Arthur Camins, retired science educator, warns that the coronavirus pandemic is rivaled by an equally harmful pandemic of selfishness.
He begins:
Deadly as it is, the uncontrolled spread of Covid-19 in the United States is but a part of a broader, more devastating phenomenon: the be-out-for-yourself-pandemic. The readily available antidote is organizing for mutual benefit, but that medicine has been intentionally kept off the public market. Now, people are marching for it in the streets.
The virus lurked in our culture in partial dormancy at least since defeat of resistance to New Deal legislation. It reemerged in plain sight with the election of Ronald Reagan, the rise of ultra-conservative think tanks and foundations, and Republican dominance in local and state government. Be-out-for-yourselfism reached pandemic proportions with Trump’s victory. It has perniciously infected much of our daily lives, reeking death and destruction in its path. We are suffering from rampant selfishness sepsis. The pathogen spreads by promulgation of a three-pronged anti-government, anti-tax, anti-regulation ideology. Racism is its nourishment.
He goes on to explain why this ideology undermines our ability to react wisely to the coronavirus, which requires cooperation and common purpose.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Thank you for this very clear, evidence supported article. Our country has been carving up and disinvesting in the common good for many years as our income inequality had grown. We are overdue for a change. We need to move toward collectivism that benefits most Americans while we reduce individualism favored by the wealthy. We need to invest in our people as they are the economic engine that promotes a healthy, more balanced economy.
and recognize clearly and adamantly that corporations are NOT people
Excellent summation, but I think Arthur left off one that’s also important and most characterizes how elected Republicans, in particular, are moved to change their views: How does it affect me/Have I been impacted by this/Do I personally know someone who is has experienced it? That’s why issues like climate change, police violence, and poverty don’t matter to them. If they don’t see it or personally know someone who has, it doesn’t exist.
A perfect example of this syndrome was the softening of Dick Cheney with regard to gay marriage and rights when it was revealed that his daughter, Mary, was gay. If something is not personal, many Republicans do not care.
Same with Rob Porter and his son, same with a myriad of Republicans who all of sudden fall in love with NIH funding when one of their family members is stricken by disease or disability, same with Jay Dickey whose amendment prohibits CDC from tracking gun violence but changed his mind after he was out of office and the Aurora shooting happened. I’m sure many here can come up with examples ad infinitum. Next up, sometime soon, Republicans representing S. Florida who all of a sudden see the light on climate change. They are beyond reprehensible and deplorable.
Greg, maybe if their loved ones were to die from the virus, they would start to change their tune. Maybe? Who knows.
Back in March, when my hair was metaphorically on fire, I made some intemperate remarks that I regret to people I respect on this blog, in particular, about the possible consequences of this pandemic. As you and others well know, I lose it at times and it’s only through contemplation that I see it and repent. Having written that, I still take great joy when bad things happen to bad people. Great joy. It’s the German in me whose favorite word in language in Schadenfreude. I took great joy in Herman Cain’s death. I hope to do so with Louis Gohmert. I would love it to see Republican naysayers and their families suffer as much as possible.
Greg,
I too enjoy schadenfreude. Like the pastor who laughed at Covid, called it a hoax, then got it and died.
The softening of Dick ( Cheney)
The softening of Dick
Was bound to come about
He really was a prick
But couldn’t hold it out
Oh, goodness, y’all . . .
I’m sorry, but when someone posts “the softening of Dick Cheney”, it’s very hard to resist.
How often does one get such great “material” for goofy poetry?
The softening of Dick” (take 2)
Dick’s gone limp
(And please don’t share)
The Goodyear blimp
Without the air
That was originally “please don’t stare” but self correct thought “share” would be better, and who am I to argue?
Poet, it might be better not to touch that subject.
Too late
Well, just be sure to wash your hands.
Did you see this?
Trump can’t pronounce “Yosemite.”
He calls it “Yo Semite.”
