very good

diabase agreed, I was going to mention the same thing. But hasn't that been the same for any super power. The term Eurocentric was coined centuries later to describe how much of the world had been defined by European culture not because they were doing more, rather that they controlled the accessible media at the time, books.

And notwithstanding the measure that we use for what makes someone smart or not so smart. Locally it is about being able to pass a regional examination in mathematics and English Language and if you are unable to you can't get into University. It puts a crazy amount of pressure on 15 to 17 year olds worse that they usually have 7 other examinations to take at the same time. Perhaps building a culture of failure as well.

I was a 3 sport kid in highschool ... basketball for 3 years, and tried to start a rugby team and league (a decade later it magically started), and was part of a fledgling water polo team. Sports are great for team building, yada yada yada but they do suck you in taking more of your time than it should - they are nothing more than a subject that you can make a career at.

i played basketball and ran cross-country in high school in addition to playing club hockey... and i agree that sports are incredibly important for development... HOWEVER, high school football in texas, which sarah is talking about, is a totally different ball of wax... which i believe is the point that she's trying to make...

though that Texan football obsession has created some beautiful vertigo inducing works of architecture.... so it can't be all wrong.

Atechno, the theories regarding how a disproportionate amount of property tax ends up in distant public schools is pretty complex issue.

However, one issue can be spelled out pretty simply... in most areas across the US, school districts are a multi-municipal configuration. There are very few places where the school district and it's city or metropolitan borders are the same (NYC, Houston).

A way to describe this in other terms is often these school districts also come with taxes that change rates based on zoning and density. And any number of unincorporated or incorporated areas may pay different taxes regarding aspects of what that school district offers.

So, the issue here is that there's not a standard millage or percentage that applies to all properties-- a blanket tax in a sense. In addition, many states allows residents to claim homestead exemptions that further decrease their tax burden. There's more complications to it... but here's a breakdown:

Two properties sit on the same block-- they have the same utilities and same infrastructure. The lots are also roughly the same size. They also have similar FAR (floor area ratios).

Property A is a corner store.

It's appraised value is $750,000. Suppose this corner store follows some of the exemptions prescribed (outdoor furniture, low-water usage, landscaping) that reduces it's taxable value by $100,000.

However, the zoning doesn't give this property any school taxable exemptions.

Property B is a house. It's appraised value is $250,000. But because of exemptions, it's taxable value is only $175,000.

Property A is zoned different than Property B.

Property A's tax rate is 0.02%. Property B's tax rate is 0.017%.

However, since Property B is a house... its school taxable value is only $125,000. Property A does not receive any exemptions for school taxable value.

Property A pays $13,000.
Property B pays $2,125.

Three problems here:

*Commercial property is always overvalued by property appraisers (leading to high taxes).

*Residential property gets far too many exemptions while commercial property rarely receives any-- this gives businesses no incentive to do anything other than be purely profit driven.

*While some businesses get discounts for some utilities, they often pay higher rates for others. Two adjacent properties, with different uses, pay different rates to draw the same electricity from the same lines and dump the same sewage into the same pipes.

Federal funding for education only makes up approximately 40-60% of a schools budget. The rest of that money comes from state income taxes (if you live in a state that has them) and property tax. We can safely assume here that residential properties are not paying much for their education.

So, how do suburbs 'steal' tax money? They don't contribute it.

Educational districts are usually county or multiple county -wide districts. Even if a city lowers its tax rate for properties, the state or county collects it and distributes it based on a number of factors.

Since most urban areas have higher tax rates and higher property value appraisals than their suburban counterparts, they pay significant more taxes for similar services even if there's not a single person living on the actual block.

It would be one thing to pay higher taxes as a business if your legal entity was doing things like widening sidewalks, adding bike lanes, executing beautification programs, providing landscape et cetera.

Many businesses have also relocated to the suburbs themselves where the overall infrastructural demands are lower which relieves their tax burden too.

