The quote above is from F. Scott Fitzgerald. It comes to mind because of a Facebook chat I had recently. It was started by a legislator's lament of the impasse on Washington State Budget negotiations.
Some joined the lament at lack of progress. Others had suggestions for change or ideas for ways to break the impasse. One person thought that we really need to find more ways to spend less and used Heritage Foundation statistics to plead his case. This trusty Radical; however, has seen the results of the last fifty years of getting by with less.
Washington State's Constitution mandates that the prime role of state government is to provide adequate education for all the state's children. The Washington Supreme Court ruled recently that we had fallen 2 Billion Dollars short of fulfilling that role. If that doesn't convince you, my own children had to suffer through the school year in a school so dilapidated that plaster fell from the ceiling and a child was wounded by a clock that didn't stay on the classroom wall. That school had the misfortune of being in a district made up of retirees and the working poor. We moved to a richer district, but not everyone has that option.
I bring all this up because a lot of recent research and polling data backs up Fitzgerald's contention. The rich graduate from High School and College at much higher rates than the poor. 15% of the lower class graduate college vs over half of the upper class. The upper class thinks differently about many things. They are less charitable than the poor giving 1.3% of their wealth to charity while the poorest give at more than twice the rate, 3.2% These statistics from The Atlantic. There is also new research that tells us that the rich don't find legal restrictions binding on them. They feel that greed is good and don't believe that others are as deserving as they are according to these studies.
I really don't know how to reform the rich. It may not even be important, if we can get the 90% of Washingtonians and for that matter the other not so rich Americans to vote for progress instead of for less is better.
I bring all this up because a lot of recent research and polling data backs up Fitzgerald's contention. The rich graduate from High School and College at much higher rates than the poor. 15% of the lower class graduate college vs over half of the upper class. The upper class thinks differently about many things. They are less charitable than the poor giving 1.3% of their wealth to charity while the poorest give at more than twice the rate, 3.2% These statistics from The Atlantic. There is also new research that tells us that the rich don't find legal restrictions binding on them. They feel that greed is good and don't believe that others are as deserving as they are according to these studies.
I really don't know how to reform the rich. It may not even be important, if we can get the 90% of Washingtonians and for that matter the other not so rich Americans to vote for progress instead of for less is better.
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