations,
> >  and laws (except for the constitution and the sunset law).

> ... I would add a couple of restrictions here:
> 
> - Require that all legislation include provisions for financing.
>   This should be sufficient to overcome the *free lunch* mentality
>   the libertarians harp about without dismantling the system completely.
> 
> - Require that all legislation have a measurable goal and will become
>   automatically void if it fails to meet that goal. Thus a proposal
>   for education might state the goal is to raise the median SAT score
>   5 points per year, starting in 1988, measured every 2 years. If scores
>   are not at least 10 points higher in 1990, the program is terminated.
> 
> - Every citizen should recieve an accounting statement every year stating
>   which laws where passed, who voted for and against them, which ones expired,
>   how much tax he had paid, where it went, what the value of services he
>   recieved in return, etc. Admittedly, some of these would have to be
>   estimates, but the idea is to provide the citizen with enough information
>   to decide if he is getting screwed, and who to blame if he is. The press
>   currently does an inadequate job reporting these things  because it
>   doesnt sell many papers, but could probably do a great job of exposing
>   fraud or inaccuracy in the estimates, which does.

I like all of these very much.  But  a  clear  and  concise  form
should be selected for all this documentation such that the aver-
age education survivor is able to monitor it.

> Very often I also think that legislators should be hired and that the
> vote should only be used to fire them, but that is for another time.

This sounds quite interesting. I wish you would elaborate.

		Jan Wasilewsky