Why pay for school and sidewalks?

And to answer the more complex question regarding this situation with much shorter answer, this competitiveness stems from planning suggestions made in the 1950s and 1960s about "marketing cities."

One of the larger figures in this movement was Charles Tiebout. He created this fancy little system known as the "Tiebout Model."

The Tiebout Model is essentially the idea of creating places having fixed price points-- that a city is a collection of services that costs the user a "subscription fee" based on what they want to purchase.

If we ignore costs like emergency services, healthcare and education, the difference between semi-developed (water, power, unlined ditches, basic paved roads, basic sidewalks) and a fully-developed (water, sewer, underground power, runoff, large sidewalks, gas, cobblestone streets, parallel parking) is really only a few hundred to a maybe a $1,000 at most in tax costs.

His model woefully ignored moving costs, restricted mobility and transportation. And because of his familiarity with infrastructure, this model also didn't include 'planned obsolesce.'

(All 'pre-modern [before 1960s]' infrastructure is tremendously overbuilt in both capacity and quality. So, his view of the world was more in line with when we use to line sewers with tile, storm drains large enough to canoe in and no more granite curbs!)

Much of the built environment between the 1960s and 1990s was built on this idea of price point and amenities. Unfortunately, we didn't forecast that "soft services [police, healthcare, education]" would spiral out of control nor did we forecast that our new modern infrastructure would have to be replaced every 20-30 years.

Many cities have realized that "hard services [utilities, streets, parks]" remain relatively constant in cost no matter the amount of users or uses. In that, they've used the bulk of population to create extraordinarily high property values with some of the lowest tax rates possible.

The Tiebout Model was created to combat the free rider problem. The "free rider problem" is the parasitic nature of certain entities to consume more than they produce [in public resources]. Despite many cities using the Tiebout Model for matters of placemaking and marketing places as "lifestyle choices," they eliminated the concept of "fairness" but creating exemptions, incentive programs and manipulating the tax collection system.

This is what basically the CATO Institute constantly recommends but they seem to imbibe their research with a little bit of "toxic" libertarian rhetoric.

They're more in favor of eliminating "schemes" all together, too.

But traditional urbanists and libertarian planners have a significant amount ideology in common regarding the physical structure, nature and costs of cities.

Unfortunately, most people would not be happy if their property tax bills doubled or tripled. And considering the cost of transportation these days, I'm not sure many people could actually afford it even in a country as affluent as the US.

All I know is that my daughter's private school has a fraction of the resources of the local Chicago Public School and she, who turned five a couple of weeks ago, can read her Maisy book to me at bedtime. Her kindergarten classmates can do the same. The children at the public school are of varying abilities and have half-day kindergarten to my daughter's nine hour school day.

I was off all things an English tutor at Harold Washington College in 1990. I would listen to this African-American speaker who railed against the "spending is everything" approach to education. He said that the biggest influences on our children's education isn't money but:

1) What the children expect from each other. If the children believe that education is important, then they will be motivated to learn.

2) What the children's parents expect from them. If your mom is gonna kick your but if you don't behave at school and do you home work, you get it done.

3) What the teacher expects from the student. If the teacher demands excellence, then students are put on notice.

4) What the student expects from the teacher.

And then the curriculum.


Also, private schools like my daughters, where the majority of students come from moderate to low-income households, have the advantage that everyone shows up wanting to learn. It is a motivated group. They may only have xeroxes and no text books, but my daughter can read, write and add and subtract two and, now, three digit numbers.

