It's really about warrants, per the Stock Gumshoe.
[quote=gillbilly]Brad, I remember those days. It was annoying to see everyone get a prize of some sort. Don't know if you're still teaching, but many schools have moved away from that. We all have our limited experience, so I'm only speaking from mine. Some schools are turning out excellent learners, others not so much. I agree with Hugh as well, there are some pretty amazing students graduating every year. I also agree with him that having a wide varieties of approaches helps, whether it be home schooling, public, private, technical, etc.
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Hey Gillbilly, I can only speak to what I saw going on in the teacher training arena back in the 90’s, as my career took another path (computer animation) after getting my teaching credential. At that time art and music teachers were being laid off statewide, not hired (as so very many bi-lingual teachers were.) And, within the context of “the dumbing down of education,” one can certainly point a finger at the Feds open border policy, and massive influx of non-English speaking students, which diverted resources away from “higher level cognitive training,” and opportunities for promoting divergent/creative/critical thinking within the curriculum.
Was this all being done purposely back then, in tandem with the thrust towards “humanization” and “moral relativism” in the classroom…in order to “soften the curriculum?’…i.e. “The Naked Communist, goal 17)
I think it’s instructive to compare the spectrum of parenting styles (permissive, authoritative, authoritarian) that we learned about back in Psych 101, to what was then being introduced into the classroom, and then take a look at the generation of graduates that it produced…the Gen Yers.
Here’s a quote from one article: “…impulse control is often difficult for children of permissive parents. This contributes to the behavioral problems that these children tend to demonstrate at school, where their peers tend to outperform them academically. Children of permissive parents also tend to be immature and find it difficult to take responsibility for their actions.”
And from another article: “Harvey’s conclusion? As a group, he says, Gen Yers are characterized by a “very inflated sense of self” that leads to “unrealistic expectations” and, ultimately, “chronic disappointment. And if you think the Gen Yers in your workplace are oversensitive as well as entitled, Harvey’s findings back that up, too. Today’s 20-somethings have an “automatic, knee-jerk reaction to criticism,” he says, and tend to dismiss it. Even if they fail miserably at a job, they still think they’re great at it…”
So, there appears to be some evidence of a causal link between the permissive teaching styles that were being pushed on student teachers in the 90’s with the behaviors and attitudes of the students that subsequently came under their tutelage.
As opposed to the Baby Boomers, and Woodstock generation, who clamored for change on just about every level, but then hypocritically have enjoyed massive and disproportionate prosperity at the expense of later generations? The hippie-turned-yuppies? Yeah, these new generations are just butt-holes.
I'm not arguing they don't display the qualities you are talking about - some of them anyway - but I don't think we should start slinging mud across generations without looking at which generations really screwed the pooch, and which generations are just doing as their parents and grandparents taught them to do. As a generation Xer, I blame my parents, their parents, and my own generation. Apples don't fall far from the trees that bear them, after all.
Honestly I think these current generations are treated with such kid gloves, and hyper-inflated senses of self, precisely because the boomers and Gen-Xers subconsciously feel guilty about screwing over the future so badly with their greed and insatiable need for material wealth.
[quote=cmartenson][quote=melissaoverbrook]
Correct! This is the goal of the US Dept of Education. Check out "
The Deliberate Dumbing Down of America"
[/quote]
While I am not familiar with the work you linked here, the title was very close to the book that got my wife and I to bite the bullet and homeschool our kids.
The book that changed us was Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling, by John Taylor Gotto.
In it he clearly articulates the various regimes and practices of modern public schooling that are designed to create conformity, obedience to authority, and a profound disconnect between and among the various subjects it 'teaches.'
Perhaps the greatest sin is that schools, both public and private quite often ruin a child's curiosity. As long as you don't do that, they'll be fine.
So we were able to homeschool and we did, and we are now 12 years into that experiment and I could not be happier with the results.
Our kids are curious and engaged and full of hope and life, as they should be. Everything is related, and interconnected and flat-out magical as long as you remain curious and they have. There. That was easy.
