Gil Smart, in a column headed “Gov. Corbett’s shock doctrine” opines:
“Our new governor is balancing Pennsylvania’s budget on the backs of students. Corbett’s spending plan cuts $550 million in basic education subsidies and another $500 million-plus in tutoring, charter-school reimbursements and block grants. Support for the four state-owned universities, including Penn State, was halved, as was funding for the State System of Higher Education….
“It’s genius, it really is — unless you’re the parent of a school-age child, in which case it’s alarming. Can schools lose this much funding without seeing a decline in the general quality of education? Can we shove austerity down teachers’ throats and still expect them to go out there every day and bleed for the kids?”
WATCHDOG: Like Smart, we deplore the slashes in the education budget. Deficit hawks in Washington must share the blame since funds that had been flowing from the feds to the states are no longer available. (Let’s hope these cut backs don’t strangle the recovery as happened in 1937 and thus prolonged the Great Depression.)
However, most others in the working and middle classes have had to work harder and just as conscientously despite having received meager if any copmensation increases over the past three years. Government employees should not be exempt from sharing the pain.