Prolly thinks it was named after a call to a Jew.
Yo! Semite!
Mazel tov
I’m pretty sure he’s an anti-yo-semite.
Donald Trump doesn’t know words. I searched “words Trump can’t pronounce” and found a very long list of articles. He can’t talk, can’t walk (down a ramp), can’t hold a glass of water… Sad. Bigly sad.
And he was talking about the sequoias in Yosemite, so expect neo-Nazis (Trump pronounced Nazzis at a Holocaust memorial) to carry tiki torches down the streets soon, chanting “The trees will never replace us!”
Love that!
There are good trees on both sides.
Yo Semite Sam
Yo Semite Sam
Was Jewish man
And muscle tough was he
He had a stash
And shapely ash
And slalomed through the trees
A rabbi who is a friend said that Trump has created a new greeting. Say you go to synagogue and you see a familiar face but can’t remember the name. You say, “Yo, Semite.”
Laughing.Out. Loud.
The “greed is good” mindset is a very serious epidemic that has been spreading for at least forty years. It might be a pandemic, as opposed to an epidemic, but just like the other deadly virus, cases are heavily concentrated in the U.S., somewhat isolated like an epidemic. Other countries have done a much better job of managing the infection. Many have social safety nets in place. The U.S. has too many people with pre-existing conditions (billions of dollars) and a long-standing lack of leadership enforcing safety regulations. The problem isn’t all in America, but it’s certainly All American.
Many other countries in northern Europe have done a much better job of being capitalist, yet providing strong social safety nets for their people. Europe has done a much better job regulating the tech companies than we have. We allow them to have their way.
Greenfield, Indiana reopened in July 2020 and did not make it through ONE day before a Greenfield Central Junior High School student tested POSITIVE. The local health department alerted the school AFTER this youth had walked the halls, the classrooms, the cafeteria and the bathrooms of GCJHS. Of course the “authorities” were horrified and immediately contact-traced and sent multiple “contacts” into quarantine.
The Me First parents of this student quite deliberately returned him to the first day of school BEFORE receiving the results of his Coronavirus test. This is NOT the equivalent of them pouring Tylenol down his fevered throat and sending him on to school only to have the medication wear off by noon when he turns into a screaming memie and is sent home from the Nurse’s Office.
The families in Greenfield are angry with these Me First INFECTED who have now placed thousands of other children and teachers at risk. But it seems anger and condemnation are the only consequences for such deadly behavior.
Similar stories are popping up all over the USA. These epidemic school reopens are viewed as Acceptable Loss, Acceptable Damage, Acceptable Risk, Acceptable Infection, Acceptable Death by the Me First Powers That Be. The deranged concepts and practices drawn from warfare and big business are now being applied to the health and well-being of those who work in schools.
In the Axios interview Trump’s response to the death rate was, “It is what it is.” Gee, that’s reassuring and consoling to Americans that have lost loved ones.
He washes his hands of any responsibility.
He won’t wear a mask. What makes you think he washes his hands? 😏
Washing one’s hands of responsibility”
Wash your hands and wear a mask
Fakest things that you could ask
Test the folks and trace them too
Testings Liberal, through and through
Surely you know that testing for the virus causes the statistics to go up.
If we stopped testing, no more virus.
The Word, according to the Great Don.
Liberal testing
Liberal testing
Liberal plot
Liberal nesting
Liberal rot
People won’t stop their bad behavior until they’re shamed into stopping it and then the shammers will be labeled as bullies. It’s the typical game plan of the bold and wealthy.
I just listened to Governor Mike Dewine field questions about school openings in Ohio. He has nothing to say but was skilled in dodging answers, confused the idea of a norm with a goal for having all students wear masks, except it seems, athletes who are preparing for competitive sports. He claims to know about children because he has children and now grandchildren. He has no coherent guidance on how to open schools beyond recommending masks and “letting the teachers figure this out.”
