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 Originally Posted by BananaStand
Who refers to ages 14-18 as "their most productive years"
In many ways they are. At those ages you have bigger capacity to benefit your life in ways that you don't at older ages.
There are other ways of looking at this, like with the time value of money. A 15 year old who saves til he's 65 is making significantly more money than is in his paycheck and it's significantly more than if he started at 35.
Furthermore, you're destroying income mobility. By sending this 15 year old out into the world with a narrow education and set of skills, you have committed him on a path with few future options. That's not a good thing.
The people who gravitate towards that work are already in that situation. For them, education is already wasting their time, energy, and earnings potential. I'm not interested in "sending" anybody anywhere, but allowing them to more accurately adjust for their skills and preferences than the k-12 (and college grants/loans) are doing.
Further, furthermore, how would you even implement this plan? Do you really want the government evaluating the long-term prospects of each kid and deciding which teens should stay in school, and who gets handed a broom??
I want the government to spend zero dollars and zero cents on education. Let parents choose what kind of path best suits their children. Like you said earlier, the gains kids make are coming from the parents anyways.
Is hunger really the result of a lack of access?? Is it at least possible that this hungry person had access to food, but decided to spend money on heroin instead? I would contend that the majority of cases of hunger and homelessness are caused by a person's bad choices, and not because of a lack of access, or opportunity.
This is as it is now. We're talking hypotheticals and philosophy. You said that because of how important education is, the government has a duty to provide it. I am applying this logic to food.
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