Anyway, I am very happy about it. :-)

The best local public schools in Chicago are not as good as where my daughter goes to school. Her school goes through 3rd grade. We'll see after that. The best public elementary schools in Chicago are not very good. We'll avoid them at all costs even though both of us parents pay property taxes on to of tuition.

not true - if you own a commercial property you can also write off depreciation same as you can with residential property. up until the mid 80s it was something like 1/10 or 1/15th of the value - which was incredibly high, and the only reason we have malls (which still are not profitable unless heavily subsidized) and suburban office parks and other kinds of suburban development. right now the "official" depreciation rate is 1/39th of the total value of the building (i.e life of building according to the IRS is 39 years). but there are ways to front load this so that you can claim that portions of your building will depreciate in something like 5 to 10 years (which apparently means you can make back a significant portion of your investment in a couple years just on tax breaks)... I think accountants call it "accelerated depreciation."

really - commercial real-estate (especially in suburbia) is still pretty close to being a shell game.

AND - there are other subsidies... which I won't get into...

@ rusty, don't remember that particular bit but quite like the mercer report.

@ strawbeary, now you sound conservative (re immigrants fkucing up the IQ of proper merikans). don't think japanese are any different than north americans when it comes to it. education is just valued here. same as in india but without the population bomb.

as a more or less liberal i am quite cool with asking people to take care of things themselves and stop whining about it. unless they really can't -
in which case we should all lend a hand and stop whining about it. especially when it doesn't cost anything. being wise enough to know the difference is not so easy, which is perhaps why we all just decide to decide ahead of time...

good luck donna with the math program.

Make, my son loves maisy. We started with the cartoon, and then I discovered the books. I even made him a stuffed maisy.

I don't argue that sports aren't valuable, I'm arguing their place in the school day. Shouldn't extra-curricular activities stay, well extra-curricular? Is it binifitial for students to take an hour or more from the actual schoolday to play sports? And is it smart to schedule games and tournaments during the schoolday? This is my issue with sports. Sports are great to teach team building and fitness, but it shouldn't be held as a career choice. The chances that the students will go pro is slim. And while they may use sports to get into college, they need to be able to read higher than a 4th grader if they want to stay there.

That high school where I'm teaching has a football stadium to rival some colleges. They also have a fully turfed indoor practice field for when it's yucky outside. IT'S FOOTBALL YOU PANSIES!!

Inside of Stadium...


I cant find an image online of the exterior. Figures.

I just want to remind everyone that while sports *can* teach self-esteem, sports has a pretty high record of destroying self-esteem too. And while sports *can* inspire team-building, sports can also inspire vicious competition. And while sports *can* teach to try your best, sports can also teach that cheating is acceptable if it means your team wins.

I'd also remind everyone that these positive attributes, as well as negative, can also be learned via choir, orchestra, debate, and chess. And Solar Decathlon.

Screw sports. Physical fitness is good, but competitive sports are the antithesis of educational goals. IMO.

Actually, persons of Japanese descent DO have measurably higher IQ's. Both Japanese nationals and Japanese Merikans. Not sure about NZ, but it might be true. Studies were done in an attempt to show that standardized tests weren't culturally biased. So that is a fact, not rhetoric. Culture and education are just two compents of intelligence, genetics is the other, the one we don't like to admit. I don't have data on other groups, so this is an observation by the schools and teachers I work with that I have heard about - Hispanic culture values family, food and the good life. Fine. But it also means education excellence falls a bit lower on the cultural value scale as compared to the Japanese. Many hispanic families pull their kids out of school for a month or more, often without even giving notice to the school! It is a cultural thing, they go visit family, etc. But when they come back and the students are behind in their lessons, how is the school supposed to forgive this behavior and be equipped to accomodate it? They aren't. Should we work to accomodate this cultural phenomena, one that is at odds with the educational culture we have in place? Or should those that refuse to participate properly in the programs we have established suffer because of it? I'm not racist, far from it, but I would expect to fail out of school if I took a month or two off every year and didn't supplement my education to stay afloat somehow. I'm centrist, so I say let's define the problems and meet in the middle, of course. But the real problem I'm defining is that the first step is defining the problem/s, something that is pretty unpopular because of progressive values.