Education is not about collecting facts, it is about connecting facts. Well, at least that's what education should be, but all too often is not.
Why would we, as a population, agree to give ourselves substandard educations? Why would we not revel in the magical mystery tour that life is, as opposed to turning into drudgery at an early age? Teachers should really not be that at all, but mentors, more like experienced tour guides who know that it is far better to let the travelers round the corner and 'discover' the beautiful waterfall for themselves, than tell them all about it and force them to slice it into meaningless names before seeing it.
If any of you meet my kids (or have as the case may be) you'll see what I mean…they are intelligent human beings…not kids or students or children. And that is the potential birthright of every young human being…as long as they are not taught otherwise along the way.
[/quote]
This right here is why I moved from public to independent school teaching. My wife, who still teaches in the public system, now has to jump through so many flaming hoops and test-preparation strategies that are not only exhausting her, but are sucking from her the LOVE of teaching…which in my opinion is the most important characteristic any teacher can have. For my part, I will leave my profession the moment my passion for it dissipates, and when I feel I can no longer subvert the authority of the powers that be by teaching my kids to make the connections of history, and to THINK, rather than to memorize and regurgitate facts. Now, facts are important, don't get me wrong…but they are less important than the connections that can be made between those facts, or the trends and larger movements of history than can be seen from those facts. The problem is that we teachers, like anyone, have mortgages to pay and food to put on the table for our children. We have to follow the "rules" if we wish to remain employed, and when it comes down to the choice between being a dissident and unemployed or being a sheep going along with the system for the sake of making a living, most everyone I know would choose the latter. So, let's be kind with our teachers here…they are as much subjects of the system as anyone else, even though many teachers I know want to go back to an education system that teaches critical thinking. The problem is that teachers - like many professions - are not the ones who are in charge of education, nor educational policy. It's the PhDs and suits who determine it. Sound familiar?
I try my hardest to be a teacher who "flies under the radar" while teaching my kids, as much as possible, to think things through, to never blindly trust authority (even me…I tell them they should feel free to counter anything I say, as long as they have facts and details to back it up), to analyze and interpret, and to look for the history they AREN'T teaching you, rather than the canned shit they are trying to pass off as important. Am I perfect? Not by a long shot. But my first series of lessons on the modern world is where I ask them to use documents and maps to answer the question: "What were the consequences/effects of Columbus's accidental discovery of the "New World"?" On the first station they come across two maps - one from pre-Columbian Americas showing all the major tribal and ethnic groups, and then compare it to the map of the European colonies two hundred years later. Then I ask them to explain what story these maps are telling us. It's HARD for them to think outside the paradigm that Columbus was a hero and that the post-Columbian world was better off for it, but as newbies go they do a damn good job of coming up with the notion that those people are not here anymore, and then they begin to ask why. On my unit test on the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment, the most important questions I ask them are why was the Enlightenment revolutionary? and How did the scientific revolution change social attitudes about women? (answer: it didn't. It used science to further justify existing patriarchal views) The test finished up with them writing a paragraph explaining what they learned in this unit, why it is relevant (or not) today, and what they "take away" from what they learned. I'd love to try to include some photo examples of student responses embedded in this post, but I'm not proficient enough to figure out how to do that, and I have papers that are crying out to get graded, so I have no time to figure it out.
In my economics course, I am infusing elements of the Crash Course into what I'm teaching, but what may surprise you is how unsurprised the students are by the corruption, unsustainable nature and inherent frailty of the system. They are more observant than we sometimes give them credit for, and smarter too. When I explained how governments issued bonds to cover shortfalls in budgeting, it took maybe 5 seconds before one of them raised her hand and said "But, wait, a debt has to be paid off. So the more debt this generation takes on, the more we will have to pay back in the future, right?" Better yet, when I asked how the budget problems could be fixed, they collectively looked indignant…as if my question was an insult to their intelligence due to its simplicity.
"We could cut spending."
"We could increase taxes."
Then, the most brilliant response: "We're probably better off doing both. That way we don't have to raise taxes or cut spending as much individually."