Dewine seems to get shot down every time he tries to impose some common sense rules on Ohioans. I guess he is just giving up. He seemed like a reasonable Governor?
He has reverted to form. Amy Acton seemed to stiffen his spine for a while. Since she was driven out by state legislative Reps (indicted Larry Householder on the front lines!) he’s now back to the equivocating, slippery eel he’s been his whole career. Remember, this state elected his mirror image, Rob Portman. When he was a US senator, he used to have Dum Dum lollipops in his waiting room (they’re made in Ohio, just like the horrific, chemical-laden Peeps). Most appropriate freebie ever. We briefly had our moment in the sun when this all began, now we’re back to becoming the next Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi. Take your pick.
Some posters here have written that they should not be asked to come back into the classroom until it is “100% safe”, yet are happy to let the people who provide them with food and medical care continue to do so even though it is not 100% safe for the “essential workers”. How does that fit into the “Me-First” pandemic?
TE,
What do you think of governors and legislators holding virtual meetings where they decide to send teachers and students to in-person school in buildings with poor ventilation, windows that don’t open, 30 people in a room?
I think we need to balance the risks from going to work and the risks from not going to work. You can i can still eat because we have decided the risks of the workers in the food supply chain going to work are less than the risks of the workers in the food supply chain not going to work.
Workers in meat processing plants have become infected and died. This is a good time to be a vegetarian.
“Some posters here have written that they should not be asked to come back into the classroom until it is “100% safe”
Which posters?
Link please.
Otherwise, no one is going to take you seriously. And why should they?
“Sphincter speak ”
Sphincter speak
Is quite a skill
Not for meek
Or weak of will
Sphincter speak
Is like a fart
Cuz once you leak
The guests will part
I’ve seen it, although I can’t produce links (WordPress is not very searchable.) Bigger point is a lot of people are calling for schools to be closed. I haven’t heard anyone calling for grocery stores or Amazon delivery to be shut down. Yes, you can caveat with “closed unless safe.” Do we really think grocery stores and food delivery services are “safe” in the covid context? I certainly don’t. Yet I use them.
If you are claiming it, you had better be able to give a link.
Otherwise, it’s just hearsay and not very credible hearsay at that.
100% safe? That sounds like pure horse manure to me. Who would say that?
Other than TE, that is.
Is that what you say in court?
I’ve seen it but can’t provide links and WordPress is not very Searchable.
FLERP, Those don’t seem to me parallels. How is receiving delivered groceries unsafe in any way? And grocery shopping scores way higher on the safety meter than teaching/ attending school. Capacity is limited to 25%; transactions are masked, distanced, brief, mostly silent, & conducted in large high-ceilinged spaces.
Cashiers have hundreds or more face to face transactions every day, handling money and credit cards. Most places I go, the transactions are not very distanced or silent, and in any event they usually involve some physical contact/handoff. In urban areas, grocery stores are not spacious. There’s also the entire food delivery chain to consider: warehouse workers, truck loaders, slaughterhouses, chicken farms, fruit and vegetable production—much of this done globally by low-wage workers in conditions that arguably are not “safe” even in normal times. Bus drivers, subway workers, police. There are a lot of unsafe jobs that we rely on and that cannot pause.
FLERP: But I think your point is that teachers/ students should go back because they’re just as [un]safe as providers of food. [You added police & transport; you could add healthcare– let’s just stick to food-supply chain for a moment.] You seem to be talking about fairness or equity or something. There’s no virtue in expanding the number of people exposed. The only fair thing to do now is protecting the public by staying away from others if you are able to. Teachers, like many professionals, are in the unique position of being able to prop up the consumer economy by staying employed, while providing a service online.
