This is a somewhat of a repeat, but I think you will that it is justified. We all want good schools and our kids to do well in school. This has always been the case here in the USA. Early pioneers were quick to build country schools where ever they settled. Most we just one room and the teacher was some young person who could read and write and who often boarded with one of the families in the area. That was how it was done and to the surprise of most people today, the results were as good or better than our results today. These people did not have much money so they had to make sure they got their monies worth from their one room schools. From the begining it was thought that if they could just afford more, they could have better schools and their kids could get a better education. Spend more and get more. What a logical sounding theory. Like most theories, it has never been "Double Blind" tested. We all know that many things that we take for granted when "Double Blind" tested turn out to be wrong. I feel this is the case with our educational system.
We would all accept that spending more does not give proportional results. It is a simple case of "Diminishing Returns". I think we can all accept that. If we actually get more by spending more, we must agree that the addition benifit cost more per unit of improvement. At some point the benifit of more spending is almost zero. In the case of the USA, I feel that we hit the zero benifit point a long time ago, why else would our kid's test scores be going down rather than up?
Let's look at what it is costing. To make this as simple as possible, I am going to make the following assumptions;
(1) Every year your kids is in school it costs us taxpayers $10,000. In some states it is more and some less, but $10,000 is a close number and is simple to use.
(2) Our kids go to school from pre-school or head start to 12th grade or for as many as 14 years.
(3) Figure you kid graduates at age 18 and does not have a real tax paying job until age 25 when they start paying back their cost of education.
(4) I assume our kid is responsible and works and pays taxes from age 25 to age 65 for a total of 40 years.
(5) Finally, I assume a 5% interest rate necessary to analyse expenditures over a period of time. I use compound interst just like for your mortgage or your savings account.
With me so far? If your kid was part of the head start program where they went to pre-school before Kindergarten, you kid would have been in school for 14 years when he graduated from high school at age 18. Now, as explained above, they don't start paying off the taxpayer's investment in them until age 25 or 7 years after they graduated. I think that you have to agree that these assumptions are not out of line. Now the big question is how much does your kid owe or have to pay back? Well, the number is $275,760. Bigger number than you thought? Now let's look at how much your kid would have to earn free and clear per hour for the next 40 years to pay back the taxpayers, just like you would pay off your home loan at 5%. How about $8.04 per hour?
For a kid who just went to Kindergarten and 12 normal years of school, he would still have to pay back at the rate of $7.26 per hour for the next 40 years. Now do you think we have some kind of problem?
Now think about the fact that only 60% of our kids graduate from high school and that about 50% of our population don't pay any income tax. That means the ones who graduate and pay taxes have to pay a lot more. What to see what those numbers look like? First, let's adjust the $7.26 per hour for the 40% who don't graduate. Now the number is $12.10 per hour. Now, let's adjust for 50% don't pay income tax and let's assume that all the drop outs fall into this group. That means that 83% of the high school graduates pay income tax. Now the figure goes upto $14.58 per hour. If you don't agree with my numbers, do your own calculations.
As you can clearly see, there is no way that we can afford these kinds of costs for education. We have to make some changes and just where do we need to make those changes? Note, that if I were to adjust the figures for what it cost for a high school degree and the kid went to school for 14 years, rather than the number of $275,760, it would be $459,600. Hey, those are the numbers.
(1) We have to get the cost per student down per year by lowering teacher compensation, increasing class size.
(2) We have to get the graduation rate up significantly.
(3) We have to reduce or eliminate the number of years that our kids are in school and skew the investment toward the latter years rather than the younger years.
Think about these numbers and see what you think we should do.
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Malt Your Own Barley
You know that I am the Brewmaster and as such should Blog on beer making from time to time. The reason that I brew my own beer is that I am Cheap and for that reason I need my malt to also be Cheap. It has taken several years and several failures to perfect my malting technique. Now against my better judgement, I am going to share the fruits of my labor with all of you.
First, go to your local farm feed store and buy a bag of barley, but not just any bag of barley. Buy "Seed" barley. There are a lot of types, but the type does not matter all that much. Seed barley has been selected and cleaned so that it has a very high germination rate. That means, most of the seeds will sprout. With regular barley, there is no concern about the germination rate, but with malting there is.
Next you will need a bucket or some other container to wet the barley down in. I use a 10 gallon water canteen like you see at football games where the team dumps the Gatoraide onto the winning coach. These are cheap and have a good lid and a spigot on the bottom. They are also insulated and that will come in handy later. I like to use two of these containers. Fill the container about half full with barley and cover it with tap water at about 65-75 degrees and let stand for a couple of hours. Next, drain off any water and dump the barley into the other container and again cover the barley with water and imediatly drain off all the water from the bottom. This should wet the barley well enough to stimulate germination. Let stand at room temperature over night and next day dump the barley back into the other container. The purpose of this is to assure that a lot of air gets to the barley and that the barley at the bottom of the first container is not over soaked. Next day, do the same thing again and inspect the barley to see if little sprouts are starting to form. Keep this process up until the sprouts are about the same length as a barley seed. The sprout will fold back onto the seed so it will be easy to judge. If the barley starts to get hot during the process, pour on some cool water and dump it back into the other container. This whole process should not take more than 3 days.
Now comes the special part. Buy from one of the brewing supply houses a stainless steel convex shaped filter screen that will fit into the bottom of one of your 10 gallon containers. These screens are sold for use later in your Lautertun. The screen will come with a fitting in the center. Take this out and adapt a new fitting so that a garden hose can be connected to it. Now it gets interesting, but this is the big pay off. You will need a turbine type air compressor like those used for the new type of "High Volume Low Pressure" paint sprayers or HVLP. Attach he air hose to the center of the stainless steel convex screen and place it in the bottom of the empty container. Now you are ready to dump the sprouted barley into the container and turn on the compressor. Clean compressed air will now be forced down to the bottom of the container and up thru the wet sprouted barley. It may take upto 6 or 8 hours to completly dry down the wet barley. During this process, the new sprout on each barley seed will dry up and die. Now the first stage is complete.
Turn off and take out the air hose and filter and start dumping the barley back and forth between the two containers. This will cause the dried up sprouts to seperate and fall off. If you do this outside in the wind, the wind will blow all the dead sprouts away and you will end up with "Malt" that looks almost like the barley that you started with. If you have been buying malt from a supplier, this is what basic pure malt looks like.
From this point on you can use the malt like you would anyother pure untoasted malt. If you were to use this malt in beer making it would yield a very light colored and flavored beer. It would first have to be crushed and mashed, but that is the subject of another blog.
First, go to your local farm feed store and buy a bag of barley, but not just any bag of barley. Buy "Seed" barley. There are a lot of types, but the type does not matter all that much. Seed barley has been selected and cleaned so that it has a very high germination rate. That means, most of the seeds will sprout. With regular barley, there is no concern about the germination rate, but with malting there is.
Next you will need a bucket or some other container to wet the barley down in. I use a 10 gallon water canteen like you see at football games where the team dumps the Gatoraide onto the winning coach. These are cheap and have a good lid and a spigot on the bottom. They are also insulated and that will come in handy later. I like to use two of these containers. Fill the container about half full with barley and cover it with tap water at about 65-75 degrees and let stand for a couple of hours. Next, drain off any water and dump the barley into the other container and again cover the barley with water and imediatly drain off all the water from the bottom. This should wet the barley well enough to stimulate germination. Let stand at room temperature over night and next day dump the barley back into the other container. The purpose of this is to assure that a lot of air gets to the barley and that the barley at the bottom of the first container is not over soaked. Next day, do the same thing again and inspect the barley to see if little sprouts are starting to form. Keep this process up until the sprouts are about the same length as a barley seed. The sprout will fold back onto the seed so it will be easy to judge. If the barley starts to get hot during the process, pour on some cool water and dump it back into the other container. This whole process should not take more than 3 days.
Now comes the special part. Buy from one of the brewing supply houses a stainless steel convex shaped filter screen that will fit into the bottom of one of your 10 gallon containers. These screens are sold for use later in your Lautertun. The screen will come with a fitting in the center. Take this out and adapt a new fitting so that a garden hose can be connected to it. Now it gets interesting, but this is the big pay off. You will need a turbine type air compressor like those used for the new type of "High Volume Low Pressure" paint sprayers or HVLP. Attach he air hose to the center of the stainless steel convex screen and place it in the bottom of the empty container. Now you are ready to dump the sprouted barley into the container and turn on the compressor. Clean compressed air will now be forced down to the bottom of the container and up thru the wet sprouted barley. It may take upto 6 or 8 hours to completly dry down the wet barley. During this process, the new sprout on each barley seed will dry up and die. Now the first stage is complete.
Turn off and take out the air hose and filter and start dumping the barley back and forth between the two containers. This will cause the dried up sprouts to seperate and fall off. If you do this outside in the wind, the wind will blow all the dead sprouts away and you will end up with "Malt" that looks almost like the barley that you started with. If you have been buying malt from a supplier, this is what basic pure malt looks like.
From this point on you can use the malt like you would anyother pure untoasted malt. If you were to use this malt in beer making it would yield a very light colored and flavored beer. It would first have to be crushed and mashed, but that is the subject of another blog.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Events Or Trends?