I tell you, they're on to us. They know in the depths of their souls that the game is rigged and the party is coming to an end, and they trust us less for lying to them about it. In fact, I consider it the height of my teaching year so far when a student, examining some basic charts, asked if the system was "sustainable," and I responded "I don't think so, but you'll need to draw your own conclusion." Her riposte was, "can we fix it?" and I said, simply, that I didn't know, but I intended to continue trying. For the first time ever, I could see a respect on their faces underneath the fear generated by a teacher acknowledging the bitter truth; a respect that here was an adult who was not going to rose-color things up just to make them feel better.
When I teach about the Federal Reserve, unlike my partner teacher who will teach all the normal things, I will start them out with a video produced by the FED concerning its role in the economy, then I will show Chris's segment on the Fed. If asked which is the truth, I will not tell them anything other than that they need to look deeper and always ask why anyone in authority might say certain things…and then I'll let their already capable minds lead them. Others might disagree if these approaches are professional of me, of course, and I am walking a dangerous line. Even posting this much about it makes my skin tingle, as if the eyes of my school's administrators might somehow fall on this post and lose me my job. Public school teachers are watched a WHOLE lot more than I am, too.
So, my executive summary is this:
- Kids are smarter and more observant than we think, and most of them ain't fooled by the hypocritical and dishonest adult world around them.
- There are teachers out there in the system fighting against common core and the education of obedience. It'd be nice if more voters would help us out on that front, though.
- The majority of teachers are just trying to make ends meet too. Let's not blame them for this educational train-wreck in progress, please.
- Despite my own bugle-trumpeting, I'm not the best teacher out there. Trying my best, but that rarely translates into actually doing an excellent job.
Great points!..there are lots of moving pieces to this societal experiment. But, how much of what has happened to bring us to this seeming critical juncture has just been happenstance, and how much has been social engineering? Do you see "the elites fingerprints" upon the long-term trends in public education? I guess my premise is that there is indeed a nefarious unseen "guiding hand," that's determined to break down both the moral character and the general intelligence of the U.S. population…and that public schooling is one of the more effective tools that they use to this end.
Brad, I tend to stray away from conspiracy theories, and it would take much evidence to prove to me that there has been a deliberate plan and coherent vision coming together by the powers that be to dumb America down. Rather, I see it as a thousand little decisions - some made for nefarious reasons, and others made for noble ones - and the inherent chaos of the system that have led us to where we are today. I blame conservatives and liberals equally, but I don't think it has been planned and executed in any Orwellian way.
But, then again, I'm not too bright, so… 
Your assertions are false. The funds created by QE and used to purchase securities from the banks are NOT SEEKING ANY RETURN AT ALL and are all sitting to the tune of around $3 trillion in the excess reserves accounts of those banks at the Federal Reserve from whom the Federal Reserve purchased the securities. Those funds in the excess reserves accounts are paid interest at the Federal Funds Rate of 0.25% by the Federal Reserve.QE has has no impact whatsoever on either long term or short term yields (interest rates) in the bond markets. Those rates have been pushed to very low levels by VERY HIGH DEMAND FOR US TREASURIES where prices of bonds are inverse to yields. Demand for those bonds pushes up the prices which in turn lowers the yields.
[Moderator's note: Took the comment out of boldface type. All-caps and all-bold comments are the equivalent of yelling, and are not allowed on the forums.]
Chris, it is obvious you simply don't know what you are talking about. What I stated is completely correct. The Federal Reserve DOES NOT CONTROL ANY INTEREST RATES WHATSOEVER other than the two interest rates I specified correct which are:1) Federal Discount Rate - currently 0.75%
2) Federal Funds Rate (which it influences) - currently 0.25%
Both rates are only for VERY SHORT TERM LIQUIDITY PURPOSES AND APPLY ONLY TO BANK BORROWING, with the Federal Discount rate being for direct borrowing by banks from the Federal Discount Window at the Federal Reserve and the Federal Funds rate being for interbank borrowing.
The only 2 rates set by the Federal Reserve have absolutely nothing to do with the interest rates that banks pay on savings account, other than to "influence" the banks to perhaps pay higher or lower rates on those accounts.