Regional geography bee 2nd place here, should have been first place. Let's not let the Amerikans with the bad geography skills represent all Amerikans. Let's not call Amerikans stupid by comparing the worst of them with the best of others. Just because Amerikans export their stupidity doesn't mean that is the norm, or that is all we have to offer, it means that is what you are focusing on or hearing about. After all, Amerikans represent and export intelligence too, it is just harder to see, not as funny.

Donna, that is why choice and variety are important, and also why it is dangerous to extend extreme views (texas football) to all sports. I am not a music or theater person, so I shouldn't have opportunities to develop skills because my natural inclination was to do it through sports? Isn't that pushing your values on others, something progressives like to associate with conservatives?

Thanks for the mind f*ck, all. This is fun.

Source for this IQ study, Straw? The one that you said was done in an attempt to show that standardized tests aren't culturally biased, in other words, a study with a foregone conclusion? Because the last time I hunted down one of your sources that denied climate change it came from a thinktank funded entirely by Exxon.

wait - they take time out of the school day for sports? is that normal in other states? that's pretty unthinkable around here.

Not sure what source that was, Donna, but if I quoted a source from Exxon, it would have been a peer reviewed one, that is how the science world works to eliminate bias from any source. If I had a source from Exxon that wasn't peer reviewed, I apologize and will be more careful from now on.

As for Japs having higher IQ's was in that book I read about nueroscience, I didn't read the actual study.

strawbeary,

Here's a study I pulled from my behind, that once for all proves that liberals and atheists have higher IQ's than cons and the faitful.

So, if you want to be taken seriously as a conservative herb-derp, keep your mouth open at all times :)

And that study was supposedly done by a 'Jap'. So they should know, right?

Rusty, don't you have some nails to pound somewhere? Two common explanations for the Liberals having higher IQ's is that 1) Intelligent people are more likely to say they are liberal, but in fact may not be. So those studies are flawed because you have to take people's word for it, you simply can't account for that variable. Liberalism and conservatism are pretty hard to understand and categorize - see above conversation, and more intelligent people are more likely to say they are liberal because it is popular. 2) Liberals or progressives are evolutionarily novel (by definition, your article even says this). Since evolutionarily novel people tend to be people living in large cities and/or attending higher education where liberal values are more popular because of the density and diversity of the institutions and cities they reside in, it would make sense that a study could show progressives as being smarter, but it doesn't make it so.

By the way, I'm not set out to PROVE anything, more so to excercise thinking in a different way and seeing if I still have the same opinions, and I'm reporting that I don't have the same opinions anymore, although I do have the same values.

I now ask: Why do conservatives give more $ to charity? I think it is because the importance in charity giving for conservatives is not to give in and of itself in order to make oneself feel good, but to give to those that they chose, not random strangers through a centralized bureacracy. Both groups have good intentions, but one is evolutionarily novel, more progressive than the other, two different ways of doing the same thing according to individual values, and both accomplishing the noble task of helping out someone in need. See #2 above.

straw - there is no difference in born IQ across ethnicities or socioeconomic groups - it's entirely cultural -and more a result of a dominant group keeping another group down (for example - off the top of my head - I know that Koreans who live in Japan score lower than Japanese in IQ tests, but Koreans living in Korea are statistically equal to Japanese).

besides - ethnicity/race is a social construct - not biological. If you had taken any education courses on cognitive development within the past 20 years you'd know this. this research has been around since at least the 80s and I know there are definitely genetic studies done in the 90s. If I have time I'll pull some sources - but I'm sure if you google it you'll find several academic articles on this subject.

this is fine and all, but may i just say that - as of today - we have officially kept our youngest daughter alive for four years. !!

happy monday all.

Another flaw with Dr Kanazawa's study is the test he used to measure intelligence. I am not qualified to give the test or evaluate the results of it, but I am familiar with that test, and it is far from an IQ test. I'm sure the Dr is intelligent, but not an intelligent study or conclusion, but a popular one because of our culture, wouldn't you say?

toaster, I simply mean IQ has a significant hereditary component, along with environmental. I say race, but I mean genetics. Twins separated at birth and raised in completely different environments have very similar intelligence levels.