Compare to food industry. Humans have to eat daily. Food-supply workers contribute to viral spread, but the alternative is mass starvation. Education could stop [&/or limp along online] for two whole years without endangering lives– and do a big service to the country by helping to minimize viral spread. Our sector, seen from the covid perspective, is no different from hardest-hit entertainment/ tourism/ indoor-dining/ brick-mortar retail/ transport. We are an activity which can be refrained from altogether, or engaged in online. Opening in-person ed is an option, an alternative– not a necessity– that immediately ramps up public exposure and viral spread. Yes there will be bad fallout socially, emotionally, economically, just as in those other sectors– that’s on the pandemic.
TE, the very politicians who want schools to reopen to help take care of children are the SAME crapheads who constantly refuse to fund schools and vote against adequate funding vote against raising taxes on the uber-wealthy, and vote against federalizing funding. They want to have their cake and eat it too. I think it’s known in the lexicon as “hypocrisy”.
TE is just making stuff up and is not worthy of a serious response.
Don’t feed the trolls! They go away if ignored. Remember dear Charles?….hasn’t been around for a long time since he got ignored.
Charles was sometimes entertaining. He was a troll in that instead of debating, he always tried to distract by changing the subject. He wasn’t very good at it, just relentless. Donald Trump, on the other hand, is a very skilled media troll. Trolls don’t debate; they speak on mean spirited tangents and in annoyingly repetitive circles. It’s good to debate.
Charles said the same thing over and over. Choice is good. He had court cases he cited. The same ones. He was exultant at any bad news for public schools or unions. He never debated. He asserted. He didn’t go away. I deleted him when he repeated himself. He and a few other of the negative voices on the blog reminded me of a Monty Python skit. Man one comes into a room where he has paid $5 to have a good argument. The argument begins. Yes, no, yes, no. Then the Python says in desperation, “That’s not an argument, that’s a contradiction.”
I prefer Harlan.
Yeah, Charles’ repetitious spite against public schools was frustrating and insulting, and I have always been glad you deleted his posts, Diane. There have been a few others I was glad you booted. There are some nasty people and bots out there.
Harlan is okay, just a straightforward conservative but not too pushy. John has been getting on my nerves for years with his fake racial paternalism. He talks in circles too. I can hardly tolerate it. School choice segregation is NOT a civil right!
Charles’ inability to engage in meaningful discussion made him appear one dimensional, like a caricature of a caricature. I sometimes was able to laugh at him instead of tearing out my hair because of him. Actually, there’s nothing wrong with tearing out my hair right now. Might as well, since the barbershop is closed.
I miss Charles. He was much more coherent than one of our other commentators who only spews whataboutism over and over again and never has a proposed solution or remedy to consider.
Sorry Greg, I don’t miss Charles at all! He made my blood boil. Thank you Diane R. TE just acts the pretentious know-it-all, snob and for some reason, I can just ignore that.
100% safe is not what teachers are asking for. Essential grocery stores and hospitals are not 100% safe either, but grocery stores and hospitals are different than schools. Grocery stores are very large spaces. Hospital workers have medical grade PPE. Apples and oranges with schools.
That may be, but just remember this:
Moms and dads carry groceries.
Moms and Dads carry the coronavirus
Moms and dads carry kids.
But kids don’t carry moms and dads (except in rare cases)
And kids don’t carry the coronavirus (at least not according to this article)
Hope that helps.
The question of whether children can transmit the disease has not been settled. The last study I saw reported was the one from S Korea that said kids of 10 and older transmit the virus as much as adults. There have been reports of children younger than 10 getting the virus. Statistically it may be comforting to know that little ones are less likely to catch it but they are not immune. If your own child gets it, the stats are irrelevant.
Moms and dads carry bread. You and I, Poet, carry cheese.
Left Coast Teacher,
What level of risk do you think teachers should be asked to endure? The same as the folks that spend 8 hours in a grocery store picking things of the shelf so that the wealth privileged can reduce their risks by having their groceries delivered? If teachers are willing to assume the same risks that those in the food supply chain, that seems reasonable. Of course, as some here have commented, teachers can not be as selfless as those who work in healthcare.
