Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Taxes and the Common Good

[Molly Williams (mmw]

Once again, I wasn't meaning to start a discussion of paying for
children and their education in society. I was responding
specifically to Becky's original post, which asked about whether
people feel resentful when they feel they have to do or pay
something, versus feeling happy to give when not feeling forced.
More, she was asking about how people react when they feel that
other people think they are entitled to something that's theirs,
whether or not they actually /are/ entitled to it or not. These are
subtle distinctions. I don't think she meant to start a discussion
of various ways of paying for child care, although that's also
interesting and useful.

Similarly, I didn't want to start a discussion of public support for
education. I could have easily given another example, which I
thought of later, of how people when driving are usually happy to
let other drivers in line, but when someone butts in line in a way
that makes other drivers feel they are overstepping some invisible
line, you get road rage. Same idea.

As I said in my original post, I understand why educating other
people's kids benefits me and the society in general. That's not the
issue that was originally raised, or one I was trying to raise.

You said: 
> I find it surprising to find this kind of sentiment on a cohousing list,
> since a major value shared by most cohousers is that community is vitally
> important and that community occurs when we all try to pay attention to the
> needs of our neighbors not just ourselves.

First, I am not a member of a cohousing group, just someone thinking
(less and less) about it. Second, I am surprised that there is a
mindset of values among cohousers. I think most people, cohousers or
not, would say community is important. It's the conception of
community that differs from person to person. I  myself think
overpopulation, especially in wasteful society like ours, stretches
the resources of community and of the earth.  

~ Molly Wms.

Rowenahc wrote:
> 
> Molly Williams said:
> "We are non-parents, most of whose property taxes goes to pay for the local
> public school system. While I believe that having an educated
> populace is a benefit to the whole society, parents or not, it still
> irks me to have to pay ever-increasing taxes for other people's kids
> to go to school."
> 
> I find it surprising to find this kind of sentiment on a cohousing list,
> since a major value shared by most cohousers is that community is vitally
> important and that community occurs when we all try to pay attention to the
> needs of our neighbors not just ourselves.
> 
> There are at least two lines of reasoning that support universal education.
> One is economic - this country will not survive and flourish if we do not
> educate our people.  As it is, our population is aging and would be
> shrinking without immigrants.  Unfortunately, in too many places local
> taxpayers are short-changing the schools and as a result we are having to
> import most of our engineers and other technicians from places such as India
> and China!  Without a flourishing economy, who will support us in our old
> age?!   The second is moral.  The concept behind universal education is that
> everyone raised in our country deserves the opportunity to succeeed - even
> those whose parents had the bad taste to have a lot of children.  In this
> day and age a poor education is a sentence to the cycle of poverty and while
> sufficient funds do not guarantee a good education, an insufficiency of
> funds guarantees a poor one.
> 
> I guess you pushed a button here.  Sorry if this sounds like a flame.
> 
> Rowenahc
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