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Find more Kappan articles in the
THE MOST striking aspect of these three critiques is the position each takes with respect to the economic analysis contained in the first half of Tough Choices or Tough Times, the report of the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce. Michael Petrilli and Denis Doyle characterize the economic analysis as obviously accurate and old news. Lawrence Mishel and Richard Rothstein spend most of their space assailing the same economic analysis as obviously flawed. The economic analysis in the report is a red flag to Mishel and Rothstein for different reasons. Mishel is affiliated with a group of economists who are committed to the view that government has an obligation to create policies to ameliorate the effects of capitalism on the poor. This group views arguments of the kind made in the Commission's report as weapons that their political opponents can use to prove that education alone will get people out of poverty and that the nation therefore need not invest in everything from food stamps to Social Security to tax credits for the working poor. Rothstein represents the views of educators who deeply resent being blamed for the failings of American business when the economy is doing poorly and never being thanked when the economy is doing well. I am actually quite sympathetic to both sentiments, but they have little bearing on the Commission's report. Mishel and Rothstein attempt to discredit the report by demolishing statements that the report never actually makes. They set up their argument by saying that the Commission sees "skill development as virtually the only policy lever for shaping the economy" (emphasis in original). Actually, that is not true. On page 22 of Tough Choices or Tough Times, we say, "Successfully running a national economy based on technological growth depends on assured strength in many areas," and we go on to provide a long paragraph filled with examples that have nothing to do with elementary and secondary education, including strong research universities, sustained national investment in basic research, good protections for intellectual property, and the availability of venture capital. The fact is that we never said that skill development is virtually the only policy lever for shaping the economy. And no serious economic analyst would say that it was. But why was it so important for Mishel and Rothstein to attribute that view to the Commission? Because, short of that extreme position, one can maintain only that skill development is an important tool for shaping the economy. That is in fact our position. But Mishel and Rothstein know that it is very hard for them to attack that position, much as they might wish to do so. Three distinguished economists -- Theodore Schultz, Robert Solow, and Gary Becker -- won the Nobel Prize in economics for their contributions to the conclusion that education is a major contributor to economic growth, which is the very position that the Commission's report takes. That is why Denis Doyle said that "the notion that education . . . is the source of most wealth is by now old news." But what about the other complaint, that the report's premises are obviously wrong, given that the United States experienced extraordinary economic success in the 1990s, immediately following the release of the first Commission's report in 1990, in which we said that our country's economy was in jeopardy because of our poor educational performance? Surely, they say, such economic success following such dire predictions shows how unfounded those predictions were! No, actually, it doesn't. Though economists believe that investments in people's knowledge and skills are among the most important investments we can make in economic growth, they also point out that these investments have among the longest lead times of any public investments we can make. Consider the current report. Judging by past events, it could easily take 20 years or more for the ideas in this report to be implemented at scale. From that point forward, it could take close to 20 additional years before most of the 3-year-olds affected by those policies operating at scale have entered the work force. And it would be years beyond that before the people who had been educated under the new system constituted a majority of the work force. That amounts to a 50-year lead time between the point at which the recommendations are made and the time that the full effects of those recommendations are felt in the work force. The economic boom of the 1990s was largely the result of the enormous productivity improvements that we achieved as a result of the flight of highly talented refugees from Hitler during World War II; the magnet we subsequently became for talent from China, India, and other Asian countries; the enormous investments we made during World War II and in the postwar years in basic and applied research; the wisdom of the investments made through the GI Bill; the great expansion in secondary and higher education during the 1950s and 1960s; and so on. All of these investments, combined with the unique advantages the U.S. enjoyed in terms of availability of venture capital, protections of intellectual property rights, and our high tolerance for business failure and support for those willing to take risk, made the 1990s possible. Far from disproving the connection between investment in people's skills and economic outcomes, the 1990s actually prove the point. Because of the long lead times involved in this sort of investment, it is particularly important to ask how the student body is likely to change over the period in question. We point out in the Commission's new report that the current heavy flow of immigrants from countries with poor education systems means that we will have to greatly improve the performance of our education system just to maintain current levels of student achievement, a point that Mishel and Rothstein ignore. Mishel and Rothstein sarcastically ask what economic theory suggests that employers are short of skilled workers when wages for people with some college are flat. Actually, what the data show is that the returns to education are greater now than they have ever been before, meaning that the correlation is tighter between what you know and what you earn than ever before, and the difference in earnings between those who have more education and those who have less is growing steadily greater. We point out in the report that the middle class is getting smaller, but not because all of its members are getting poorer. Those with less education are getting poorer, and those with more are getting richer. This is exactly what the theory of supply and demand would predict. The price of highly educated labor is going up because the demand for it is going up faster than the supply. The price of