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The Fraser Institute Explained
The Fraser Institute is in the news again here in Alberta with their annual rating of schools. This is a largely useless exercise because the numbers they produce every year simply confirm what is already known. Namely that academic achievement correlates directly with socioeconomic class. Rich schools produce kids with better marks basically.
FI doesn't provide this service out of altruism. They have a very obvious agenda that includes getting the Alberta government to move to school vouchers. I have no problem with people sending their children to private schools (I would do it myself if I had children and sufficient wealth). However, I don't think I have the right to steal from other people's children to be able to do it. Vouchers are basically stealing from the public schools to pay for private ones.
It's like saying "I buy books at the bookstore and I have a health club membership, so my taxes shouldn't go towards libraries and swimming pools."
How does rating schools promote vouchers? By conditioning people to think of the schools as being a consumer product that can and should be exposed to market forces. I think the free market is an excellent tool, but it is not a universal one. Some things shouldn't be market driven, just like not all things can be fixed with a hammer.
The Fraser Institute has an agenda of making everything - absolutely everything - into something that is owned. In their universe, the water we drink, the air we breath, the space we take up, would be owned by someone. Watch The Corporation sometime and you will see a Fraser Institute spokesman say just that.
I don't know why the media still pays attention to these guys. Every report and recommendation they will ever make can be summed it in the following way:
1) If a government policy is good for business, we're for it.
2) If a government policy is bad for business, we're against it.
3) If a government policy has nothing to do with business, we're against it because it wastes resources that could be used towards doing things that are good for business.
To see why this is bad, simply observe that in countries where minors can smoke cigarettes, tobacco companies make a point of marketting to them. Age limiting tobacco sales are bad for business.
FI doesn't provide this service out of altruism. They have a very obvious agenda that includes getting the Alberta government to move to school vouchers. I have no problem with people sending their children to private schools (I would do it myself if I had children and sufficient wealth). However, I don't think I have the right to steal from other people's children to be able to do it. Vouchers are basically stealing from the public schools to pay for private ones.
It's like saying "I buy books at the bookstore and I have a health club membership, so my taxes shouldn't go towards libraries and swimming pools."
How does rating schools promote vouchers? By conditioning people to think of the schools as being a consumer product that can and should be exposed to market forces. I think the free market is an excellent tool, but it is not a universal one. Some things shouldn't be market driven, just like not all things can be fixed with a hammer.
The Fraser Institute has an agenda of making everything - absolutely everything - into something that is owned. In their universe, the water we drink, the air we breath, the space we take up, would be owned by someone. Watch The Corporation sometime and you will see a Fraser Institute spokesman say just that.
I don't know why the media still pays attention to these guys. Every report and recommendation they will ever make can be summed it in the following way:
1) If a government policy is good for business, we're for it.
2) If a government policy is bad for business, we're against it.
3) If a government policy has nothing to do with business, we're against it because it wastes resources that could be used towards doing things that are good for business.
To see why this is bad, simply observe that in countries where minors can smoke cigarettes, tobacco companies make a point of marketting to them. Age limiting tobacco sales are bad for business.
no subject
Given that Ezra Levant used to work for them, I can see why most national media outlets don't report a lot of what the FI says.
Ezra LeRant?
(Anonymous) 2005-03-03 07:30 am (UTC)(link)I share Quixote's annoyance with what comes out of FI - like the old Alberta Report, I'm pretty sure they manufacture their facts for the most part.
Re: Ezra LeRant?
Re: Ezra LeRant?