Enbar the idea that the Supreme Court is DOMINATED by conservative thinkers is truly a fantasy.

But you are missing the point of the article. It's not talking about power. It's talking about the heart of America.

For example, I have lots of friends who are teachers. Most of them because they couldn't decide what to do with their lives when they got to college.

The fact is that it doesn't take any special skill to be a teacher. And there is no 'practical' reward for doing your job well. You are only rewarded for how much time you have spent at your job and how many kids have come through your class. My tax dollars pay your salary even if you are a lousy teacher. The point is that people...

Enbar the idea that the Supreme Court is DOMINATED by conservative thinkers is truly a fantasy.

But you are missing the point of the article. It's not talking about power. It's talking about the heart of America.

For example, I have lots of friends who are teachers. Most of them because they couldn't decide what to do with their lives when they got to college.

The fact is that it doesn't take any special skill to be a teacher. And there is no 'practical' reward for doing your job well. You are only rewarded for how much time you have spent at your job and how many kids have come through your class. My tax dollars pay your salary even if you are a lousy teacher. The point is that people are fine with this, some even think that the government should be MORE involved.

A more American way of doing it would be to let the parents decide where their children will attend and therefore who will get their money. Thus the schools with the best teachers would get the most kids. And thus you and all teachers would be motivated to be the best teachers so as to get the best jobs. And thus you would be able to have a salary that reflects your skill level as a teacher getting rid of your glass ceiling.

But now thanks to news media, movies, college professors etc the socialist(first way) is the default way of thinking in this country. That is the point of the article.

Personally, I am motivated to be the best teacher I can be because I care about my students, I care about what I teach, and I take pride in my work. Pretty much all of my colleagues, except the most jaded and cynical (who usually end up getting out), feel the same way.

Good for you! And if you are a good teacher, which you will be if you enjoy teaching and truly care about your students, then I want you to get the most reward possible. But right now you aren't, you get what the government says you get. Good teachers are one of this country's most valuable resources. Unfortunately our current system does not allow us to assign due value to them.

By the way, if you d...

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Personally, I am motivated to be the best teacher I can be because I care about my students, I care about what I teach, and I take pride in my work. Pretty much all of my colleagues, except the most jaded and cynical (who usually end up getting out), feel the same way.

Good for you! And if you are a good teacher, which you will be if you enjoy teaching and truly care about your students, then I want you to get the most reward possible. But right now you aren't, you get what the government says you get. Good teachers are one of this country's most valuable resources. Unfortunately our current system does not allow us to assign due value to them.

By the way, if you don't think it takes any special skill to teach, you might want to try it sometime. I've had a lot of jobs, ranging from blue-collar to white-collar, and teaching is by far the toughest one.

You are right, teaching is tough, I've done it. So is being a doctor. So is being an architect or a lawyer. Want to compare salaries or job opportunities with one of those professions? I'm not putting down teachers, I want them to be able to get just as much return for their work as those other professions. But under the current system and accepted thinking....they won't.

Based on the rising costs of education in universities (forget health, litigations etc for now) and with mentality like yours in future government, I wouldn't be surprised if we'd be leaving lots of 'not so best' without any education due to lack of funds or any other unfortunate circumstances in life.

First of all unfortunate things happen, that's a fact of life. And blaming my mentality for not preventing them or not making reparations for them is wrong and unproductive.

Secondly there are plenty of not so expensive(if not as high profile) colleges where you can get a teaching degree, I went to one. And if costs are rising then it has more to do with high paid, tenu...

Based on the rising costs of education in universities (forget health, litigations etc for now) and with mentality like yours in future government, I wouldn't be surprised if we'd be leaving lots of 'not so best' without any education due to lack of funds or any other unfortunate circumstances in life.

First of all unfortunate things happen, that's a fact of life. And blaming my mentality for not preventing them or not making reparations for them is wrong and unproductive.

