Intercepts
A listening post monitoring public education and teachers’ unions.

Mike Petrilli of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute knows more about the ins and outs of education policy than just about anyone on the planet, but I can’t believe he wrote a sentence as naive as “The era of big spending in education is over.”

You’ll notice that in the NBC report, no reference is made to how many teachers we have or have hired in the last few years, or how much we currently spend per student.

I’m sure Petrilli patterned his statement after Bill Clinton’s 1996 State of the Union speech, in which he famously said, “The era of big government is over.”

The federal budget for 1996 was $1.6 trillion. Now it’s almost two and a half times that.

Petrilli and President Clinton both make the mistake of underestimating those who when they hear the era of big government or big spending is over, jump up and deliver the Bluto speech from Animal House:

Government (and education spending) will continue to expand as long as the benefits are concentrated and the costs are diffuse. It only makes sense to believe, as Petrilli does, that “what goes up must come down.” Unless, of course, we’re talking about government spending, which defies gravity like upsidaisium.

Bars of upsidaisium in storage

So we shouldn’t jump the gun on broad statements, because it ain’t over ’til it’s over…

…or at least until the fat lady sings.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 23rd, 2010 at 10:34 and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.