The Federal Reserve HAS NO CONTROL WHATSOEVER ON YIELDS ON US TREASURIES and can only influence those in a limited way by jawboning and by increasing or lowering demand for them by buying or selling US Treasuries. The Federal Reserve holds less than 15% of all outstanding US Treasuries. The annual market for US Treasuries is around $9 trillion in newly issued US Treasuries from the US Treasury and the Federal Reserve only buys about 8% of these, mostly to replace matured US Treasuries which have been paid off in full to the Federal Reserve by the US Treasury. The Federal Reserve is essentially a RELATIVELY MINOR PLAYER in the overall market for US Treasuries with about 92% of all US Treasuries each year purchased by parties other than the Federal Reserve. Do you not comprehend that? If not, I would suggest you review US Treasuries at:
http://www.TreasuryDirect.gov
As to cash proceeds from QE, ALL OF THOSE PROCEEDS TO THE BANKS TO THE TUNE OF AROUND $3 TRILLION HAVE GONE DIRECTLY INTO THEIR EXCESS RESERVES ACCOUNTS AT THE FEDERAL RESERVE which is where those funds are sitting and have been sitting so there is obviously nothing else to do with those funds as you either ignorantly or naively assert.
EXCESS RESERVES ACCOUNTS OF BANKS TOP $2.5 TRILLION - WSJ
So what exactly are excess reserves, and why should you care? Like most central banks, the Fed requires banks to hold reserves—mainly deposits in their "checking accounts" at the Fed—against transactions deposits. Any reserves held over and above these requirements are called excess reserves.
Not long ago—say, until Lehman Brothers failed in September 2008—banks held virtually no excess reserves because idle cash earned them nothing. But today they hold a whopping $2.5 trillion in excess reserves, on which the Fed pays them an interest rate of 25 basis points—for an annual total of about $6.25 billion. That 25 basis points, what the Fed calls the IOER (interest on excess reserves), is the issue.
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303997604579238403178592262
[Moderator's note: Removed boldface type.]
[quote=Adam Price]Chris, it is obvious you simply don't know what you are talking about. What I stated is completely correct. The Federal Reserve DOES NOT CONTROL ANY INTEREST RATES WHATSOEVER other than the two interest rates I specified correct which are:
1) Federal Discount Rate - currently 0.75%
2) Federal Funds Rate (which it influences) - currently 0.25%
Both rates are only for VERY SHORT TERM LIQUIDITY PURPOSES AND APPLY ONLY TO BANK BORROWING, with the Federal Discount rate being for direct borrowing by banks from the Federal Discount Window at the Federal Reserve and the Federal Funds rate being for interbank borrowing.
The only 2 rates set by the Federal Reserve have absolutely nothing to do with the interest rates that banks pay on savings account, other than to "influence" the banks to perhaps pay higher or lower rates on those accounts.
The Federal Reserve HAS NO CONTROL WHATSOEVER ON YIELDS ON US TREASURIES and can only influence those in a limited way by jawboning and by increasing or lowering demand for them by buying or selling US Treasuries. The Federal Reserve holds less than 15% of all outstanding US Treasuries. The annual market for US Treasuries is around $9 trillion in newly issued US Treasuries from the US Treasury and the Federal Reserve only buys about 8% of these, mostly to replace matured US Treasuries which have been paid off in full to the Federal Reserve by the US Treasury. The Federal Reserve is essentially a RELATIVELY MINOR PLAYER in the overall market for US Treasuries with about 92% of all US Treasuries each year purchased by parties other than the Federal Reserve. Do you not comprehend that? If not, I would suggest you review US Treasuries at:
http://www.TreasuryDirect.gov
As to cash proceeds from QE, ALL OF THOSE PROCEEDS TO THE BANKS TO THE TUNE OF AROUND $3 TRILLION HAVE GONE DIRECTLY INTO THEIR EXCESS RESERVES ACCOUNTS AT THE FEDERAL RESERVE which is where those funds are sitting and have been sitting so there is obviously nothing else to do with those funds as you either ignorantly or naively assert.
