One hesitates to enter ’Puter’s bailiwick of edumocation, but this takedown by Friend of the Gormogons Flava Last prompts the following thoughts off the top of one’s head, and what are blogs for if not making unconsidered comments publicly?

One doubts Lemann’s idea that the education market’s “success” is indicative of fundamental soundness. First, it’s not really a market: the first ten years of education are mandated by law, and the first twelve are “free”—and literally free if you’re not a property owner in most places. These are unusual product characteristics. Second, despite the fact it’s “free” you have huge (and one bets increasing) numbers of people often willing to pay extra to get out of it—either from (relatively) cheap Catholic parochial schools to extremely expensive prep schools to home schooling where you not only bear expenses but provide most of the labor. (Homeschooled in U.S. in 1985: 50,000 kids. 1999: 850,000. 2007: 1,500,000.)

Next, you’ve got universities which, due to the collapse of the high-school diploma as certificate of basic literacy and numeracy, are now the gateway to many entry-level jobs. And they can (and do) charge ridiculously stupid amounts of money because the government makes sure kids can indebt themselves, thus destroying any demand-side pressure.

All this suggests a “market” highly rigged towards the producers—which you would expect with highly organized lobbies of unionized teachers and university associations acting as rent-seekers.

Also—”look, enrollment is rising everywhere!” Dude, that just means the school-age population is growing. Education is mandatory, chucklehead.

Confucius, Œc. Vol.

Don’t ask impertinent questions like that jackass Adept Lu.