Us humans think about everything in terms of our own existance and the experiances that we have accumulated in the short period of our lives. Some times this leads to good conclusions and some tines it does not. What I have found is that many of the things that I concluded were "Trends" were in fact the simple results of a single event. If you look at a many trends and try to look back to the start of that trend, you will find that it is the result of some single event. The further thing that you will find is that is was a "one time" event and will not happen again. This is why I feel that thinking of things as "trends" misses that main point of the cause and the liklyhood of such an event or trend to occur again or even contine.
Take some thing big like the human race. If someone in your aicent history did not take part in sex, you would not be here to day. Going all the way back to what ever the start was, 100% of those who came before you were into sex. This is an example of where some required event continued to happen in order that the trend or continueance of the human race was made possible. See, it was and event and not some trend.
We hear all kinds of things about how great the USA is and of all the things that we have accomplished. There is a strong trend of the USA continuing to grow in economic strength and power. It is a trend that will just continue on and on. Right? I don't think so. Now let's take a look at events.
The Native Americans were here for about 30,000 years and during that time they never had an "Event" of smelting iron for did they have an "Event" of making gun power. They did have an event of discovering how to grow corn, potatoes, beans and tomatoes amoung many other crops. They had the event of discovering how to select the best seeds and thus develop corn and other corps that were far superior to those that they started out with. They did this for about 20,000 years and were able to feed and cloth more people here in America than there were in all of Europe at the time Columbus first came to America. Columbus did not discover America, he was lost.
Because Europeans had the "Event" of iron and gun power, it was easy for them to kill off most of the Native Americans and take over their land.
The price that Europe paid for all of America was very small. As an "Event", it was one of the biggest in all of human history. It was, however, a one time event that can never be repeated. Now what happened after that event? It appeared to be some kind of special trend of growth and power in America. If a few people today could take over as much wealth so easily, don't you think that such an event would create what appeared to be so great trend?
A more recent event was the aftermath of WWII. This old USA went into WWII broke, much like we are today. The big evert, however, was that after WWII we were the only ones standing and could easily pick up the pieces and we did. The Great Depression was a thing of the past. Us hard working Americans with just our skill and intelect were able to become very wealth after WWII.
I might remind you that Argentina was considered the richest country in the world prior to and just after WWII, not the USA. They had rich farm land and were neutral during WWII and sold to all sides. There used to be a saying, "Rich as an Argentine". After the Eropeans killed off all the Native Americans in Argentina, they were able to grow cattle and wheat for almost nothing. The power and wealth of Argentina was clearly driven by a single event that can never be repeated.
Have you ever been to a true Ghost Town? There are all kinds of them around the world where some event put them on the map. It was Gold or Rubber or some other special event that caused them to grow and become wealthy. Denver was where the dish Oysers Rockefeller was created. The reason was that rich Gold miners in the Denver area wanted to buy the most expensive dish in the house and that was Oysters. The fact that they had to be brought overland by wagon on ice made them very expensive and many would start to go bad. By adding spinach and baking them, they could be made palitable, thus Oysters Rockefeller. The point is that most of the old mining towns are now ghost towns. The single even that started the trend toward wealth just "played out".
How about the light bulb or the transistor. These were events that appeared to have started trends. They are like throwing a stone into a pool of water and seeing the rings that form as trends that continue, but decline over time and distance. Notice that both the light bulb and the transitor were the work of single individuals or private companies, not governments. There would be no computers today without the transistor. A "Chip" or integrated circuit is just a bigger more complex transistor. Did you ever think about what the USA or you life would be like without the transistor having been invented. Notice that even the word invented comes from the base, event!
In a prior Blog, I mentioned the event of all those smart technical people from Germany coming to the USA before and after WWII. What if they had all gone to some other country? How about all the smart Russians who also came here? Now when was the last time we had a bunch of really smart and well educated people come here from some other country? OH! That's right, we get 40% of our medical doctors from some place else. It has been a long time hasn't it. Do we have a trend down? Do we need some more special events that will benifit the USA, or are we smart and hard working enough to pull ourselves out of the hole that we have dug for ourselves?
Did you know that it was not that long ago that we were the largest oil producer in the world? We still have more coal than anyother country and it is easy to get and is of high quality. How about farm land? I mean really good farm land. China has more, but we still have most of the best.
One final note, we are 25th out of 30 in the world in math and yet spend more than anyother country on education. Do you really think we are going to make it by keeping doing what we are now doing?
Take some thing big like the human race. If someone in your aicent history did not take part in sex, you would not be here to day. Going all the way back to what ever the start was, 100% of those who came before you were into sex. This is an example of where some required event continued to happen in order that the trend or continueance of the human race was made possible. See, it was and event and not some trend.
We hear all kinds of things about how great the USA is and of all the things that we have accomplished. There is a strong trend of the USA continuing to grow in economic strength and power. It is a trend that will just continue on and on. Right? I don't think so. Now let's take a look at events.
The Native Americans were here for about 30,000 years and during that time they never had an "Event" of smelting iron for did they have an "Event" of making gun power. They did have an event of discovering how to grow corn, potatoes, beans and tomatoes amoung many other crops. They had the event of discovering how to select the best seeds and thus develop corn and other corps that were far superior to those that they started out with. They did this for about 20,000 years and were able to feed and cloth more people here in America than there were in all of Europe at the time Columbus first came to America. Columbus did not discover America, he was lost.
Because Europeans had the "Event" of iron and gun power, it was easy for them to kill off most of the Native Americans and take over their land.
The price that Europe paid for all of America was very small. As an "Event", it was one of the biggest in all of human history. It was, however, a one time event that can never be repeated. Now what happened after that event? It appeared to be some kind of special trend of growth and power in America. If a few people today could take over as much wealth so easily, don't you think that such an event would create what appeared to be so great trend?
A more recent event was the aftermath of WWII. This old USA went into WWII broke, much like we are today. The big evert, however, was that after WWII we were the only ones standing and could easily pick up the pieces and we did. The Great Depression was a thing of the past. Us hard working Americans with just our skill and intelect were able to become very wealth after WWII.
I might remind you that Argentina was considered the richest country in the world prior to and just after WWII, not the USA. They had rich farm land and were neutral during WWII and sold to all sides. There used to be a saying, "Rich as an Argentine". After the Eropeans killed off all the Native Americans in Argentina, they were able to grow cattle and wheat for almost nothing. The power and wealth of Argentina was clearly driven by a single event that can never be repeated.
Have you ever been to a true Ghost Town? There are all kinds of them around the world where some event put them on the map. It was Gold or Rubber or some other special event that caused them to grow and become wealthy. Denver was where the dish Oysers Rockefeller was created. The reason was that rich Gold miners in the Denver area wanted to buy the most expensive dish in the house and that was Oysters. The fact that they had to be brought overland by wagon on ice made them very expensive and many would start to go bad. By adding spinach and baking them, they could be made palitable, thus Oysters Rockefeller. The point is that most of the old mining towns are now ghost towns. The single even that started the trend toward wealth just "played out".
How about the light bulb or the transistor. These were events that appeared to have started trends. They are like throwing a stone into a pool of water and seeing the rings that form as trends that continue, but decline over time and distance. Notice that both the light bulb and the transitor were the work of single individuals or private companies, not governments. There would be no computers today without the transistor. A "Chip" or integrated circuit is just a bigger more complex transistor. Did you ever think about what the USA or you life would be like without the transistor having been invented. Notice that even the word invented comes from the base, event!
In a prior Blog, I mentioned the event of all those smart technical people from Germany coming to the USA before and after WWII. What if they had all gone to some other country? How about all the smart Russians who also came here? Now when was the last time we had a bunch of really smart and well educated people come here from some other country? OH! That's right, we get 40% of our medical doctors from some place else. It has been a long time hasn't it. Do we have a trend down? Do we need some more special events that will benifit the USA, or are we smart and hard working enough to pull ourselves out of the hole that we have dug for ourselves?
Did you know that it was not that long ago that we were the largest oil producer in the world? We still have more coal than anyother country and it is easy to get and is of high quality. How about farm land? I mean really good farm land. China has more, but we still have most of the best.
One final note, we are 25th out of 30 in the world in math and yet spend more than anyother country on education. Do you really think we are going to make it by keeping doing what we are now doing?
Sunday, November 21, 2010
When Did It Really Happen?
I think you must know by now that I am a very simple person and that I don't find most things very complex. I have found that when you don't know much about something, It always seems complex, but when you finally understand it, it turns out to be very simple. Now take the state of our country? We are in a big mess and many feel that the country is not only broke financially, but basically broken. This place is not like the place that we were all born into. If you don't agree, you must be smoking something. We all know that we are in a mess, but "when did it really happen"? It is like being stuck in the mud. You look out and see that the wheels of you car are sunk hopelessly in deep mud. The fact is that you were stuck in the mud long before you looked out the window and saw mud all around you. This is what I am talking about with respect to our economy and the state of our Union.