EXCESS RESERVES ACCOUNTS OF BANKS TOP $2.5 TRILLION - WSJ
So what exactly are excess reserves, and why should you care? Like most central banks, the Fed requires banks to hold reserves—mainly deposits in their "checking accounts" at the Fed—against transactions deposits. Any reserves held over and above these requirements are called excess reserves.
Not long ago—say, until Lehman Brothers failed in September 2008—banks held virtually no excess reserves because idle cash earned them nothing. But today they hold a whopping $2.5 trillion in excess reserves, on which the Fed pays them an interest rate of 25 basis points—for an annual total of about $6.25 billion. That 25 basis points, what the Fed calls the IOER (interest on excess reserves), is the issue.
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303997604579238403178592262
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Let's see…you've called Chris ignorant, naiive, and stupid. Pray tell, how many multi-hour presentations have you done where you lay out a very data-driven and economically sound argument for why our financial system, energy system, and environment are all headed for crises? Published numerous articles on all sorts of economic trends and issues? What are your credentials again? I may not always agree with Chris on some finer points, but you're calling him stupid in the field he knows a hell of a lot about, so you might want to; a) give some respect in your tone, which right now resembles an adolescent who is pissed his Dad won't let him go to the party where all the girls are hanging out, and b) bring to the table some data and logic and engage him on his points directly. Oh, and don't quote the Wall Street Journal without back-checking their data. Posting things from the mainstream media here, and acting as if they are gospel, will get you as far as Paris Hilton will get, naked, in a gay bar.
Try refuting his points without resorting to name calling. It might make your argument more convincing.
THE FEDERAL RESERVE HAS NOTHING WHATSOEVER TO DO WITH INTEREST RATES PAID BY BANKS OR MONEY MARKET FUNDS TO SAVERS WITH TIME DEPOSITS. Nothing, nada, zip, zilch, nil.
The Federal Reserve CANNOT AND DOES NOT CONTROL INTEREST RATES AT ALL IN THE ECONOMY and only controls the following 2 interest rates which have nothing whatsoever to do with the economy:
- Federal Discount Rate - currently 0.75%
- Federal Funds Rate (which it influences) - currently 0.25%
Both rates are only for VERY SHORT TERM LIQUIDITY PURPOSES AND APPLY ONLY TO BANK BORROWING, with the Federal Discount rate being for direct borrowing by banks from the Federal Discount Window at the Federal Reserve and the Federal Funds rate being for interbank borrowing.
The only 2 rates set by the Federal Reserve have absolutely nothing to do with the interest rates that banks pay on savings account, other than to "influence" the banks to perhaps pay higher or lower rates on those accounts.
There is no minimum amount that was ever coded into regulations that banks have to pay on a savings account, although there were once maximums with Regulation Q which was part of the Glass Steagall Act and those were 5.25% for banks and 5.50% for thrifts (savings and loans).
Banks USED TO GENERALLY FOLLOW the Federal Discount Rate in terms of what they would pay savers as recently as 2007, but that was before they discovered that they could pay savers 0.000000000000000000001% and not have any significant loss of deposits.
As long as banks have LOW DEMAND FOR BORROWING against depositor funds, the chance of banks "competing" with other banks to pay higher rates to attract funds (which used to include FREE TOASTERS, etc. along with bonus interest rates for a period of time) is nada, zip, zilch, and nil.
[Moderator's note: This is a repeat post. Not allowed.]
Snyderman, you apparently don't comprehend the facts related to the Federal Reserve and interest rates, either. I'd suggest you read and attempt to comprehend exactly what I stated and further review the information available at:http://www.FederalReserve.gov
http://www.TreasuryDirect.gov
You haven't managed to refute a single point that I made and are just acting as an apologist for Chris and his delusional and dead wrong assertions.
[Moderator's note: At this point it is difficult to tell whether your animosity is serious, or whether you are simply having fun being a troll. I think you will find that the crowd at PP.com is a bit too mature and level-headed to be easily goaded into shouting back at you.]