Toasteroven, I know about depreciation and income tax exemptions.

What I was referring to was property tax exemptions. In many tax structures, you'll have an appraisal value, a taxable value and a school taxable value.

Unless you live in an area with a form-based code or an area that gives out development incentives in the form of tax rebates, the appraisal value and the taxable value are the same.

The tricky thing with property tax, unlike income tax, is that is due yearly rather than quarterly. So, any small changes to millage, taxable value or a new assessment can make your property tax jump up thousands to tens of thousands of dollars.

If you own, you'll have to pay this. If you lease, you're going to have an unhappy landlord who either stops maintain the property for a period of time or attempts to renegotiate the lease terms (i.e., higher rents).

Oh, hogwash.

If donations to all religious organizations are excluded, liberals give slightly more to charity than conservatives do. But that's besides the point. Americans give 1.67 percent of G.N.P to charity. Europeans come across as stooges in comparison (British give at 0.73 percent, while French, at 0.14 percent). European classes are perhaps in lesser need of charity by others?

A lot of it has to do with the way taxes are structured in US (some of these studies relied on date from itemized deductions found on tax returns), what constitues a non-profit charity, and overall distrust of federal government on the right.

The most religious person in my family give 10% of his family's income to his church. Yes, it's a non-profit, and he gets to claim that expense on his tax return. He may see it as charity, but when his money ends up funding obstinate only lobby groups, I tend to think of his contributions more as a form of domestic terrorism.

err

Abstinence not obstinate.

Back to pounding in nails with my forehead.

uh - so you're saying that japanese have less genetic variation than other "ethnicities?" We're talking blanket statements about certain "ethnic groups" - not intelligence variation between two people who share essentially the same genes. I will counter with the fact that non-identical twins and siblings can and often do have huge differences in their intelligence levels - and they have the same parents.

I really hope you don't teach science.

morning all. congrats Steven..

rusty, "obstinate only education" is the best neologism I've read all day!

Why would you exclude religious donations, Rusty??? As a non-religious person, to think all religious groups and churches are corrupt is a place I won't even go. Again, the qualities of a few bad apples shouldn't be applied to the entire group, is that how you draw conclusions, Rusty? I thought you were smarter than that. Since I'm not religious, I find other avenues to support people I want to, so I support women, education, and disabled people with my charity donations. But that is because those are my VALUES. People give thru church and church groups because they feel evolutionarily close to those people, and that extension of good-will has a better chance of coming back to help them.

I better go away for awhile. I really do have things to attend to that I'm procrastinating on, paying taxes. :) This is just so much more interesting.

Not exclude, but put a gigant asterisk next to it. Religious organizations tend to have their own agenda. Sometimes this agenda is downright harmful to others. See gay rights. I just don't want anyone to think of themselves as a morally superior just because they donate money to 'protect christian family values' derpathon.

"I thought you were smarter than that"

Nope! Never said that.

Go do your taxes stinky.

it has nothing to do with churches being corrupt. donating to a church is definitely as much self-interest as it is altruism - given that what a good part of what members are paying for is ongoing programming from which they directly benefit. and if you get to reduce your tax obligation to the gubmint, more the better!

definitely not the same thing as a dare to care or salvation army or similar where a significant percentage of the giving goes directly to the charitable mission.

"I will counter with the fact that non-identical twins and siblings can and often do have huge differences in their intelligence levels" They do? Interesting. I understand otherwise. And no I don't teach science, the company I work for isn't a school, we support the classroom teachers (both private and public, and the teachers are very thankful, they need us, they give us our business because they have things they can't handle so we take some of the biggest problems off their plate so they can focus on their jobs). Basically, when there is a problem with a student, we work to figure out what the problem is and work to solve it.

