education spending

[Brad De Long]

>Brad De Long said the other day:
>
>>a serious (OK, semi-serious) push to increase educational
>>attainment
>
>As far as the U.S. government contribution, it's largely rhetorical. Here's
>federal spending on the budget category called "Education, training,
>employment, and social services" as a percent of GDP:
>
>1962           0.219%
>1970           0.856%
>1980           1.171%
>1990           0.682%
>1993           0.772%
>1998           0.653%
>2004 (proj)    0.647%
>
>So, spending rose a bit during the Bush years and has fallen in the Clinton
>years - and Clinton's own budget projects a further decline over the next 5
>years even before the cretins in Congress get a hold of it.
>
>Yes, education is mostly a state and local responsibility, but for all the
>blather Clinton & Co. have uttered over the last 6 years, there ain't no
>money where their very active mouths are.
>
>Doug

Yep. You're right...

Brad DeLong

-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
"Now 'in the long run' this [way of summarizing the quantity theory of
money] is probably true.... But this long run is a misleading guide to
current affairs. **In the long run** we are all dead.  Economists set
themselves too easy, too useless a task if in tempestuous seasons they can
only tell us that when the storm is long past the ocean is flat again."

--J.M. Keynes
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
J. Bradford De Long; Professor of Economics, U.C. Berkeley;
Co-Editor, Journal of Economic Perspectives.
Dept. of Economics, U.C. Berkeley, #3880
Berkeley, CA 94720-3880
(510) 643-4027; (925) 283-2709 phones
(510) 642-6615; (925) 283-3897 faxes
http://econ161.berkeley.edu/
<delong at econ.berkeley.edu>