Adam Price,
You've decided to challenge the presented work - it is therefor incumbent on you to display the data disproving the assertions made. The scientific method can steer all fact based dialog to a refined understanding. Provided you have the facts, you present them to support your claim.
You have given nothing to refute except links. Present the code or law that dictates the responsible party for interest rate laws and how they work, or accept the work as presented. That is how it works, and you'll find:
a. the attitude is entirely unnecessary here, and;
b. It won't get you very far.
Cheers,
Aaron
It would seem that he's the Darbikrash of modern economic theory.
Mr. Price - Whatever they are paying you, it's too much.
Mr Price has decided to utilize the "proof by repeated assertion" technique. I'm not impressed. He's a troll. End of story. I suggest: ignore him and hopefully he'll just go away.
[Moderator's note: A.M., time2help, davefairtex, and Snydeman, thank you for putting the maturity and level-headedness of our community on fine display. Adam Price will be taking a vacation from the forums now.]
[quote=Adam Price]Your assertions are false. T he funds created by QE and used to purchase securities from the banks are NOT SEEKING ANY RETURN AT ALL and are all sitting to the tune of around $3 trillion in the excess reserves accounts of those banks at the Federal Reserve from whom the Federal Reserve purchased the securities. Those funds in the excess reserves accounts are paid interest at the Federal Funds Rate of 0.25% by the Federal Reserve.
[/quote]
Adam, here's the thing about this site. We use facts.
To just cite one example, out of many, that I could pursue to demonstrate where your thinking is leading you astray, I'll use the bolded text above about excess reserves as a starting point.
If the facts that underlie the bolded parts are wrong we can save a LOT of time by not bothering to refute or attempt to counter the assertions built off of them, because they will be, by definition, flawed.
Make sense?
OK, so your main claim above is that all the funds created by QE are sitting in excess reserves and therefore cannot be out there influencing interest rates. If true that's a pretty good starting point for the rest of your arguments.
Luckily, the data we need to verify that claim is easily accessible with a few mouse clicks
From the Federal Reserve we find these data points.
Fed balance sheet on Sept 1, 2009 before the crisis hits = $895 billion.
Fed balance sheet today = $4,461.6 billion
Difference between the two = $3,566.6 billion (this is the total amount of Fed QE balance sheet additions)
Total excess reserves today = $2,667 billion
The difference between excess reserves and Fed QE additions = $899.6 billion
Thus, rounding up slightly, the amount of money out there influencing things like interest rates is $900 billion, which is more than the entire size of the Fed balance sheet before the crisis hit.
Your primary claim is that the injection of some $900 billion into the US financial system did not influence interest rates in any meaningful way, even though this amount was larger than the entire size of the pre-existing Fed balance sheet that had been accumulated through nearly 100 years of careful monetary policy execution.
That's not a reasonable claim, at all, ergo any assertions built off of that are potentially even more unreasonable.
As you've already noted, hopefully, we are allergic to unfounded assertions around here.
This caught my eye this morning;
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-24/fed-s-4-trillion-holdings-keep-boosting-growth-beyond-end-of-qe.htmlThis is a very, very simple point.. but I think it is lost on most folks. The balance sheet becomes a self-perpetuating source for ongoing QE.. in other words.. just because the FED has stopped printing money.. does not mean that the distortion to the bond market, and the resulting rate manipulation across the maturity spectrum (This one's for you Adam!) will end. Now I guess this balance sheet income amounts to sterilized QE, in other words not amounting to newly printed money... but it's still distortive, obfuscating the true supply vs. demand picture for US debt.As the Federal Reserve prepares to end its third round of bond buying next week, the central bank plans to hang on to the record $4.48 trillion balance sheet it has accumulated since announcing the first round of purchases in November 2008. …
Chair Janet Yellen opened the door to keeping a multi-trillion-dollar portfolio for years, saying a decision on when to stop reinvesting maturing bonds depends on financial conditions and the economic outlook. Shrinking the balance sheet to normal historical levels “could take to the end of the decade,” Yellen said at her press conference last month.
