this post was submitted on 27 May 2026
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Fuck Flock cams, but also fuck school freeloaders, too. I lived in an area with really good schools bordering a state with cheaper taxes and worse schools where people would have family or a hand-me-down residence listed for schools in (good) state while actually living in (cheap) state with the cheap state listed as residence for tax purposes. Every once in a great while they’d sit a cop outside a school and check out-of-state license plates, but it was so rare. These freeloaders were sending their kids to school on my dime.
The way to fix this is to make the entirety of the school experience the same. Not by going cheap. But by giving more money to poorer schools to subsidize education so it's up to the exact same standard across the board. Schools being paid for by local taxes is part of the problem here. It will not get better if we keep trying to fix it at the local level. These flock cameras are just the latest in an ill advised attempt to fix a problem the wrong way when fixing it the right way could cost much much less.
But if poor people were smart, how could we continue to fleece them? It’s no longer profitable if even a fraction of them wise up!!
/s
Even in states where schools are funded from education slush funds which are supposed to distribute funding equally it doesn’t work well. Well-off areas get better funding, poor areas get less. Some states even do it by county, so if people live in a rural county with no industry or population to tax the schools get very little money.
Yeah, making it so things are more equitably distributed would be great, including higher teacher pay, lower administrative costs (like each district having its own admin and pay structure is ridiculous), etc.
Where are you proposing the tax money come from for this? While there are certainly areas of poverty that lack funds, I'm not even sure that's the majority of the lack of funds. Another is today's senior citizens that were fine with their children's education being subsidize by yesterday's senior citizens and the childless tax payments, but as soon as their children are grown they vote down any tax increases to fund schools.
Another point: I know a number of families that have intentionally moved out of good school, well funded, districts seeking lower taxes, and hence, worse funded schools. They would fight you on getting better funding even for their own schools if it meant the necessary tax increases. Teachers don't, and shouldn't work for free.
Idk maybe tax the fucking billionaires? Maybe instead of useless foreign wars spend it on schools? Tax the NFL? I'm just spit balling.
They seem to think that what I mean is that we shouldn't use tax money at all. No. I'm happy to pay for the same education for all children. A standardized education.
Incorrect. That's not what I think. I'm seeing if you've thought through the consequences of your proposed change and have a solution I can't see.
Okay, so right now many schools are paid for by additional local income/sale/property taxes (these would be over and above any state or federal tax money that all schools would get). Those local taxes are passed by vote of the people in those localities. Under the current system, if "City A" has voters choose to tax themselves at a higher rate for better schools, then they get better schools. If "City B" has voters shoot down their tax increases, their schools pay the price and decline.
I'm not trying to strawman you here. I'm trying to understand your proposal. Are you proposing to take the additional tax money generated in City A that they put on themselves and give a portion of it to City B to create your standardized education?
Your argument is predicated on the idea that a few paying more tax should in some way be spread further which would lead to a drop in education inevitably in many places.
My point is that, instead of localities paying more (or less tax) it should be a tax across the board from everyone to maintain the best education. So instead of locality A and B paying a higher local tax and locality C and D paying a lower one (meaning that they have to have their system supplemented by localities A and B.
But by simple math, if we eliminate that tax entirely and instead institute a higher tax rate at the federal level then everyone is paying into the same system and money would be allocated based on the number of children it serves i.e. each child receives $27,000 a year in funding for education to be spent paying faculty, buying school supplies and learning aids and equipment. All of that would of course have to be standardized.
I can name several problems with the is system because a lot of the way we standardize things in this country is to pay a private firm and that in and of itself is a whole can of worms.
But something this could potentially do is pay teachers a competitive rates (the disparity between teachers salaries from state to state alone is horrendous let along locality to locality), and allow for a more even spread of teachers to students. Less over crowded classrooms. The same or at least equitable activities and opportunities for the curriculum and extra curricular experiences.
There's other things that would need to be fixed in society as well. But the current system can do one of two things to make the school system more equitable for all students. They can share (with higher economic yield areas that have higher property values) paying for poor schools to operate at the same standard, or they can consolidate, essentially eliminating the requirement that a student must live in a specific zip code to attend said school.
But one of those things puts a significant burden on poorer parents, and the kids. Having to be bussed hours to school causes its own snowballing problems.
Of course doing it the way I suggested will likely eliminate some school types. Technical schools, agricultural schools, specialty schools, schools with fusion style approaches to teaching that often benefit Neurodivergent kids etc.
But either way I dislike the idea that kids are freeloading by going to the "good school". If the parents have to game the system then the system to get their child a good education then the system is fundamentally broken.
Nice fake quote
Get out of here with that lazy answer. Saying [paraphrased] "Have someone else pay for it somehow" is the most throwaway answer to any cited problem. If you want to contribute to the conversation looking for a solution, then contribute. What you posted here isn't a useful or meaningful contribution.
I'm not opposed to taxing fucking billionaires, but how are you proposing? Increase on capital gains taxes? Higher taxes on non-resident properties? Wealth tax on unrealized gains? That's a great conversation to have, but its pretty far away from school spending which is what we're talking about here.
I'm not opposed to lowering defense spending, but in the USA you might as well try to boil the ocean than try to reform the Military Industrial Complex today. Short of revolution, that's not happening in our lifetime. If we have revolution, school taxation will be the last of our worries.
I'm glad you asked, here is my proposal.
At any rate I'm still being more helpful than your "can't afford it" rhetoric.
oN mY dImE
Your view, while understandable from a personal standpoint, is fucked up. The way schools are funded means that poor districts get very little funding, while wealthy white district get plenty. This leads to worse education in poor areas and better education in more wealthy areas. Is this how we should really be handling this?
We live in a society. Part of that is your dime paying for stuff that benefits other people. You also get plenty of stuff on other's dimes. Stop being so selfish. The real fix is to increase funding globally, ideally on the dime of the ultra-wealthy (who are going to complain that's it's on their dime, but I don't give a fuck).
Disgusting? Lol. You completely disregarded the fact that these were knowing and willing tax dodgers deliberately and fraudulently attending schools they were not allowed to. They‘re not poor, they can afford to maintain separate residences in two states. Get your reading comprehension in gear.
Completely missed the point to white knight some unneeded righteousness. I have Zero problem with people unable to pay for education getting an education, but that‘s not what's happening here, and I‘m well aware of how school funding works.
Most people have no idea how different these education experiences are, and it's a foundation of class warfare in America.
The whole system in the US that allows rich people to go to well funded public schools, and poor people being forced to send their kids to bad public schools is disgusting.