TE,
Another arrogant comment. People who stock shelves in grocery stores are not necessarily in close contact with customers or other employees. Teachers are expected to spend the day in close contact with 15-30 students, who may or may not wear masks, in a building that may have poor ventilation and may have no windows.
Please tell us about your own experience as a teacher: have your classes resumed? How many students in a class? Will they be six feet apart? Will they wear masks? How many hours each day do you teach? Are your classrooms well ventilated?
And we carry water, for the Kochs, Gateses and Bezoses of the world.
Demarcate the Market
Hospital and market
Are different than a school
PPE’s demarcate
The former, as a rule
Still waiting for the link to the posters who claimed they should not be asked to come back into the classroom until it is “100% safe” .
A pretty reasonable request, I think, given the implication that they are hypocrites.
One does have to wonder if TE will be teaching in person or remotely this fall.
Of course, most colleges have large lecture halls and students are a significant distance from the professor, so the situation is usually quite different from (significantly safer than) that in a k-12 school.
Perhaps small classrooms are the norm at the college where TE teaches. But without knowing which college he teaches at and whether they will be open this fall for in person instruction, we have no way of knowing whether TE is himself a hypocrite.
Don’t you love it when politicians sequestered in their homes say on TV feed that parents and students should return to in-person instruction?
Diane
My comment was tongue in cheek.
You obviously didn’t click on the link I provided.
It refers to a recent study that indicates precisely the opposite of “kids don’t carry coronavirus”.
In fact, the article is entitled “Children often carry more coronavirus than adults do: study”
Dr. Ravitch,
Perhaps I was unclear, but I was not speaking about the workers who stock the shelves in grocery stores, but the people who spend their working day taking goods off the shelf, packing them into bags, and sending them off to be delivered to other peoples homes. In my grocery store these people make up a large fraction of the people in the store. Do you have a different experience grocery shopping?
Classes have not started yet. My largest class (currently about 200 students) will have it’s lectures online only but students will have the option to attend discussion sections in person or remotely. In my other two classes (75 and 40 students), students will have the option to be in the classroom in person or attend remotely. Masks and social distancing will be required for those attending the class. I know that the university has closed some spaces on campus because of ventilation issues (and will be using at least one tent for performing arts classes), but I do not know about the ventilation of the classrooms where I am teaching.
I do have a different experience of grocery shopping. The shelves are stocked before customers arrive. Occasionally they are stocked when customers are there. There is no delivery to homes. The cashiers stand behind a plastic shield and wear face masks. The buildings that house the supermarkets have high ceilings and good ventilation. They are in no way analogous to a classroom where teachers are in close contact for several hours with a room of 15-30 students and where the ventilation is often quite poor.
Dr. Ravitch,
Once again I am not talking about the employees who put the goods on the shelf, I am talking about the employees who go around the store and take goods off the shelf, packing the bags that get delivered to homes.
Sorry, I have no idea what you are talking about.
We need to stop calling so-called essential workers heroes and compensate them for the hazardous conditions they face. You want me to risk my and my family’s lives? Pay me. Give me health insurance. How callous to pit teachers against food service workers in a race to the bottom, to see how bad conditions will get before the rioting and looting restarts. Medical and educational professionals and other people working during the pandemic deserve and demand better than “how bad can you all take it?”
“How callous to pit teachers against food service workers in a race to the bottom”
That’s what economists do best, doncha know?
That’s all economists do.
TE is too ignorant of science to understand the risk of in-person teaching in most k-12 schools
And he’d probably die of covid19 before he’d ever admit to (lowly) teachers that he was wrong (about anything).
Pit vipers
Two new studies, TE, say that elementary-school-aged children infected with SARS-CoV-2 carry 10 to 100 times the viral load in their upper respiratory tracts as adults do and that they transmit the virus at TWICE the rate of adults, that they don’t get as sick but that they are great vectors for the disease. This isn’t about ME-FIRST. It’s about preventing the INEVITABLE massive surge in infections and deaths and severe long-term medical consequences that will result from putting approximately 60 million kids and 6 million adults in small, enclosed places (Coronavirus Exposure Chambers) for 7 hours a day in the middle of a pandemic.