I'm going to try to trace what happened by way of our educational system. Further, to keep this simple, I am only going to trace engineering graduation rates. For years we produced engineers in colleges and universities at a slow but steady rate. After the big economic crash of 1929 we could not continue to send as many of our kids to college so that they could earn engineering degrees. But wait, something happened. The best educated country technically in the world, Germany, came crashing down worse than the USA. This resulted in some of Germany's best engineers and technical people moving to the USA. Many got jobs a teachers and professors in our universities. I think you must know a few. This helped, but it was not enough to push us over the top. We still had our "Great Depression" to deal with. Then along came WWII where we drafted every farm boy in the country and trained them and sent them off to war. Now it gets interesting. When the war was over we had all these well trained and motivated young men on our hands. We also had most of the rest of the world bombed to rubble. Some one go the idea of the "GI Bill" where the government would provide a very small almost a subsistence allowance for these kids to go to college. All their young lives college was a dream outside their reach. They were all willing to work hard and only needed a very small helping hand to realize their dreams.
So in 1945, we were off to the races with respect to graduating engineers. Our colleges and universities were over run with engineering applications. Many were turned away and only the best were accepted. The USA continued it growth in engineering graduations until we hit the peak in 1986, after which we started to decline. My point, how ever, is not 1986, but exactly when did the decline start to happen. You all know that before something that has been going can come down, it has to first stop going up! So when did we stop going up? Due the prosperity in the USA after WWII, many more families could afford to send their kids to college and they did. The point of this is that while college enrollment was going up, the percentage of engineering students was going down. This means that the problem recognized in 1986 started far earlier. Our population was growing and the numbers of kids going to college was growing, but not for engineering.
I'm going to guess at some of these numbers to make a point. We know the problem started before 1986 and we know that big things with a lot of inertia don't change fast. On this basis, my guess is that the decline in our kids being motivated to take up engineering must have started at least 16 years before. I say this, be cause even the increase in the number of our kids going to college was not enough to counter the trend. This means that about 1970, we turned some kind of corner about who we were as a nation. This means that our kids about the age of 18 or 19 who were going off to college in 1970 were different from the ones who had gone off before them.
If the kid went off to college at age 18 or 19 in 1970, this means they were in our public high schools from about 1966 to 1970. Now I think we might be getting some place. Isn't this the middle of the hippie movement and free love and the flower people? How about Pot? How about Dr Spock? I think this is when it all really happened. It was about this time that we as a country went off the tracks. It happened in the bigger cities first and in the Northeast and on the West coast, but it eventually spread nation wide. Now to fix a problem, you have to first find the cause. Now I think that I have found the cause, but I leave it to you to come up with the cure.
I'm going to try to trace what happened by way of our educational system. Further, to keep this simple, I am only going to trace engineering graduation rates. For years we produced engineers in colleges and universities at a slow but steady rate. After the big economic crash of 1929 we could not continue to send as many of our kids to college so that they could earn engineering degrees. But wait, something happened. The best educated country technically in the world, Germany, came crashing down worse than the USA. This resulted in some of Germany's best engineers and technical people moving to the USA. Many got jobs a teachers and professors in our universities. I think you must know a few. This helped, but it was not enough to push us over the top. We still had our "Great Depression" to deal with. Then along came WWII where we drafted every farm boy in the country and trained them and sent them off to war. Now it gets interesting. When the war was over we had all these well trained and motivated young men on our hands. We also had most of the rest of the world bombed to rubble. Some one go the idea of the "GI Bill" where the government would provide a very small almost a subsistence allowance for these kids to go to college. All their young lives college was a dream outside their reach. They were all willing to work hard and only needed a very small helping hand to realize their dreams.
So in 1945, we were off to the races with respect to graduating engineers. Our colleges and universities were over run with engineering applications. Many were turned away and only the best were accepted. The USA continued it growth in engineering graduations until we hit the peak in 1986, after which we started to decline. My point, how ever, is not 1986, but exactly when did the decline start to happen. You all know that before something that has been going can come down, it has to first stop going up! So when did we stop going up? Due the prosperity in the USA after WWII, many more families could afford to send their kids to college and they did. The point of this is that while college enrollment was going up, the percentage of engineering students was going down. This means that the problem recognized in 1986 started far earlier. Our population was growing and the numbers of kids going to college was growing, but not for engineering.
I'm going to guess at some of these numbers to make a point. We know the problem started before 1986 and we know that big things with a lot of inertia don't change fast. On this basis, my guess is that the decline in our kids being motivated to take up engineering must have started at least 16 years before. I say this, be cause even the increase in the number of our kids going to college was not enough to counter the trend. This means that about 1970, we turned some kind of corner about who we were as a nation. This means that our kids about the age of 18 or 19 who were going off to college in 1970 were different from the ones who had gone off before them.
If the kid went off to college at age 18 or 19 in 1970, this means they were in our public high schools from about 1966 to 1970. Now I think we might be getting some place. Isn't this the middle of the hippie movement and free love and the flower people? How about Pot? How about Dr Spock? I think this is when it all really happened. It was about this time that we as a country went off the tracks. It happened in the bigger cities first and in the Northeast and on the West coast, but it eventually spread nation wide. Now to fix a problem, you have to first find the cause. Now I think that I have found the cause, but I leave it to you to come up with the cure.
Friday, November 19, 2010
Back To Class Size
You hear a lot of talk about class size and why we should have smaller class sizes. This all sounds good on the surface and that is where most voters stop their analysis. They work on the basis, "if it is good for the kids, then we should do it". This might work if we had unlimited resources, but we don't. We don't have unlimited money or time. We have to prepare our kids for life and there is a limited amount of time and money to do the job. Now if you agree with this basic point, we can go on to see if we can come to some compromise. Yes, that's right, a compromise. You might notice that about everything in life is some kind of compromise, so start getting used to it. The compromise here is exactly how many kids should we have in a class? Where do you start and what do we consider? Let's see.
If you read some of my prior Blogs, you will already understand that 99% of optimization decision points are on the flat area of the optimization curve. That is the point where the slope or first derivative is zero. I like to show off a little calculus once in a while, but you don't need to know calculus to understand this. We know that there is an optimum class size and it is some where between one and infinity and we know that the area of optimum is in a flat area. We also know that all the data that we use to calculate this optimum class size is subject to differing degrees of error. That is just a fact. If anyone tells you that they know or have calculated the optimum class size, I can tell you that they are incompetent. The point is, we know in advance that the optimum class size we calculate is going to be off to some degree. Now this is where it gets interesting. Just to make this easier to follow, let's assume that we have calculated that the optimum class size is 25. If we test the "value: function for a class size of 20 and 30, we will notice that they yield about the same "value" function as the optimum 25 class size. Conclusion is that it does not make much difference whether the class size is 20, 25 or 30. Interesting isn't it? This takes us to how to interpret these interesting results.
Now if you were the teacher's union who only has the sole interests of the kids at heart, you would push for the class size of 20. Smaller is always better. If you were a tax payer, you would push for 30 because the "value" function for 30 was about as good as for 25 and you would save a lot of tax money by needing fewer teachers. See how this whole thing works? The teacher's union would never claim that the reason the want the class size of 20 was so that the school would hire more teachers. Teachers are the good guys.
Now,let's look as some more aspects of the problem. We know that the school has newer and older teachers. Does it seem logical that newer teachers should have smaller class sizes and older teachers larger? Seems logical to me. Years of experience teaching should result in teachers being more "productive". Older teachers get paid more, so why can't they teach more kids? Interesting isn't? How about the complexity of the course being taught? Can a teacher teach more kids in a history class than they can in a math or physics class? Complexity should come into the consideration at some point.
Here is another. The teacher's unions look at the national school system when they come up with their recommendation for class size. The national average high school graduation rate is only 60% and in some cities it is below 50%. At the same time there are some districts where the high school graduation rate is over 90%. Do you think that all schools, no mater what their graduation rates are should have the "same" optimum class size. I you got thru 4th grade, I think you would agree that in schools where the kids are well mannered and have responsible parents that the optimum class size should be larger than the national average.
What I have tried to point out is just another way the the teacher's union is screwing the tax payers of this nation. You must already know that the "Head Start" program had "zero" affect on improving school performance. After the fact studies have clearly shown that these expensive programs were a 100% waste of tax payers money. As tax payers and parents, it is your responsibility to see that your kids get a good education and that it is done at a reasonable cost. We spend more than any country in the world and we get the worst pop for the buck. We need change and it is not going to come from Obama and his teacher's union buddies.
If you read some of my prior Blogs, you will already understand that 99% of optimization decision points are on the flat area of the optimization curve. That is the point where the slope or first derivative is zero. I like to show off a little calculus once in a while, but you don't need to know calculus to understand this. We know that there is an optimum class size and it is some where between one and infinity and we know that the area of optimum is in a flat area. We also know that all the data that we use to calculate this optimum class size is subject to differing degrees of error. That is just a fact. If anyone tells you that they know or have calculated the optimum class size, I can tell you that they are incompetent. The point is, we know in advance that the optimum class size we calculate is going to be off to some degree. Now this is where it gets interesting. Just to make this easier to follow, let's assume that we have calculated that the optimum class size is 25. If we test the "value: function for a class size of 20 and 30, we will notice that they yield about the same "value" function as the optimum 25 class size. Conclusion is that it does not make much difference whether the class size is 20, 25 or 30. Interesting isn't it? This takes us to how to interpret these interesting results.
