What does the US financial crisis mean for education?
September 29, 2008 by Kristina Chew, PhD
Filed under Health
What effect will the financial crisis have on the US education budget? Today’s Ed Week notes:
Congress late last week approved a bill extending funding for most education programs and other parts of the federal budget at fiscal 2008 levels through March 6, when the new administration will have been in office for more than a month.
If lawmakers agreed on a fiscal 2009 appropriations bill financing the Department of Education by March 6, it would be up to the new president to sign it.
But what now, in the wake of the US House of Representatives rejecting a $700 billion rescue of the financial industry?
(I realize that this post is very focused on matters in the US and on the US economy in particular but—living in a New Jersey that is well-populated with people who “work in finance,” it’s getting really tense around here.)
My opinion, and perhaps a minority opinion, is that there is going to have to be some kind of publicly financed underwriting because the impact on this market, and the ripple effect to foreign markets reminds me uncomfortably of the prelude to events of the leading up to the Great Depression. But I’m not in favor of a wholesale no-strings bailout set as precedence for continuing corporate irresponsibility, and I don’t think that is what is proposed. I believe a review of the impacts of deregulation is needed, and if that is done I hope that it could be done dispassionately with a minimum of finger-pointing and party politics.
What I found lacking in the story was the particular details that are problematic enough to scuttle the bill. Nancy Pelosi’s speech may have been empassioned, but supposedly these are adults dealing with a very serious matter, and a good speech would not be enough to scuttle a good bill although saying that might have been the case makes a good story.
As far as education? I don’t know. We are at least as dependent on property taxes and income taxes for our school budgets, so if the economy goes south or we have significant mortgage default or foreclosures, that’s not going to help. If the Feds belt tighten across domestic programs, it doesn’t suggest expansion of special education.
Short answer–’don’t know. First things first.
[OT: My comment is in moderation, but I apologize in advance for the general incoherency--'need a cup of coffee.]
Jim called me as I got Charlie off the bus and started making comparisons to the Great Depression—we’ve been talking about op-ed about “the Lost Tycoons”. Yes, increases seem more than unlikely.
FWIW, my Representative was one of those who voted against the bill and publicly stated that he has good reasons for doing so and viable alternatives to a fiscal rescue–so I guess that I will be writing him to pick his brain about what those are.
I don’t think that it’s going to be primarily a U.S. issue for long
England certainly seems to be heading the same direction, and we all know that Canada’s never going to be far behind the States.
I’m frankly pretty worried about how education and services may end up going in the next 20 or so years- between this horrendous economic mess and the adjustments that North American society will likely have to make if even half of the likely peak oil type scenarios come true, I’m worried that it’s going to be a tense time for people who aren’t pretty self-sufficient.
(It’s pretty tense around here too- my husband works in a media-related field in NYC, so our fingers are crossed pretty seriously right now).
Well, perhaps there was one collateral benefit to passage of the “bailout bill”–mental health parity.
WASHINGTON — More than one-third of all Americans will soon receive better insurance coverage for mental health treatments because of a new law that, for the first time, requires equal coverage of mental and physical illnesses.
The requirement, included in the economic bailout bill that President Bush signed on Friday, is the result of 12 years of passionate advocacy by friends and relatives of people with mental illness and addiction disorders. They described the new law as a milestone in the quest for civil rights, an effort to end insurance discrimination and to reduce the stigma of mental illness.
(…)
By wiping away such restrictions, doctors said, the new law will make it easier for people to obtain treatment for a wide range of conditions, including depression, autism, schizophrenia, eating disorders and alcohol and drug abuse…”
Bailout Provides More Mental Health Coverage”
New York Times, 10/5/08