Let’s talk after the most devastating public policy blunder in US history, for it’s happening; you are going to get your wish–most schools, under pressure from governors and Trump and Devos, are attempting to “open safely,” which is like jumping out of a plane without a parachute but with guidance from the CDC to roll into a ball and aim for a tree canopy. My take: I’m watching a slow-motion train wreck.
Oh, Bob there you go again trying to blind people with science.
lol
Covid Malady
If virus were a lady
Then blinded I would be
By science of malady
That Bob has shown to me
LMAO!
Sometimes it just works perfectly.
Schools provide ideal environments for transmission of an airborne illness.
Bob, any suggestions I can pass along to a teacher in FL who is being forced back into classroom?
This is a very good question. I haven’t given the question a lot of thought, but here are a few things that occur to me:
Purchase or make a number of fine-mesh, multi-layer cloth masks. The key: that they be multi-layer.
Purchase tight-sealing swim goggles that are transparent on the sides so that you still have some peripheral vision. Also purchase some anti-fogging spray to treat the goggles with.
Keep a supply of gloves on hand.
Dress in scrubs. Buy five sets of these–one for each day. At the end of the day, remove them and place them in a plastic bag. Then, immediately when you get home, undress and shower before interacting with family.
Forget the box of tissues that you usually keep on your desk and the bottle of hand sanitizer. Send a note home to parents asking them to purchase for their students small, individually sized tissue and hand sanitizer packets.
Don’t accept hardcopy for anything. Tell students that all assignments, tests, adn quizzes must be submitted electronically. Create Google Docs or Microsoft OneDrive or other such sharepoint folders for this purpose. If you have to give a hardcopy test, do not have students pass them in but, rather, leave them on their desks when exiting the classroom. Wear gloves to collect them and leave them sit for a couple days before responding to them. Post test grades electronically.
Use Kahoot or some other piece of quiz software to get feedback from students using their cell phones (if, that is, all your students have cell phones).
Eliminate having students get up and move about during class.
If students are to collaborate, have this be done electronically.
Teach from the front of the classroom.
If you are fortunate enough to have windows in your classroom and are allowed to keep them open, do so, weather permitting.
Clarify with administrators what penalties will result from student failure to maintain distance and keep their masks and goggles on. There must be no exceptions.
A few ideas that occur to me off the top of my head. But the very idea of holding class under these conditions seems, to me, suicidal (like Russian roulette) or quixotic (like feeding aspirin to a cancer victim).
Thanks, Bob. What about legal remedies? My friend has some potentially serious health issues if exposed.
Well, as you know, Greg, the Republicans are trying to include protection for employers from Covid-related lawsuits in the latest stimulus bill. Unfortunately, your question is beyond my ken. Perhaps address it to Flerp!
Thank you so much, Bob! I sent that info to my friend and we’ll speak tonight. It seems that getting dressed as though he’s going into a meth lab might be the only recourse to both stay safe and make a political statement. From what I understand, none of the staff, parents, and even the union are taking this seriously. It breaks my heart.
D____, Greg. I’m sorry.
I’m not sure how an airplane or a train should be allowed. I was at the airport, check in line backed up, 100 people bunched together in the usual fashion. Not much planing there on the airline’s part. Then off to security, empty lines, but supposedly not enough physical distance they said so walk a quarter mile to another checkpoint. Go figure.
Most of the talk is about not doing in person school. So how will students be served better? Or maybe this is just a blog about the interests of teachers and not students or families.
Last time I checked, teachers are still getting paid and students are not receiving the full social benefit of a quality on site public education. If that has no value, then by all means, Bill Gates is right, on line school is and was the answer all along.