Now if you were the teacher's union who only has the sole interests of the kids at heart, you would push for the class size of 20. Smaller is always better. If you were a tax payer, you would push for 30 because the "value" function for 30 was about as good as for 25 and you would save a lot of tax money by needing fewer teachers. See how this whole thing works? The teacher's union would never claim that the reason the want the class size of 20 was so that the school would hire more teachers. Teachers are the good guys.
Now,let's look as some more aspects of the problem. We know that the school has newer and older teachers. Does it seem logical that newer teachers should have smaller class sizes and older teachers larger? Seems logical to me. Years of experience teaching should result in teachers being more "productive". Older teachers get paid more, so why can't they teach more kids? Interesting isn't? How about the complexity of the course being taught? Can a teacher teach more kids in a history class than they can in a math or physics class? Complexity should come into the consideration at some point.
Here is another. The teacher's unions look at the national school system when they come up with their recommendation for class size. The national average high school graduation rate is only 60% and in some cities it is below 50%. At the same time there are some districts where the high school graduation rate is over 90%. Do you think that all schools, no mater what their graduation rates are should have the "same" optimum class size. I you got thru 4th grade, I think you would agree that in schools where the kids are well mannered and have responsible parents that the optimum class size should be larger than the national average.
What I have tried to point out is just another way the the teacher's union is screwing the tax payers of this nation. You must already know that the "Head Start" program had "zero" affect on improving school performance. After the fact studies have clearly shown that these expensive programs were a 100% waste of tax payers money. As tax payers and parents, it is your responsibility to see that your kids get a good education and that it is done at a reasonable cost. We spend more than any country in the world and we get the worst pop for the buck. We need change and it is not going to come from Obama and his teacher's union buddies.
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
VAT Value Added Tax
A few years ago I wrote a Blog on the "Value Added Tax" concept. I don't think most people here in the USA have any idea about exactly what a VAT is or how would affect our economy. Now I see some of the new Republicans talking about VAT again as part of the solution. To understand how a VAT would impact our economy and jobs here in the USA, you have to first look at how things work now.
Everyone knows that social security is on a course to failure. When it started we had 12-15 workers for every retired person. Now and in the future this ration will do down to 2 to 1. That is just one of the problems. All the money that was paid into the social security pot over the years by individuals and companies has been used to buy government bonds. It was not a lot different from what the Fed is doing now by buying new government bonds. In both cases the government spent all the money from selling the bonds and are now selling more bonds to anyone who will buy them. All of this adds to the national debit. The bottom line is that there is "no" money in the bank for future claims by social security. The other point is that we have entered into all kinds of trade agreements around the world with counties like China. We have agreed not to place tariffs on products from these countries. The result is that we are now in a "one way" trade program with China and a lot of other countries. Because of our legal, banking and distribution systems, it is a lot easier to sell products here in the USA that for us in China. We lose in 90% of these trade agreements. Now we have agreed not to tax imports to level the playing field. See the problem. Back on social security, our government did a slight of hand on how the social security is funded. The worker pays about 8% of his gross pay into social security and the employer matches it. Sounds good, but the affect is bo bury 100% of the social security in every product that we produce. That is where we screw ourselves. We make every thing that we make here more expensive by at least 15% while imported items from China don't have to add this 15% onto their products. I can only conclude that we are stupid to have such a system. Now a little history. If we produced 100% of what we use right here in the USA, it would not make any difference how we collected the tax to pay for social security, but that is not what we have now. Back in the 1930's we made 90% of what we used. In the 1940's and 1950's, the rest of the world had to buy our stuff, no matter what it cost. That is not the case now. I think that by now, you must have a better understanding of why were are in the mess that we are in.
Shifting to a VAT tax for 100% of the social security tax that amounts to about 15% will have the affect of making our products cost 15% less, while making the products imported from China 15% more. Now if we look at our consumption based on 50% being imported and 50% being produced here and a VAT of 7.5%, we would collect the same amount of tax from the VAT as we collect by the current method. You can do the math. The big difference is that our home made products would cost 7.5% less and those made in China would cost 7.5% more. I feel that this would go a very long way toward leveling the playing field. Our exports to the rest of the world would also go down by this same 7.5%.
Think about VAT and do some math and see if you don't agree? The problem is that our politicans have lied to us for so long that now when they seem to be on the right track, no one believes them. It is like the kid who cried "wolf" one too many times. I would be interested in your comments.
Everyone knows that social security is on a course to failure. When it started we had 12-15 workers for every retired person. Now and in the future this ration will do down to 2 to 1. That is just one of the problems. All the money that was paid into the social security pot over the years by individuals and companies has been used to buy government bonds. It was not a lot different from what the Fed is doing now by buying new government bonds. In both cases the government spent all the money from selling the bonds and are now selling more bonds to anyone who will buy them. All of this adds to the national debit. The bottom line is that there is "no" money in the bank for future claims by social security. The other point is that we have entered into all kinds of trade agreements around the world with counties like China. We have agreed not to place tariffs on products from these countries. The result is that we are now in a "one way" trade program with China and a lot of other countries. Because of our legal, banking and distribution systems, it is a lot easier to sell products here in the USA that for us in China. We lose in 90% of these trade agreements. Now we have agreed not to tax imports to level the playing field. See the problem. Back on social security, our government did a slight of hand on how the social security is funded. The worker pays about 8% of his gross pay into social security and the employer matches it. Sounds good, but the affect is bo bury 100% of the social security in every product that we produce. That is where we screw ourselves. We make every thing that we make here more expensive by at least 15% while imported items from China don't have to add this 15% onto their products. I can only conclude that we are stupid to have such a system. Now a little history. If we produced 100% of what we use right here in the USA, it would not make any difference how we collected the tax to pay for social security, but that is not what we have now. Back in the 1930's we made 90% of what we used. In the 1940's and 1950's, the rest of the world had to buy our stuff, no matter what it cost. That is not the case now. I think that by now, you must have a better understanding of why were are in the mess that we are in.
Shifting to a VAT tax for 100% of the social security tax that amounts to about 15% will have the affect of making our products cost 15% less, while making the products imported from China 15% more. Now if we look at our consumption based on 50% being imported and 50% being produced here and a VAT of 7.5%, we would collect the same amount of tax from the VAT as we collect by the current method. You can do the math. The big difference is that our home made products would cost 7.5% less and those made in China would cost 7.5% more. I feel that this would go a very long way toward leveling the playing field. Our exports to the rest of the world would also go down by this same 7.5%.
Think about VAT and do some math and see if you don't agree? The problem is that our politicans have lied to us for so long that now when they seem to be on the right track, no one believes them. It is like the kid who cried "wolf" one too many times. I would be interested in your comments.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Sea Salt, Make Hydrogen?
Have you noticed all the TV adds about how good "Sea Salt" is? I see all kinds of claims in TV adds, but never any rebuttal or correction. I think "Sea Salt" is one of the great ones. Campbell Soup's TV adds claims that they now use "Sea Salt" and that now they can use less to get the same old good taste. This means their soup has less Sodium. Isn't that great? If anyone took chemistry in high school, they know that "all" salt is the same. Sodium Chloride. The only way that I can see that "Sea Salt" might have less Sodium per pound is that "Sea Salt" has more contaminates than other salt. The fact that a pound of "Sea Salt" actually does not contain a full pound of salt could prove that a pound of "Sea Salt" has less Sodium than regular salt. Sounds like splitting hairs to me.
How about this one? One of the big oil companies ran this add on TV. They showed a young woman who claimed she like math and science. She explained that the oil companies have had "big" machines that produced Hydrogen for years and have been working on reducing the size of these units. They claimed that if they could get the units down to a small enough size, then they could put them in cars so that they could make their own Hydrogen. They claimed that this would result in much better mileage and save the environment. Sounds OK, except that their claims are 100% Bull Shit. It is almost impossible to "make" Hydrogen and no oil company ever "made" any Hydrogen. What they have done is to sperate Hydrogen from other compounds. 90% of the time the Hydrogen is "seperated" from natural gas. This is the cheapest way to get pure Hydrogen. If a car was to "seperate" Hydrogen on board the car, the Hydrogen would have to come from some place, and what would that be? They would have to carry a very large amount of natural gas and also have a place to store the Carbon that was left over from the "seperation" process. It also takes energy to do the seperation since pure Hydrogen and pure Carbon are at higher energy states. This fact from physics proves that the claim by the oil company is total "Bull Shit".
Any high school graduate who has taken any science class would know that the oil company TV add is BS.
