Editor’s note: This op-ed is by Ed Deegan, an accountant who lives in East Montpelier.
Around November of last year, two legislators were interviewed by the Times Argus. The interview stated several premises these legislators were heading into the new session with: School spending is out of control; spending has increased by 70 percent in the last 10 years; the Legislature should impose consolidation of schools to control cost. How many of these premises are accurate? Probably none.
Let’s take the easy one first. School spending has increased by 70 percent. No it hasn’t. As someone who monitors this stuff over many years I could not remember spending statewide hitting 7 percent in any year recently and it hasn’t. There is an old joke: “How do you pick a good accountant?” “You ask them what two plus two is and the one who answers, ‘What do you want it to be?’ is the one you hire.”
As an accountant I can analyze the Agency of Education data in slightly different ways and bend the number slightly, however, I cannot get a 70 percent increase because it doesn’t exist. Education spending statewide has increased by 40 percent over the last decade of verifiable data from the State of Vermont Agency of Education reports. That is a substantial difference.
When the state proposes more mandates and consolidations as it is doing now, grab your wallets and run.
Let’s backtrack to the first premise: School spending is out of control. Well, at a 70 percent increase in spending you might justify this premise, but at a 40 percent increase it looks a little different. More importantly, when analyzing data, you need to be looking at it in relative terms. So, in relative terms using the real data of a 40 percent increase, how does it look? I don’t need to look at this data because the state already has done this research. Tom Kavet, the economist the state uses, has looked over this information over several very long study periods and in relative terms, as a percentage of the state GDP, education spending is fairly stable. A few years ago Tom went way back and did the same research with the same results. The conclusion of this research is a simple premise backed by solid research. School spending is not out of control.
The third premise: The state needs to force consolidation to control cost. It is “likely,” based on the data Tom Kavet is looking at that consolidation will drive cost higher in education (not lower). Looking at the same data, I come up with the same conclusion. What else does his report state? The “definitive” cost driver he can trace with data is “state mandates.” I remember the old cartoon “Pogo” whose line was “We have met the enemy and he is us.” So when the state proposes more mandates and consolidations as it is doing now, grab your wallets and run.
We have the information we need to make good decisions. The state pays Kavet to do this work and then seems to disregard what he is telling them. His work is high quality and he puts the data in clearly stated and simple premises. The state needs to listen.