Secondly there are plenty of not so expensive(if not as high profile) colleges where you can get a teaching degree, I went to one. And if costs are rising then it has more to do with high paid, tenured professors who do nothing more than spout liberal ideology(I worked for one), not government mentality.

Maybe my point wasn't clear. If you want to introduce market forces into teacher's pay, who is going to pay for the better teachers? If you want teachers' pay to be similar to that of doctors and lawyers, only high-income families will be able to afford their services. Poor families will have to make do with crappier teachers (or no teachers at all, if the teaching profession is going to be totally modeled on medicine and the law). Then kids from poor families are going to have an even less chance of upward mobility than they do in the current situation.

I am actually not opposed to merit pay and school choice in principle, but you are going to need government intervention to make sure ...

Maybe my point wasn't clear. If you want to introduce market forces into teacher's pay, who is going to pay for the better teachers? If you want teachers' pay to be similar to that of doctors and lawyers, only high-income families will be able to afford their services. Poor families will have to make do with crappier teachers (or no teachers at all, if the teaching profession is going to be totally modeled on medicine and the law). Then kids from poor families are going to have an even less chance of upward mobility than they do in the current situation.

I am actually not opposed to merit pay and school choice in principle, but you are going to need government intervention to make sure that the distribution of teacher quality cuts across class and racial lines (and this intervention will probably have to be at the federal level, since local and state governments have little incentive to engage in redistributionist policies). Market forces can't and won't do that themselves.

I actually don't think there is a free market in the medical profession and that doctors' high pay is based on their hard work and ambition. In my personal experience, doctors do not want to be paid for performance. One (or one's insurance company) has to always pay for a doctor's visit, even if the doctor's diagnosis is incorrect. There is no centralized database that measures a doctor's competency, so one cannot make an informed choice about which doctor to visit. I think many doctors--with perhaps the exception of doctors in research institutions & doctors in emergency rooms--want to keep the link between their services and a patient's condition obscured.

While I favor government int...

I actually don't think there is a free market in the medical profession and that doctors' high pay is based on their hard work and ambition. In my personal experience, doctors do not want to be paid for performance. One (or one's insurance company) has to always pay for a doctor's visit, even if the doctor's diagnosis is incorrect. There is no centralized database that measures a doctor's competency, so one cannot make an informed choice about which doctor to visit. I think many doctors--with perhaps the exception of doctors in research institutions & doctors in emergency rooms--want to keep the link between their services and a patient's condition obscured.

While I favor government intervention to make sure everyone has access to health care, I also think that something needs to be done to increase consumer power with regard to doctors and drug companies.

Sorry, when you said that teaching requires no special skill and that your friends became teachers because they were basically directionless in college, it sounded an awful lot like you were putting down teachers. If you aren't, I apologize for the misunderstanding. Personally, I find teaching requires a great deal of skill, and it is a lousy profession for people who aren't committed to it, who will likely be miserable.

I get your overall point, and it's certainly valid. However, I'm very dubious about this "free-market fundamentalism" that just assumes that if we treat teaching and education like just another marketable commodity, like shoes or hamburgers, that everything will improve fo...

Sorry, when you said that teaching requires no special skill and that your friends became teachers because they were basically directionless in college, it sounded an awful lot like you were putting down teachers. If you aren't, I apologize for the misunderstanding. Personally, I find teaching requires a great deal of skill, and it is a lousy profession for people who aren't committed to it, who will likely be miserable.

I get your overall point, and it's certainly valid. However, I'm very dubious about this "free-market fundamentalism" that just assumes that if we treat teaching and education like just another marketable commodity, like shoes or hamburgers, that everything will improve for everyone. Instinctively, I don't think that choosing a school is the same as choosing between a McDonald's and a Wendy's for your burger. I could be wrong on this, though.

And if costs are rising then it has more to do with high paid, tenured professors who do nothing more than spout liberal ideology(I worked for one)

I'd be curious to hear more about your academic experiences. Sounds like they were pretty unpleasant. However, I don't think that what you've said here really reflects typical academic culture.