How about this one? One of the big oil companies ran this add on TV. They showed a young woman who claimed she like math and science. She explained that the oil companies have had "big" machines that produced Hydrogen for years and have been working on reducing the size of these units. They claimed that if they could get the units down to a small enough size, then they could put them in cars so that they could make their own Hydrogen. They claimed that this would result in much better mileage and save the environment. Sounds OK, except that their claims are 100% Bull Shit. It is almost impossible to "make" Hydrogen and no oil company ever "made" any Hydrogen. What they have done is to sperate Hydrogen from other compounds. 90% of the time the Hydrogen is "seperated" from natural gas. This is the cheapest way to get pure Hydrogen. If a car was to "seperate" Hydrogen on board the car, the Hydrogen would have to come from some place, and what would that be? They would have to carry a very large amount of natural gas and also have a place to store the Carbon that was left over from the "seperation" process. It also takes energy to do the seperation since pure Hydrogen and pure Carbon are at higher energy states. This fact from physics proves that the claim by the oil company is total "Bull Shit".
Any high school graduate who has taken any science class would know that the oil company TV add is BS.
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Interesting Data On California
I was just digging thru some data on California and thought it was insightfull. The average home price is $467,000 while the average family income is only $61,021. This means the average home costs 7.65 times the annual average family income. The rental rate that my father used to charge was 1% per month of the value of the rental home. It took 1% to make any money on the rental property. Now if you look at what the $467,000 home as a rental, it would rent for $4,670 per month. That works out to $56,040 per year. That means the average family in California would have to spend 91.8% of their gross annual compensation. Given deductions from their gross pay, the rental cost of their homes would take over 100% of their pay. Now, maybe you can see why California is so screwed up financially.
I could not believe these numbers, so that is why I did this blog.
I could not believe these numbers, so that is why I did this blog.
Saturday, November 13, 2010
How About That Post Office?
We just found out that our US Post Office lost $8 billion dollars last year. We are always seeing these large numbers in the news, but do people really have any understanding of the significance of these big numbers? I don't think so. My guess is that 90% of our citizens could not tell you what the $8 billion dollar loss by the Post Office amounted to per person. Seems that most people get all mixed up when the numbers are followed by more than one or two zeros. I guess that is because the USA ranks about 25th in the world of the top 30 economies in basic math.
We know that there are about 300 million people in the USA. 300 million is 3 followed by 8 zeros. 8 billion is 8 followed by 9 zeros. To divide the $8 billion dollars by the 300 million people, we subtract 8 zeros from both numbers. This leaves us with $80 for every 3 people. Now if we assume the aveage family size is 3, then the US Post Office has a loss of $80 per family or $26.67 per person. I don't think that I buy $80 worth of stamps per year. If that is the case, the US Post Office would have to more than double their rates to break even.
This business of people not understanding basic math affects the quality of our voters in many areas. I have heard on the news that the state of California has a deficit or about $28 billion. The state of California has about 30 million people and about 10 million 3 person families. Their deficit works, out using basic math, to $933.33 per person and $2,799.99 per family of 3. Once you take these big numbers down to an understandable level, people can see their significance.
How about a nation debit of $14 trillion dollars? Our population is about 300 million. $14 trillion is 14 followed by 12 zeros. Recall that 300 million is 3 followed by 8 zeros. Again, using simple math, we subtract 8 zeros from both numbers and get $140,000 divided by 3 for $46,667 per person. For families of 3 this works out to $140,000 per family. We know that half of Americans don't pay any tax at all, so the families who do pay taxes will have to come up with twice this amount for a total of $280,000 per family.
See what happens when you understand basic math and can boil big numbers down to a size that one can understand?
We know that there are about 300 million people in the USA. 300 million is 3 followed by 8 zeros. 8 billion is 8 followed by 9 zeros. To divide the $8 billion dollars by the 300 million people, we subtract 8 zeros from both numbers. This leaves us with $80 for every 3 people. Now if we assume the aveage family size is 3, then the US Post Office has a loss of $80 per family or $26.67 per person. I don't think that I buy $80 worth of stamps per year. If that is the case, the US Post Office would have to more than double their rates to break even.
This business of people not understanding basic math affects the quality of our voters in many areas. I have heard on the news that the state of California has a deficit or about $28 billion. The state of California has about 30 million people and about 10 million 3 person families. Their deficit works, out using basic math, to $933.33 per person and $2,799.99 per family of 3. Once you take these big numbers down to an understandable level, people can see their significance.
How about a nation debit of $14 trillion dollars? Our population is about 300 million. $14 trillion is 14 followed by 12 zeros. Recall that 300 million is 3 followed by 8 zeros. Again, using simple math, we subtract 8 zeros from both numbers and get $140,000 divided by 3 for $46,667 per person. For families of 3 this works out to $140,000 per family. We know that half of Americans don't pay any tax at all, so the families who do pay taxes will have to come up with twice this amount for a total of $280,000 per family.
See what happens when you understand basic math and can boil big numbers down to a size that one can understand?
Friday, November 12, 2010
Is Anyone Listening"
We are "Broke"! How are we going to be able to pay back China? First, we have to stop spending more than we are earning. Until we get even we can not expect to start paying anything back. To pay back China, we have to earn "more" than we spend. Now how do we start doing that? We have to look at every thing that we do and spend. Sounds good so far, but what are the specifics? I think it is clear that our governments at all levels spend to much and get to little value for that big expenditure. I am big on "efficiency". Quality of life is based on primary productivity and productivity is a function of "efficiency". See how most systems connect at some point? Everyone is looking at Washington DC when much of our public expenditures and waste are at the state and local level. We need to start close to home with our expenditure reductions. That means our own homes, our local goverrnments and state governments.
At the state and local level, our biggest expenditures are for education. From my prior Blogs, you know that we are not getting our monies worth from our education dollars. Our education system is simply not efficient. Education is a primary investment that we spend large amounts of money on so that we will get a big payback at some point in the future. Why do we make investments in anything? It is to earn back more than we have spent. Education is no different. Try this?
I just looked up on Google what the "10 worst paying college degrees" were. Here they are: (1) Social Worker, (2) Elementary Education, (3) Theology, (4) Music, (5) Spanish, (6) Horticulture, (7) Education, (8) Hospitality, (9) Fine Arts, (10) Drama. This is the list. It is intersting to note that the number 1 Masters Degree at the University of Wisconsin is "Social Worker". Does that tell you something? Most of the degees on the list are more like "hobbie" degrees. Note than none of these degrees require a person to know any Math or Science. To my thinking, these are all "Bull Shit" degrees and should all be eliminated. The tuition for these degrees should be doubled or trippled because they are not a good investment by us taypayers. We should produce 100% of the education degrees at our local tech schools, not take up space at our universities. People who earn "real" technical degrees, like Applied Math, Physiscs, Chemistry and Biology at our universities should be allowed to teach in our public schools. Now, you have to be dumbed down before you can teach in our public schools.
Try this other one. Who is the highest paid public employee in most states? It is the football or basketball coach at one the state's public universities or colleges. Itn't that interesting. I propose that we eliminate 100% of the PE teachers in our public schools and colleges. Notice that most local news papers spend 100 times more ink on sports than they do on the real mission of our schools. Notice how many kids get atheletic scholarship to go to different colleges. This whole concept is stupid. I know from participating in college sports that it takes up so much of your time that you are forced to take easy or fewer classes. Most kids get "gift" classes where they all get "A's" from the coach. Notice that 90% of kids who play football or basketball in our colleges "don't" graduate or don't graduate in the normal number of years. This costs up millions. Notice that over 50% of our college kids who are lucky enough to play profession sports are bankrupt within 10 years of being out of sports. This whole thing sounds like a poor investment for us taxpayers and our society.
Here is a summary of my position:
(1) Eliminate "Bull Shit" majors and degrees from our universities or tripple the tuition for them.
(2) Eliminate PE teachers and sports from our public schools and universities.
(3) Eliminate Education degees from our universities and colleges and shift them down to local community colleges.
(4) Allow university graduates with real degrees to teach in our public schools.
(5) Eliminate "Bull Shit" classes from our public schools, just like proposed for colleges.
(6) Require that we graduate 90% of our medical doctors and that 90% of the students in our medical schools were born in the USA.
(7) Require that in every university Phd program have at least 80% of the students born in the USA.
(8) Require that all universities and colleges base their acceptance solely on qualifications not race, economics or diversity.
(9) Require that all full time college professors teach at least 9 semester units.
(10) Put up for bid all new teaching positions at our universities and public schools. Hey, they have been doing this for coaches for years!!!
I don't see anything wrong with being a little radical during these radical times.
At the state and local level, our biggest expenditures are for education. From my prior Blogs, you know that we are not getting our monies worth from our education dollars. Our education system is simply not efficient. Education is a primary investment that we spend large amounts of money on so that we will get a big payback at some point in the future. Why do we make investments in anything? It is to earn back more than we have spent. Education is no different. Try this?
I just looked up on Google what the "10 worst paying college degrees" were. Here they are: (1) Social Worker, (2) Elementary Education, (3) Theology, (4) Music, (5) Spanish, (6) Horticulture, (7) Education, (8) Hospitality, (9) Fine Arts, (10) Drama. This is the list. It is intersting to note that the number 1 Masters Degree at the University of Wisconsin is "Social Worker". Does that tell you something? Most of the degees on the list are more like "hobbie" degrees. Note than none of these degrees require a person to know any Math or Science. To my thinking, these are all "Bull Shit" degrees and should all be eliminated. The tuition for these degrees should be doubled or trippled because they are not a good investment by us taypayers. We should produce 100% of the education degrees at our local tech schools, not take up space at our universities. People who earn "real" technical degrees, like Applied Math, Physiscs, Chemistry and Biology at our universities should be allowed to teach in our public schools. Now, you have to be dumbed down before you can teach in our public schools.