Think of it this way - if the FED merely allowed for the balance sheet to wind down via the self-liquidating (they get paid off) nature of bonds, it would be pretty painless, because they would not be "selling" per se… just not replacing. But they can't, or won't even do that. I suppose someone could take the balance sheet data and approximate the level of stimulus we are talking about… but let's just say that 10% of the balance sheet liquidates yearly, that's $448 B, or $37 B monthly. Any way you slice it, we are talking real money. Still think the economy is getting better?
Here we go;
Adam said,
THE FEDERAL RESERVE HAS NOTHING WHATSOEVER TO DO WITH INTEREST RATES PAID BY BANKS OR MONEY MARKET FUNDS TO SAVERS WITH TIME DEPOSITS. Nothing, nada, zip, zilch, nil.San Fran FED President John Williams said,The Federal Reserve CANNOT AND DOES NOT CONTROL INTEREST RATES AT ALL IN THE ECONOMY
San Francisco Fed President John Williams, who also supports ending QE, said in a presentation in Washington earlier this year that research shows purchases have “sizable effects” on lowering bond yields, though uncertainty remains about the magnitude of these effects and their impact on the overall economy. He cited several research papers showing QE2 lowered yields on the 10-year Treasury note by around 15 to 25 basis points.Since all interest rates, both paid and earned, key off of UST bond yields, I would say that the FED itself has invalidated Adam's trollish argument. I will stop now : )
Great points Snydeman. I also work in a private school now, but taught for years in public schools and universities.
Administrations originally were beneath the faculty in the hierarchy, but since they worked 12 months out of the year, they were eventually paid more, and then "paid more" eventually meant "more important." The policies and curriculums are being dictated from the top down. Look no further than Silicon Valley, which dictates to the government, which in turn tells the universities and so on down the line. Let's take the IPad/BYOD initiatives in public school that puts tablets in every kids hands. I can tell you these devices are not all they're cracked up to be. They distract the kids and the interface is pretty awful for education (can't type on them, difficult to use e-texts and to take notes). Some apps are okay, but even in private schools we're being told by the administration that we have to use them in our classes (literally, they ask us to send them a list of apps that you are using...heaven forbid we don't use any). What's interesting is there really isn't anyone under the age of 25-30 who grew up using these devices in the classroom, so we really don't know how they effect learning and the classroom environment, but you'd be hard-pressed to find a school that isn't racing to the finish line to outfit every student with a tablet. I can't tell you how many faculty meetings have been taken up with discussing what to do about students abusing their tablet in class (shopping, facebook, twitter, email, etc). Furthermore, we are now seeing seniors in high school that have trouble spelling simple words because they have been using a computer with spell check to write their papers for years. I agree with you as well about conspiracy, it would take a lot of evidence to convince me. Whether you call it dumbing down or narrowing, I think it lies in the millions of little "logical" decisions made over the years, and that creates an inertia that takes on a life of its own. Love your executive summary points!
The problem is that teachers - like many professions - are not the ones who are in charge of education, nor educational policy. It's the PhDs and suits who determine it. Sound familiar?
Oh good lord, don't get me started on the role of technology in the classroom! Our school started integrating required computer tablets 7 years ago for all students, and teachers were hard-pressed to figure out how to make technological education "innovative" (an overused and overvalued word, in my opinion). After three years, most teachers were still teaching the same way, but a few of us were seriously trying to utilize the technology to make learning more fun, efficient, and relevant. In my fourth year I piloted a program using Microsoft's OneNote program, where I toggled server permissions and sharing functions in such as way as to enable a digital class notebook, where I could drop notes, pictures, outlines, anything into an organized notebook that would almost instantly sync to student tablets. Students could also do their homework in a personal notebook which would sync with my own tablet, so handing in work was as simply as starting up your computer.