low-skill labor is going down because the supply is ever larger and the demand is steadily decreasing. Interestingly, Mishel and Rothstein never mention the section of the report that chronicles the steadily rising costs of our elementary and secondary education system, over time and in relation to the systems of other countries; the failure to substantially improve student achievement despite that rise in costs; and the steady increase in the number of other countries that outperform the U.S. in measured student achievement and attainment. Can they seriously believe that these statistics do not threaten the ability of the U.S. to maintain or improve the standard of living for the American people? Their comments appear to suggest that the only important issue is how our wealth is shared among us. That is an important issue, though not one that this Commission was established to investigate. But, surely, it matters just as much how much wealth there is to divide and what it will take for individuals to succeed in the intense competition that lies ahead. That is the issue we addressed. I TURN now to the critiques of the report's recommendations. Doyle's primary quarrel with the recommendations is not that they would not be effective ways to improve the system, but rather that the powers that be will not allow them to see the light of day. Only events will prove him right or wrong, but I have another, less pessimistic, view. Doyle notes that the accelerated graduation recommendation is no more than many other countries have been doing for years, but says it has no chance of enactment here. Why? Because we are so committed to access and equity in higher education. We have had a chance to talk with a number of state P-16 councils, representatives of national higher education associations, state higher education boards, and state legislators since the report was released. They know that the current system is not working, that the majority of high school students never get to higher education, and that a majority of those who do, drop out because they cannot do the work. They know that is neither access nor equity. When we point out that our plan would prepare a much, much larger proportion of high school students for college and make sure that they are ready to do college-level work when they arrive, we get very positive responses. Based on what I have seen so far, I think there are much stronger grounds for optimism than Doyle allows. Referring to the Commission's recommendation concerning contract schools, Doyle asks whether he alone remembers the performance-contracting "fiasco" run by the Office of Economic Opportunity. But he does not say whether he regards that fiasco as a failure of design, implementation, politics, timing, or something else altogether. It is clear that some charter schools are brilliant successes and others abject failures and that some of the difference is attributable to the degree to which they are held strictly accountable for the performance of the students in their care. A large part of our economy runs quite successfully under the concept that an organization will be paid to deliver services under a contract that stipulates the standards of performance that must be met in order to retain that contract. It is hard on the face of it see why this concept should not be applied to those who would educate our children. Finally, Doyle challenges the Commission's proposal for reallocation of funds within the system, again, not on the grounds that the ideas are misguided, but on the grounds that the system will not permit the proposed savings to be realized. That may or may not be true, but, if it is true, our country's prospects for significantly improving our education system are very poor. Based on the response that our report has gotten among elected officials since it was released, I am actually quite confident that we are going to be able to find a few states lucky enough to have political leaders willing to take on these issues and succeed. And all we need are a few states. That is how real reform always starts. Petrilli finds a lot to like in the report but wonders whether we go far enough. He points out that, if we are to make the kinds of changes the Commission wants in the secondary school curriculum, then the elementary school curriculum will have to be rethought, too. Amen, I say. And he asks whether we were sufficiently ambitious in projecting the proportion of students who could benefit from a demanding curriculum like the International Baccalaureate program or a program made up of AP courses. It is true that our estimate of that proportion, though larger than the present number, was still modest relative to the whole cohort of students. We aimed to be realistic, but we would applaud any state that chooses to set its sights higher. Which brings me back to Mishel and Rothstein. They actually begin their assault with praise -- for the Commission's attention to income inequality, the special challenges faced by disadvantaged students, improved teacher compensation, preschool for all, and augmented school time when necessary. The only recommendation they chose to take issue with was the one having to do with teacher compensation. They do not object to our recommendations for greatly adding to teachers' cash compensation. But they do object to changing teachers' retirement benefits from the current defined-benefit plans to defined-contribution or cash-balance plans, as the Commission recommends. Their claim that teachers' benefits are not out of line with those of most Americans is based on a complex analysis. Our analysis, which comes up with a very different conclusion, is equally complex, so we have put it up on our website (www.skillscommission.org) for all who wish to peruse it. But Mishel and Rothstein do not argue with our assertion that what we propose is nothing more than providing for school teachers the same retirement systems and benefits that college teachers now have. It is hard to see why teacher unions, many of whose members are college teachers, should object to having K-12 teachers living with the same system, about which the college teachers have never complained. But more to the point, we would have the states offer practicing teachers their choice: either join the new system or stick with the one you have. No serving teacher, under our proposals, would be forced to enter the new system. But, by offering young people a whole new deal that provides much higher cash compensation, we could attract the best and brightest of our college entrants to teaching. And Mishel and Rothstein never tell us why they object to that. MARC TUCKER is president of the National Center on Education and the Economy, Washington, D.C., and co-chair of the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce. (c)2007, Marc Tucker. |
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