Try this other one. Who is the highest paid public employee in most states? It is the football or basketball coach at one the state's public universities or colleges. Itn't that interesting. I propose that we eliminate 100% of the PE teachers in our public schools and colleges. Notice that most local news papers spend 100 times more ink on sports than they do on the real mission of our schools. Notice how many kids get atheletic scholarship to go to different colleges. This whole concept is stupid. I know from participating in college sports that it takes up so much of your time that you are forced to take easy or fewer classes. Most kids get "gift" classes where they all get "A's" from the coach. Notice that 90% of kids who play football or basketball in our colleges "don't" graduate or don't graduate in the normal number of years. This costs up millions. Notice that over 50% of our college kids who are lucky enough to play profession sports are bankrupt within 10 years of being out of sports. This whole thing sounds like a poor investment for us taxpayers and our society.
Here is a summary of my position:
(1) Eliminate "Bull Shit" majors and degrees from our universities or tripple the tuition for them.
(2) Eliminate PE teachers and sports from our public schools and universities.
(3) Eliminate Education degees from our universities and colleges and shift them down to local community colleges.
(4) Allow university graduates with real degrees to teach in our public schools.
(5) Eliminate "Bull Shit" classes from our public schools, just like proposed for colleges.
(6) Require that we graduate 90% of our medical doctors and that 90% of the students in our medical schools were born in the USA.
(7) Require that in every university Phd program have at least 80% of the students born in the USA.
(8) Require that all universities and colleges base their acceptance solely on qualifications not race, economics or diversity.
(9) Require that all full time college professors teach at least 9 semester units.
(10) Put up for bid all new teaching positions at our universities and public schools. Hey, they have been doing this for coaches for years!!!
I don't see anything wrong with being a little radical during these radical times.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
This Is Real Simple
I used to ask my friends about shooting at a deer and what they took into consideration. I have been hunting deer for the past 55 years and have taken a few really nice deer. Hey, if we don't shoot and eat them, they are going to die in the woods and rot. Did you ever measure anything with a precision micrometer? No matter how good you are at measuring, you never get it exactly right. My point is that nothing in this world is "Exact". There is always some error. Now if you accept the notion that no mater what you do, there is always some error, the questions follows as to how to deal with this error. It is always there and we need to take it into consideration. Now back to the deer. I am a good shot and have a very accurate rifle, but I am always a little bit off on every shot. You could kid yourself, but we all know that no one is a "perfect" shot. This leads us back to the original question of how we deal with this error that is always there. In the case of the deer, the best place to hit the deer is right in the heart. Hit him there and it is all over. The problem is that you know that you will be a little bit off, so what direction is the best to be off? If you shot too low, it will kick up dust and scare the deer off and you will not get a second shot. If you catch the deer low, he will run far away and die some place where you will never be able to find him. If you shoot high, you mighty catch him in the spine and he will go down and you can then finish him off. If you shoot too high, it will be a total miss and the deer will most likely not know where the shot came from and you may get a second shot. See how this whole thing works. When you error, there is a "best" way to error. In the case of the deer, "shoot high". Now how about some other cases?
Take something that is also real simple. We hear a lot about improving our school system my making class sized smaller. I think that we would all agree that the smaller the class size, given that all other conditions were unchanged, our kids would get a better education. The problem is exactly what size class is the one that gives us the best value for out kids? If we had one teacher per kid, it might be good for the kid, but we will not be able to afford it. If, on the other hand, we had 100 kids per teacher, the cost would be very low, but the education of our kids would, also be low. The real question is, "where do we get the best value for our dollar in education with respect to class size"? Do you agree with that? Most people would. I don't have a graph here, but if you accept that somewhere between 1 and 100 is the optimum class size in terms of "value", where is the optimum? If you make these calculations, you will find that the curve will show that the optimum value is somewhere between 15 and 25 with the optimum at 20. I just made this up, but the point is that when you look at the numbers and the "value" index for a class size of 15, 20 and 25 the "value" number is about the same. This is because the optimum area on the curve is very "flat". In theroy, the optimum point is exactly "flat". It has a slope of "Zero". High school math!! Now what does this mean?
Here is the punch line. Almost every decision situation is one that tries to find the "optimum" point or the "best" decision. In the case of the class size, we want the "optimum" or "best" class size because at this point we will get the best value for our tax dollar. Isn't that what it is all about? Now let's go back to the deer example. Which of the class sizes should I recommend and why? You have to come up with your own answer, but here is mine. I would go for 25 and here is why? If I went for 15 and it turned out to be wrong, I would be stuck with extra teachers who I would have a hard time getting rid of. The value for 15 would be the same as for 25, so why not go for 25. If I turned out to be wrong, I could always hire some more teachers, but not the other way around. Starting to see how this works?
In all decision situations, you have to investigate the "value" function and see which side is the "best" to error on. I could come up with a thousand example, but I think you are getting the idea. You will never have exact information when making a decision, no matter how hard you might try. Good luck.
Take something that is also real simple. We hear a lot about improving our school system my making class sized smaller. I think that we would all agree that the smaller the class size, given that all other conditions were unchanged, our kids would get a better education. The problem is exactly what size class is the one that gives us the best value for out kids? If we had one teacher per kid, it might be good for the kid, but we will not be able to afford it. If, on the other hand, we had 100 kids per teacher, the cost would be very low, but the education of our kids would, also be low. The real question is, "where do we get the best value for our dollar in education with respect to class size"? Do you agree with that? Most people would. I don't have a graph here, but if you accept that somewhere between 1 and 100 is the optimum class size in terms of "value", where is the optimum? If you make these calculations, you will find that the curve will show that the optimum value is somewhere between 15 and 25 with the optimum at 20. I just made this up, but the point is that when you look at the numbers and the "value" index for a class size of 15, 20 and 25 the "value" number is about the same. This is because the optimum area on the curve is very "flat". In theroy, the optimum point is exactly "flat". It has a slope of "Zero". High school math!! Now what does this mean?
Here is the punch line. Almost every decision situation is one that tries to find the "optimum" point or the "best" decision. In the case of the class size, we want the "optimum" or "best" class size because at this point we will get the best value for our tax dollar. Isn't that what it is all about? Now let's go back to the deer example. Which of the class sizes should I recommend and why? You have to come up with your own answer, but here is mine. I would go for 25 and here is why? If I went for 15 and it turned out to be wrong, I would be stuck with extra teachers who I would have a hard time getting rid of. The value for 15 would be the same as for 25, so why not go for 25. If I turned out to be wrong, I could always hire some more teachers, but not the other way around. Starting to see how this works?
In all decision situations, you have to investigate the "value" function and see which side is the "best" to error on. I could come up with a thousand example, but I think you are getting the idea. You will never have exact information when making a decision, no matter how hard you might try. Good luck.
Friday, November 5, 2010
Gaming Our Educational System
Not a real nice title. That is why what I have to say is not all that nice. We have a much worse educational situation than most people would ever realize. I like to use sports examples so see how football works. Notice that the college teams that do best are the ones with the best recruiting programs. They get most of the best players. You don't think this is right? Think about it again. Once a college team has a winning season, it is much easier to recruit more of the best players. I have heard that 90% of the top coach's time is spent recruiting the best players. How about colleges. The top colleges like Stanford or MIT produce the best and highest paid professionals. You have to at least agree with that. I think you know why the top college football teams win year after year. They have the best players. Now look at what is wrong with this picture. Don't we send our kids to these colleges to learn something? In the case of football, you don't see winning teams made up of "walk-on's" do you? The kids on the winning teams already know how to play football and are top athletes to boot. Isn't it the same for colleges like Stanford? I have had top professors who retired from Stanford teaching at San Jose State. If that is the case, then whey doesn't San Jose State produce as many top earning graduates as Stanford? Stanford starts on average with better players. Simple isn't it. Now what is this Blog all about? It is about gaming the system.
What happened is that us parents saw that people who were college graduates were making a lot more money than non-graduates. We all wanted our kids to have a better life and make more money. For that reason we agreed to paying more taxes so that more of our kids could go to and graduate from college. Gaming is messing with one of the variables in a system to get it to perform in a special way that was to our advantage. You see all kinds of examples of "gaming". It happens around us all the time. We know from experience that it is little more than cheating and in the end does not produce the results that was expected. Our push to get more of our kid in and thru college is this exact same thing.
Here is what we did. We added courses to our colleges that were quit different from those of the past. How about Black Studies? How about the growth of Political Science? Many kids think it is smart to talk about "Poly Sci" to their parents and give them the impression that they are really doing some thing significant in college. How about "Sociology" or "Dance" or "Music Appreciation". Is this really what parents want for their kids? I don't think so.
