Why Utah is Last in Spending on Secondary Education

I heard a report yesterday on TV that Utah is dead last in spending per pupil on secondary education in the US. The average spent by a state in this great United States is just over $10,000 per year. Utah spends just under $6,000, New York spends $17,000.

We all here knew Utah was the cheapest state in the Union with respect to spending on our kids. We often volley back and forth with Mississippi for largest class rooms and least amount of money spent. We can't even say anymore "at least we aren't Mississippi". I suppose the Mississippians are saying "At least we aren't Utah".

The TV talking head gave as justification for this poor record on spending that "in Utah we have big families". That is crap. Not that we don't have big families, but to use that as the reason we don't spend as much money on our kids' education is a huge copout.

We don't spend money on our kids because our legislature would rather use our taxes as incentives to their friends' industries or not raise taxes at all or trade our state lands (the taxes from state lands goes to schools) for below market rates.

It is amazing that we get the quality of student we do in Utah with such a poor spending record.
Our kids are well educated relative to our stature (or lack thereof) in the rankings of spending. This is a testament to the dedication and sacrifice of the secondary teachers. We routinely hear of teachers using their own money for supplies.

We (the liberal commie left wingers) have been saying for many years that we would gladly do away with the multi-million dollar subsidies to Wal-Mart or Kennecott to give more to our kids. Every few years the legislature gets shamed into throwing a few bucks at the education problem in the hopes it will go away.

At least we aren't Mississippi where they don't have the quality of student or the business base for the kids to get underpaying jobs below their level of education just so they can spend more money at Wal-Mart or Xengo.