I just did some more reading about the herditary component of intelligence. I found that it is estimated that the hereditary component of intelligence is somewhere around .75. This is on a scale of 0 to 1, with 1 meaning high correlation, and 0 being low correlation. It is different with children than with adults, with the correlation being less strong, about .45.

I would probably donate money to a church if they would stop building churches out of "order-off-the-internet" piecemeal warehouses.

I seriously vomit a little bit in my own mouth when I see a church operating out of an over-sized Ted Shed.

If you value family christian values, why is it bad to want your money to support those values? Self-interest is evolutionarily unnovel, so unpopular among progressives who tend toward altruism, two ways of doing the same thing.

I have to go file a bunch of grubberbmint paperwork now.

That's fine. BUT if your primary goal is to spite other members of your community, just please don't call it charity work. mmkay?

Fair enough, but to assume those that give to their churches have the intent of spite mkaes me think you are applying extreme views to the whole again, which gets us nowhere.

Can glitter centaur please come over and fill out these forms please. My head is spinning.

$150 dollar initial consult fee (includes 4 hours) plus $20 per hour. If you'd like a more retainer-type basis, I charge a $100 a week whether or I do work or not. However, if called in, I gaurantee a minimum of 6 hours.

I'll also do housekeeping for an additional $50. Will have to provide lemon pledge, though.

I do not clean keyboards, though.

If you let glitter do your taxes, you'll likely to end up in a North Korean debtor's rock-smash-forever jail.

I have no problem with churches. It's people who go there that worry me.

It is the company's taxes and forms. The city stuff is what I'm confused about, and it should be the easiest. Your rates have inspired me to call the tax guy at the city. He is free!!!! I mean tax-payer funded.

What does "evolutionarily unnovel" mean?

Good question. What do you think it means?

jump maybe you have seen this but The Globe and Mail has an article entitled Winnepeg's Fork huts provide shelter and inspiration which includes some discussion with 5468796 Architecture

cheers on Donna, I too was questioning the bit on "standardized testing" we had this argument at an academic board meeting and we found peer reviewed information as well. The testing in itself wasn't what was culturally biased it was what was in them that was often the problem.

*damn* had to reboot now my comment above seems petty. Nothing here to see move along.

So anyone see that new/Nou Jean Nouvel building??

Well when I try to google it I get evolutionarily "novel" results only, and all the names of the websites looks so scary I'm not willing to link on them. I couldn't even find a wiki on it.

But whatever. I'm done with this conversation. You're spewing a bunch of bullshit, Strawbeary. A bunch of selective self-edifying bullshit and frankly I'm really disappointed. Like you told rusty upthread, I thought you were smarter than that.

If you truly believe a pre-teen poor black inner city child of a single mother crackhead, a girl who has to worry about her safety as she sleeps every night because her mom's boyfriend keeps trying to get in her pants, who never knows if her cupboard will have food in it or not because mom might blow the money on drugs instead, if you honestly believe that girl does poorly on standardized tests because she's black and doesn't deserve a public school that will provide for her not only an education but a small ray of stability that we as a society should be willing to give, then you have your head up your ass, willfully.

And I know my story about a girl isn't exactly what you were saying with your "Asians have higher IQs" statement of "fact" but you and I both know that it's a tiny step away.

Go back to bitching about your previous employer, Straw. That was entertaining and biting. This coy but-studies-have-found bullshit is obnoxious.

In no way did I say she doesn't deserve an education because I absolutely fucking believe she does and I personally work to get it for her, can you say that? How dare you. I'm saying IT IS A CULTURAL PROBLEM, not a funding problem. Sorry if that is too novel for your indoctrinated ways. That poor girl, whether she is white or black or green lives in a goddamned culture where she has no support. Teachers and schools do what they can do to provide what may be the only support she gets, but they are fighting an uphill battle as long as that culture remains. I am suggesting the help we need in the education battle is cultural, not financial. So if you want to swear at me and put me down and disagree with me for that, go right ahead.