Here is what happened with all our tax money and the time and efforts of our kids. Lets start with 100 kids in college back 50 years ago. Sure some of these kids had money and were able to go to colleges, but many more were poor, but smart and determined. This was the group of 100 that we started with. Many of these smart hard working kids took the more difficult courses, like science and technology. Now we "game" the system and try to graduate 150 kids. Good idea isn't it? It is if the increase of 50 more graduates is not due to "gaming" the system. Here is what we ended up with by "gaming" the system. We used to graduate 50 technical graduates and 50 non-technical graduates. Now, we graduate 40 technical graduates and 110 non-technical graduates for a total of 150. The problem is that we are worse on technical graduates. This is exactly what has happened in the past 50 years. If you don't think this is true, then why are we importing 60% of our new doctors after spending so much on education? Take electric cars. Where are 99% of the batteries made? Detroit? No! Korea and China. We have high school level kids putting the batteries in the cars in Detroit, but they have no idea how they work. You starting to see the problem. We "gamed" our educational system without even know it. While we were "gaming" our educational system, our competitors around the world were doing it the old way. Hard work.
What happened is that us parents saw that people who were college graduates were making a lot more money than non-graduates. We all wanted our kids to have a better life and make more money. For that reason we agreed to paying more taxes so that more of our kids could go to and graduate from college. Gaming is messing with one of the variables in a system to get it to perform in a special way that was to our advantage. You see all kinds of examples of "gaming". It happens around us all the time. We know from experience that it is little more than cheating and in the end does not produce the results that was expected. Our push to get more of our kid in and thru college is this exact same thing.
Here is what we did. We added courses to our colleges that were quit different from those of the past. How about Black Studies? How about the growth of Political Science? Many kids think it is smart to talk about "Poly Sci" to their parents and give them the impression that they are really doing some thing significant in college. How about "Sociology" or "Dance" or "Music Appreciation". Is this really what parents want for their kids? I don't think so.
Here is what happened with all our tax money and the time and efforts of our kids. Lets start with 100 kids in college back 50 years ago. Sure some of these kids had money and were able to go to colleges, but many more were poor, but smart and determined. This was the group of 100 that we started with. Many of these smart hard working kids took the more difficult courses, like science and technology. Now we "game" the system and try to graduate 150 kids. Good idea isn't it? It is if the increase of 50 more graduates is not due to "gaming" the system. Here is what we ended up with by "gaming" the system. We used to graduate 50 technical graduates and 50 non-technical graduates. Now, we graduate 40 technical graduates and 110 non-technical graduates for a total of 150. The problem is that we are worse on technical graduates. This is exactly what has happened in the past 50 years. If you don't think this is true, then why are we importing 60% of our new doctors after spending so much on education? Take electric cars. Where are 99% of the batteries made? Detroit? No! Korea and China. We have high school level kids putting the batteries in the cars in Detroit, but they have no idea how they work. You starting to see the problem. We "gamed" our educational system without even know it. While we were "gaming" our educational system, our competitors around the world were doing it the old way. Hard work.
Double Selection
Another strange title. What on Earth is "Double Selection". I did not invent this, it is just a observation of what has been going on for a very long time. Think about it this way. What if you were trying to select the best hunting dog and went about it this way. First you made a list of all the types of dogs out there and narrowed the list down to the top 10%. This means you eliminated from consideration 90% of the possible dogs. Everyone would agree that these were very good dogs, yet you are not through with your search. Next you took the group of dogs in this top 10% group and picked out only the top 10% again. Now you would be down to only one or two dogs. Any one of these last two dogs would be a very good choice. What you have done with this "Double Selection" is to get down to the best dog in 100 or the top 1%. I think you can follow this logic. When you make "Double Selections" you get a 10 times better selection. See how it works? Now lets look at another example.
How about selecting a person for a new position. What most of us have been doing is to select on the basis of a "Single Selection" process. This means we only look at the major in college as though what was learned in that major was all that we needed to consider. We all know that one does not learn all that much in any major compared to what is needed to succeed in a position. What most of us miss is the "Selection" that took place before the kids went to college. I don't think that I am bias on this one, but our smartest and hardest working kids don't "Select" Political Science, Communications or Elementary Education as their majors in college. Our smartest and hardest working kids tend to "Select" technical or difficult majors in college. The net affect of this "Double Selection" process is that our kids who graduate in the technical and more difficult majors are many time more competent than those who were "Double Selected" into less difficult majors.
As I noted in a prior Blog, Business Administration is one of the easiest college majors and attracts those of our kids who are the least capable. Parents and business people need to understand this. How about an example or two? You hear interviews with T. Boone Pickens, the Billionaire oil guy, on TV. He has a degree in Petroleum Engineering". When was the last time that our automotive companies had a really competent President? How about Lee Iacca? He was an Industrial Engineer. How about that? Not a paper shuffler. How about the top guys in the government of China? Zero are lawyers. All are technical people. Interesting? I think that China and Korea must be using "Double Selection".
PS-------
How about a Football example? What position do you think college coaches recruit most often? You are right, it is the quarter back. They do this even though most college football teams only have 2 or 3 quarter backs on the team. The reason is that the quarter back position is the most difficult position on the high school team and requires the best athletes. This is a clear case of "Double Selection".
Notice that over the past 25 years, the USA has significantly increased the percentage of college graduates. Now, how did they do it. During the past 25 years, our universities have "decreased" the number of graduates in the more difficult technical areas, while increasing the numbers in the less difficult softer majors like Political Science and Sociology. Sorry, those are the facts.
How about selecting a person for a new position. What most of us have been doing is to select on the basis of a "Single Selection" process. This means we only look at the major in college as though what was learned in that major was all that we needed to consider. We all know that one does not learn all that much in any major compared to what is needed to succeed in a position. What most of us miss is the "Selection" that took place before the kids went to college. I don't think that I am bias on this one, but our smartest and hardest working kids don't "Select" Political Science, Communications or Elementary Education as their majors in college. Our smartest and hardest working kids tend to "Select" technical or difficult majors in college. The net affect of this "Double Selection" process is that our kids who graduate in the technical and more difficult majors are many time more competent than those who were "Double Selected" into less difficult majors.
As I noted in a prior Blog, Business Administration is one of the easiest college majors and attracts those of our kids who are the least capable. Parents and business people need to understand this. How about an example or two? You hear interviews with T. Boone Pickens, the Billionaire oil guy, on TV. He has a degree in Petroleum Engineering". When was the last time that our automotive companies had a really competent President? How about Lee Iacca? He was an Industrial Engineer. How about that? Not a paper shuffler. How about the top guys in the government of China? Zero are lawyers. All are technical people. Interesting? I think that China and Korea must be using "Double Selection".
PS-------
How about a Football example? What position do you think college coaches recruit most often? You are right, it is the quarter back. They do this even though most college football teams only have 2 or 3 quarter backs on the team. The reason is that the quarter back position is the most difficult position on the high school team and requires the best athletes. This is a clear case of "Double Selection".
Notice that over the past 25 years, the USA has significantly increased the percentage of college graduates. Now, how did they do it. During the past 25 years, our universities have "decreased" the number of graduates in the more difficult technical areas, while increasing the numbers in the less difficult softer majors like Political Science and Sociology. Sorry, those are the facts.
Parents, Wake Up
Most parents want the best for their kids and want them to go to college. Most are willing to go without in order to allow their kids to go to college. I have seen many parents just like this. They were all so proud of the fact that their kids were going to college or had graduated. When one looks deeper into the situation, what you will find is that many of these kids and parents have been screwed. A little strong? When you understand my point, I am not so sure that you won't agree.
What I did was to Google what people could expect to earn by college degree. All I checked were undergraduate degrees. One list showed the 10 "lowest" paying degrees. Top on the list was "Social Worker". For comparison, Social Worker is the top Masters degree at the University of Wisconsin. Why don't parents Google data like this when they send their kids off to college and spend all the money that the family has in the bank? Are parents that dumb or trusting in public school counselors? At the University of Wisconsin, the number one degree is Political Science while it is #37th from the top based on compensation. The top degree on the undergraduate list is Petroleum Engineer and Chemical Engineer is second. At one time the University of Wisconsin was the top rated school in the USA for Chemical engineering. It is still very good, but has now dropped to 3rd place. What we have here is the not only are parents and students getting screwed by their choices of degrees, but us taxpayers are also being screwed.
Not only do parents have to "Wake Up" but us taxpayers have to demand that we get better value at all levels in our educational systems.
What I did was to Google what people could expect to earn by college degree. All I checked were undergraduate degrees. One list showed the 10 "lowest" paying degrees. Top on the list was "Social Worker". For comparison, Social Worker is the top Masters degree at the University of Wisconsin. Why don't parents Google data like this when they send their kids off to college and spend all the money that the family has in the bank? Are parents that dumb or trusting in public school counselors? At the University of Wisconsin, the number one degree is Political Science while it is #37th from the top based on compensation. The top degree on the undergraduate list is Petroleum Engineer and Chemical Engineer is second. At one time the University of Wisconsin was the top rated school in the USA for Chemical engineering. It is still very good, but has now dropped to 3rd place. What we have here is the not only are parents and students getting screwed by their choices of degrees, but us taxpayers are also being screwed.
