The standard operating procedure of governments faced with a shrinking budget is to deliberately make the cuts as painful as possible for the general public in order to induce panic. Faced with the choice of postponing new computers for the LGBT outreach centre and laying off policemen, it's almost certain that there will be fewer cops in the beat.Case in point: the city of Everett, WA says that it will make schoolchildren walk up to a mile to school in an effort to save $400,00. Pace that kids need the exercise, it's interesting that the city government isn't going for the alternative of simply sacking five paper pushers.
That's the reason why I prefer most day to day government decisions to be as local as possible. When a borough councilman does something as cynical as this, I take comfort in knowing that I'll probably run into him in the queue at Starbucks tomorrow where I can give him a good bollocking.
4 comments:
What's wrong with that? Kids have legs, you know.
And if parents don't want their kids walking to school, they can drive them to school themselves (self-reliance) or hire someone to do it for them (privatisation of the service, providing extra employment in the form of private bus services/taxis). Fantastic!
I mean, really. A mile? That's not much. You can walk a mile in twenty minutes if you put some effort into it. I imagine it'll be more difficult in the US (from what I've heard, most cities are built with cars in mind rather than pedestrians), but it can't be that hard.
In this particular case I don't care, if parents insist on marching their kids off to the government to be "educated" then they get what they deserve.
However, if the philosophy is applied to something else, say government run health care for instance, that panic inducing might hit a little closer to home.
"Sorry old boy, that hip replacement is a bit pricier than we can manage, but here's a nice cane"
It's not the cut that bothers me, it's the calculation behind it. The politicos are basically saying, "You want less spending? Okay, but it will hurt you a lot more than it will hurt us because I'll make it that way."
As far as school buses, I agree that it's not that big a thing in and of itself. Back in England, we never had school buses. Of course, when I went to school we were all excited about that new "fire" thing. However, I would point out that this story is from Everett, WA and if you've ever been there, you'll know that making anyone walking a mile through its streets is the boundary of human suffering. I was there just yesterday and I spent the entire time with my fists balled into my eyes muttering "How long? How long?"
Well, that's what you get when you have a country whose infrastructure favours those of the large, boxy and four-wheeled.
Neil: ...What, exactly, is wrong with education in this case? And with regards to the government-run healthcare thing; as far I as recall, I don't think they outlawed private medical care. I'm not too sure of the American system, but I did have the idea that without medical insurance your options for healthcare are very limited.
(I do hope this doesn't open a large, worm-filled tin...)
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