The great thing was that they could do group or individual work anywhere on campus and I could see what they were doing in real-time, correct any misunderstandings or problems, offer feedback, etc, in real-time! A great example was I had some students looking up the Roman religious system, and they were sitting down the hall on the floor, stretched out, doing their research. When they started listing out the GREEK names of gods, I circled the names with my tablet pen and wrote "these are the Greek gods. Look for the Roman equivalent!" I heard a squeal from the group a few seconds later, and then watched a few minutes after that as they updated the list. It was a truly "innovative" use of technology- that is, it supported or enhanced the learning. Most technology interferes, disturbs, or complicates learning, in my experience.
The punch-line of my story is that the following year my school went to a one-to-one computer policy, where students could bring in ANY computer (Apples, PCs, Tablets), and since there was no longer a required suite of programs the students had to use, my school stopped paying for MS OneNote, and students did too. SOOOOO much work, down the tubes. I'm not bitter.
Ok, just a little.
My favorite "innovation," by the way, was something called back-channeling, where students would participate in a chat room with one another and the teacher, answering questions and 'digging deeper' into the content of a film or documentary as they were watching it. Yes, they were expected to watch their computer screens, think deeply, and actively watch the movie at the same time. Beyond the ludicrous nature of this, it goes against all the brain research I've ever seen, not only on teenagers but on adults as well; we simply can not focus 100% on multiple things at once, especially if the tasks encompass similar modalities. So watching a screen and watching a screen simultaneously just aren't really possible without losing a lot in transition. Then again, had anyone asked an experienced teacher I'm pretty sure we could have saved them a lot of research money and told them it was a stupid idea.
Back-channeling now lies six feet under the soil in the cemetery of stupid pedagogical ideas generated by people with too little classroom experience and too much so-called education. May it rest in peace, and not come back as a zombie, as so many stupid pedagogical ideas seem to do.
In any case, after 7 years using tech in the classroom, I've learned the following:
-Kids hate reading anything online that is of any substantial length. They need to feel the paper in their hands, to annotate it, to see it in context, and to physically manipulate it.
-Computer technology in and of itself does not revolutionize education, anymore than the TV did for my generation. Kids are excited to use technology for what they want to use it for…not for what WE want them to use it for. Videotaping a boring lecture and posting the video online for students to trudge through doesn't make it any less a lecture nor any less boring. By comparison, during my unit on World War One, I have students go to a website and participate in a choose-your-own-path game that puts them in command of a British regiment in the trenches and asks them to make hard decisions and see the consequences play out on the screen. They never forget the lesson.
-If given the choice, kids won't even open their tablets. They don't choose to take notes on them, they don't choose to do research with them, and they certainly don't want to be forced to read on them.
-Technology fails, falters, hiccups, and can be hacked. I have yet to see any student have a picture they draw in their notebook get hacked and posted online. The server on a notebook never goes down. Opening up the notebook is only as slow as the person opening it. I've had ALL of these things happen regularly when using tech in my room. Usually, of course, these things fail when I really need them to work…so I've learned not to lean on technology overly much.
-All this technology is fine during an era of still-cheap energy, but where will we be in five or ten years time, when energy and resource costs have likely spiraled out of control? For all the talk administrators and education PhDs have about the "future of education," precious few of them seem to pay enough attention to the likely outlook of the future. Then again, maybe I'm wrong and we're going to be just fine, but I doubt it.
I'm sure I'm missing something, but trust me…I feel your pain!
All debts get repaid; somehow.
95% or so of 'money' is created by banks as debt (plus any services and assets that banks purchase). This money circulates and eventually comes back to the banks as principal and interest repayments to be destroyed.
Savings is just 'money' that is in circulation but stationary at the moment. i.e. waiting to be spent and circulated again.
The central banks are lenders of last resort. Debt default cascades down to the central banks who, in practice, simply rolled over the debt. Providing enough new debt is issued to repay older debts and interest, the show continues to roll. If not enough new debt is issued (like in Greece), then savings and existing assets get liquidated i.e. gold reserves get taken, National assets gets privatised, individual savings account get raided.
May I add, that this is the financial system we have now, i.e. based on debt, but there are many others ways that 'money' in circulation could be created, which may or may not be more suited to an age of declining Net energy production. A topic for future discussion perhaps.
Ed