Not only do parents have to "Wake Up" but us taxpayers have to demand that we get better value at all levels in our educational systems.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Rationalization
Ever heard of "Rationalization"? It is not the story that your kids have given you about why they did not get better grades in school. Henry Ford is one of the first to popularize the concept when he started building cars on an "assembly line". He took the complex job of an auto builder and broke it down into many smaller jobs that were simple to do. This is the idea of "Rationalization". People on the assembly line do short simple operations over and over. They need much less skill to do these simple jobs and they get very good at them in a short period of time. This was how Henry Ford was able to put a car in every garage. Now, why is this still such a big deal? Two of the areas where we are spending far too much money and getting far too little for our investment are medicine and education. We spend far more than any other country in the world and we get much less for the money we spend. I propose that we use the concept of Henry Ford, "Rationalization" to significantly reduce the cost and thus increase the value in each of the above two areas. Revolutionary isn't it?
First to our schools. Say, we keep the schools just like they are now with grades from k thru `12 teaching all the same courses. I propose that we "Rationalize" our teachers by having them specialize in the specific area that they will be teaching. By doing this, we significantly reduce the years of college needed to lean what they need to know to teach their specific class. Example, how long should it take to teach someone in college to teach 4th grade math?. My estimate is that you could do this in one semester and you could do it in any community college or Junior College. There would be no need to waste time and money going 4 or more years to a teachers college and then doing student teaching for an additional year at no pay. This single move would reduce the cost of the teacher's education by at least $250,000 and increase the years that the person could teach from about 40 years to about 45 years. To show how significant this is, consider the teacher was paid $50,000 per year and we used 5% as the discount rate. We ask the question, what is the present worth of these two alternatives. With the current system it is $671,851 and for the "Rationalization" alternative it is $1,138,700. My alternative is 69% better than what we have now. I could do this thru other grades or classes and the results would be the same. The other factor that I did not show is the new space that we would have in our expensive colleges for more productive technical majors. If you don't understand the concept of present worth for comparing the economic merits of decisions, I would recommend some self study on the subject.
I am not going to go into medical costs and the cost of doctors, but it is exactly the same. Specialization has increased our medical cost when it should have reduced them. Do you know what went wrong and what needs to be changed? That is the subject of a future Blog.
First to our schools. Say, we keep the schools just like they are now with grades from k thru `12 teaching all the same courses. I propose that we "Rationalize" our teachers by having them specialize in the specific area that they will be teaching. By doing this, we significantly reduce the years of college needed to lean what they need to know to teach their specific class. Example, how long should it take to teach someone in college to teach 4th grade math?. My estimate is that you could do this in one semester and you could do it in any community college or Junior College. There would be no need to waste time and money going 4 or more years to a teachers college and then doing student teaching for an additional year at no pay. This single move would reduce the cost of the teacher's education by at least $250,000 and increase the years that the person could teach from about 40 years to about 45 years. To show how significant this is, consider the teacher was paid $50,000 per year and we used 5% as the discount rate. We ask the question, what is the present worth of these two alternatives. With the current system it is $671,851 and for the "Rationalization" alternative it is $1,138,700. My alternative is 69% better than what we have now. I could do this thru other grades or classes and the results would be the same. The other factor that I did not show is the new space that we would have in our expensive colleges for more productive technical majors. If you don't understand the concept of present worth for comparing the economic merits of decisions, I would recommend some self study on the subject.
I am not going to go into medical costs and the cost of doctors, but it is exactly the same. Specialization has increased our medical cost when it should have reduced them. Do you know what went wrong and what needs to be changed? That is the subject of a future Blog.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Obama Does Not Get The Message
Did you see Obama's news show? He spent 90% of his time lecturing us as to what we "really" want. The only reason that we don't go along with him and his decisions is that he has no explained them clearly enough. We are just too slow to understand all this complicated stuff. Obama, clearly does not get it. When asked about his big medical program and the fact that most people want it repealed, Obama explained that he would listen to ideas that would make it better. Doesn't he understand that the problem is just that we can not afford the program? He used the example of some person he met that had to take out a mortgage on their home to pay doctor bills. He seemed to claim that a person should not have to pay their doctor bills out of their own money. Some how, Obama and many people like him feel that someone else should pay their bills and that they should be able to spend their own money on things that they want. Is this a sick concept or what? Some how he feels that making insurance companies cover the adult kids of families can be done at no expense. Obama feels that if you find you have a serious medical condition that you should be able to buy an insurance policy for peanuts that could, somehow, save you money. Doesn't everyone know that on average, insurance costs more than just having everyone pay their own bills? Is Obama and many of us Americans that stupid? Sorry that I asked. Obama went off on electric cars again too. He claimed that if the government did not act in someway that companies would not buy electric cars. On this one point, he just might be correct, but the reason is that electric cars are not economical. They are a bad investment. Obama seems to have no concept of good and bad investments, wheather made by individuals or the government. Didn't he get the message from the real estate bubble? Wasn't that a perfect example of a bad government investment.
I go back to my old teaching days and again, remind people that the first step in the solution of a problem is to "admit" that you have a problem. Every drunk knows this. Why doesn't Obama? The first step in the 12 step programs is to admit that you are a drunk. Hey, Obama, you are a drunk.
I go back to my old teaching days and again, remind people that the first step in the solution of a problem is to "admit" that you have a problem. Every drunk knows this. Why doesn't Obama? The first step in the 12 step programs is to admit that you are a drunk. Hey, Obama, you are a drunk.
What Happened To California?
What is going on in California? Can you understand why California went Democrat against the grain of most of the rest of the country? I think I just might know where it all started. Remember the Prop #13 several years ago where California voters voted to reduce their property tax? They found that they could just go to the ballot box and vote money into their own pockets. One of the results of the Prop #13 was to reduce their monthly house mortgage payments. The impact of this was to allow people to now buy larger more expensive homes because they didn't have to make such big monthly payments. The other factor was that if you owned a home back when the Prop #13 passed, you got in on the special tax deal. New people who moved to California did not get in on this special deal. If you had a special "rent control" type deal based on Prop #13, you could move it along as you "flipped" homes. This gave these people who were grandfathered in special rights. Who would have thought Prop #13 would have such a long term affect on national economics.
Now, here is where it gets worse. Once California voters found they could vote money into their own pockets at the ballot box, California voters were ready to do it again. I think this is the reason that we see there people in California voting the way they just did. After the Prop #13 fiasco, I knew school teachers in Palo Alto who had to have at least 20 years of seniority to keep their jobs. Now California has some of the worst schools in the country. Now, new people don't want to move to California because of the home prices and poor schools. California has dug a very deep hole and it is going to be a very long time before they dig out, if they ever do.
California has had a lot of "one shot" factors that pushed them ahead of many other states, but those "one shot" deals are playing out. How about the Gold Rush? How about oil? California still produces a lot of oil. How about WWII when every thing had to be shipped out of West Coast ports? How about the weather? How about all the forests? How about all the military bases located in California? How about all the high quality farming? The problem with all these is that they are "one shot" deals. Remember the brain drain? It has not only stopped, it is flowing the other way. Much of California is Public land that can not be developed. Much of the other is steep mountains that can't be developed either. Most people do not know that much of the good land now has homes on it and good farm land is being converted to subdivisions. Santa Clara county was one of the riches farm areas in the world, but now there is "no" farming there. They had 12 big canneries there and there are none now. The big company FMC started in San Jose under the name Food Machinery. Caterpillar started in Fresno under the name Holt and moved to Illinois. Winnebago started in California too.
The point is that the decline in California started a long time ago and it is still falling, but Prop #13 started if allover again.
Now, here is where it gets worse. Once California voters found they could vote money into their own pockets at the ballot box, California voters were ready to do it again. I think this is the reason that we see there people in California voting the way they just did. After the Prop #13 fiasco, I knew school teachers in Palo Alto who had to have at least 20 years of seniority to keep their jobs. Now California has some of the worst schools in the country. Now, new people don't want to move to California because of the home prices and poor schools. California has dug a very deep hole and it is going to be a very long time before they dig out, if they ever do.
California has had a lot of "one shot" factors that pushed them ahead of many other states, but those "one shot" deals are playing out. How about the Gold Rush? How about oil? California still produces a lot of oil. How about WWII when every thing had to be shipped out of West Coast ports? How about the weather? How about all the forests? How about all the military bases located in California? How about all the high quality farming? The problem with all these is that they are "one shot" deals. Remember the brain drain? It has not only stopped, it is flowing the other way. Much of California is Public land that can not be developed. Much of the other is steep mountains that can't be developed either. Most people do not know that much of the good land now has homes on it and good farm land is being converted to subdivisions. Santa Clara county was one of the riches farm areas in the world, but now there is "no" farming there. They had 12 big canneries there and there are none now. The big company FMC started in San Jose under the name Food Machinery. Caterpillar started in Fresno under the name Holt and moved to Illinois. Winnebago started in California too.
The point is that the decline in California started a long time ago and it is still falling, but Prop #13 started if allover again.
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