“Most of the talk is about not doing in person school. So how will students be served better? Or maybe this is just a blog about the interests of teachers and not students or families.” Better by staying home? The context there is, “better than” increasing viral spread among their own families and the community at large (including students, teachers, and all their families). If you mean “better” as in, remote learning must be made available to all, and must be of better quality than that delivered in Spring, I agree.
“Last time I checked, teachers are still getting paid and students are not receiving the full social benefit of a quality on site public education. If that has no value, then by all means, Bill Gates is right, on line school is and was the answer all along.”
That benefit is a fantasy in all but communities w/zero spread, & not deliverable regardless. Safety measures reqd for in-person schooling during covid severely limit social interaction, and interfere with quality education in innumerable ways.
How much to cut teacher pay to compensate for the lesser quality of remote instruction? The time investment is nearly double, & it’s challenging work. Nevertheless, why not look at the community cost of pre-covid in-person ed: can’t something be returned to the community for shuttered bldgs at least? Some would put that figure at 25% per-pupil cost. The problem: this is not a lab experiment where you can isolate niceties like lesser costs due to closed bldgs or the comparative value of remote vs in-person ed, & tax accordingly. Tax revenue has already taken a huge hit, ed budgets will be slashed, teachers will be laid off (lessening even further the quality of remote instruction). You’re counting angels on the head of a pin. To paraphrase James Carville, “It’s the pandemic, stupid.”
Bethree,
Great last line!
I’ve had to take one flight during the pandemic, chose Delta because of the safety measures they’ve taken. I was quite impressed and they will be first choice in the future, even though I’ve got lifetime status with another airline.
Ted,
School officials are making decisions based on the health and safety of students and staff. If children get the virus, they bring it home to their families. If teachers get sick, who will teach the children?
Conducting class remotely, Ted, is a BIG job. There’s an enormous amount of work to do to prepare lessons for electronic delivery, to conduct those lessons, and to respond electronically. It’s not as though teachers who are doing that won’t be teaching. Think about it.
It should go without saying, but teachers did not choose for things to be the way they are.
And It’s most certainly not easier for them these days.
My brother is a teacher and has told me that teaching remotely requires significantly more work, not less, not least of all because online lessons require use of lots of new technology.
And my brother is no slouch in the technology department. He was trained as a scientist and probably knows his way around tech better than a lot of people who do that for a living..
The idea that teachers are afraid of technology is just idiotic. They just understand that a lot of it is crap and that it takes a lot of effort to identify stuff that isn’t and to make it work for them.
And not incidentally, I worked as a computer engineer in the tech sector for a long time (since early versions of thePC) and will also attest to the fact that much of the software developed by those who are supposed to be the best of the best of the best (Sir) (eg, at Microsoft) is a major headache to deal with.
People I used to work with referred to Gates’ company as Microslop but one need not be a software engineer to understand this. Pretty much everyone who has ever had to use their stuff does.
When the pandemic hit, many people, especially parents, learned a little bit of respect for teachers and what we do. Many people learned that teaching doesn’t start or end when the bell rings. Teaching online, it never stops. We never get to “go home”. Some people did not learn to respect teachers because of a preset ideology. Those people will never appreciate what teachers do for them, irrespective of whether they have kids in school. We will continue to do it anyway.
Ted, re: transport. I don’t think you can generalize from your experience. Perhaps safety measures vary considerably among airlines, as Greg suggests below. I have 2 anecdotes which reflect safe travel as a function of the tiny number traveling now. My SIL was able to get back in July from UK– it took a while to even book passage. She’d made it out just under the wire before May travel ban to help daughter w/birth/ care of grandchild. Both going & coming, flights/ travelers/ staff were sparse, airports/ customs vast near-empty caverns. Also just heard from snowbirds taking car-train back North from FL. Each passenger-car holds 80 travelers. Folks spread out & occupied them at about 10 people each.
Just another example of the I,ME,MINE American society. The lens through which many view life here. What’s in it for me! Screw everyone else!
