As in many districts across our nation, Boston is facing a significant budget deficit, to the tune of 50 million. Interestingly enough, while the city has slashed our education budget, it is enticing the corporation General Electric with hundreds of millions of dollars to move its headquarters to the city.
GE gets 150 million while schools budgets get cut
Hmmm… so where’s our taxpayers dollars really going?
180 Dayz 
Hi Scott,
I’m a longtime reader, first time commenter. 180 Dayz is awesome. Thank you so much for the time and reflection you’re putting into the strip. Your piece about make-up work was spot on. I have a pile of make-up work staring at me as I type!
I absolutely agree that BPS, Massachusetts, and our nation as a whole are under-funding not only the Boston Public Schools – though disproportionately so – but also all of our nation’s children. I think back to a study on how the nation spends 2.4X more money per capita on the elderly than they do on children and 7X more at the federal level (Spending on Children and the Elderly by Julia B. Isaacs in 2009 and reconfirmed for more recent budget cycles by a variety of news sources in more recent articles). I see this as a part of a larger generational war or wealth transfer. Pay to combat climate change now or transfer the cost and consequences to future generations? (Among many other similar environmental examples.) Solve social security now or shift the cost to future generations who will get reduced benefits? Solve medicare now or apply bandaids to maintain current benefits until benefits have to be reduced in the future? Raise taxes now to reflect government expenditures or run a deficit? And on and on. The failure to fund services that benefit children sacrifices society’s future for today’s comfort.
While I agree that the wealthy and corporate interests certainly shouldn’t need handouts, I wonder if focusing on this one issue is a bit of a red herring and risks provoking a debate about the wrong issue. Should the issue be:
– Should GE have gotten a handout from the city?
or
– In what ways is the city/state/nation under-investing in our society’s future?
To me, the latter debate is so much greater – both in scope and dollars – than just GE.
Keep up the awesome work!
Your BTR Science Classmate,
Dan
PS But, while we’re at, let’s absolutely pass legislation that prevents municipalities and states from offering sweetheart tax incentive deals so that we are not competing in a race to the bottom on corporate taxation. And, while we’re at it, perhaps we could pass legislation which would prevent corporations from escaping US taxation through these tax inversion deals which have become so common.
LikeLike
Dan, so nice to hear from you, it’s been too long! I see that you have kept up with your intellectual prowess as well as your concern for our nation’s young people. I couldn’t agree with you more, this is just a symptom of a much larger issue of systematically under funding our future, the children, particularly those whom already suffer under the tides of poverty and lack of opportunities, our inner city youth. I hope to hear more from you about this issue, and hope you will take some action in whatever form you feel called to do so, as I see you are very passionate and knowledgable about this. I use 180Dayz comics as my voice of reason and protest, and it seems you have quite a knack for writing about these issues succinctly and with fervor. Perhaps a blog is in your future? Whatever it may be, keep fighting the good fight and keep in touch! And, oh, good luck with all the grading, lol!
LikeLike