The Vaindemic
Vaindemic is vain
And driven by greed
It’s motive is gain
The ego to feed
“Last year, I had a conversation with someone (a well-off banker) I know about Bill DiBlasio. I indicated that New York City’s free preschool program was a significant positive development. He sneered: ‘I have no kids, so why should my taxes pay for someone else’s childcare?’”
This describes Florida well. A big chunk of the Republican base are retirees, interestingly who moved here from more liberal and higher performing states when it comes to K-12. But they also have this “I shouldn’t pay school taxes because I don’t have anyone in the system” mentality. Meanwhile, their prestigious Massachusetts high school diploma and University of Michigan degree were funded by the older people who decided NOT to move away.
I always tell seniors in here Florida to vote for the school budgets because it is an investment in the community. Somebody once paid for their education, and now it is their turn to pay. Properties in a decent school district will hold and sometimes increase in value. Maybe it’s partly selfish, but it is a good reason to get people without children to vote ‘yes’ for schools.
No, no, no! You both have it wrong. We should not be relying on local property taxes to fund so much of the school system, although that is indeed the paradigm now. Yes, these seniors for now should pay the school taxes even if they do not have kids in the system any more.
However, our school financing should be federalized, the way it is in Western Europe and Scandinavia, so that we get far more far more for our federal tax dollar other than SS, Medicare (which you still pay into when you take it) and the bloated military. In that manner, home owners would not have to deal with his nonsense to the point where they cannot afford to stay in her own homes because taxes keep on going up. We are too busy giving away our tax dollars to tax breaks for people like hideous Jeff Bezos and phony grandpa figure Warren Buffett. The list of where our taxes go is endless. Paying taxes – or even more taxes – and the tax pool are not the problem; it’s where we are forced to allocate the tax dollar to.
Robert Rendo, you read my mind…I miss Harlan, too!
(Especially his scary little picture…)
Poor dear sweet Harlan. I hope he is okay. But I digress . . . .
When I think of Harlan, I think of Emmylou’s song from arguably one of the best–if not the best–American album of the 90s:
I certainly hope a spoon will still fog up if put before his mouth.
John Harlan Underhill passed away on 6/9/2020 at the at of 84 in Santa Barbara, California. He had a B.A. in English from Amherst, an MA in English from the University of Michigan, and an EdD also from Michigan. He wrote poetry until the end, some of which he shared with me on social media. He directed kids in performances of plays by Shakespeare for many more than 40 years. I loved fighting with him on Diane Ravitch’s blog. He and I enjoyed fighting with one another so much that we continued it in other venues. Here, a poem he wrote shortly before his death:
BLIND BREATH
I’m healthy enough to love life,
But I know it cannot last.
Every soul snuffs out
After it’s embodiment is past.
Yet all religions preach the inverse
For our psyche, ego, self,
As if it were a golden possession
Part of having, saving, wealth.
Is it fear of death’s extinction
That animates such imaginative fire
To create a universe of spirits
Where no being can ever expire?
We mortals must our myths be forgiven.
Life is so gorgeous, its ending pure pain.
Each rose’s blossom, hummingbird’s beat,
Each blue day, the bright clarity of rain.
Thanks, Bob. I liked Harlan. He was smart, interesting, and funny.
Great piece, Arthur!!!
Here, perhaps, is another way to think about the risk of school. Suppose we could change practices so that in class instruction was 99% safe from infection in the sense that there would only be a 1% chance of being infected at school over the course of the next school year. This would mean that something on the order of 33,000 teachers and 500,000 students would be infected. Is that an acceptable level of infection to bear in exchange of in class instruction?
No. Deaths are the not the only result of Covid-19. Many people are having life-altering affects–blood clots, strokes, heart issues, memory and coordination issues, scarred lungs, etc.
I truly hope it’s not one of yours that gets this, but people, especially of color, are being bowled over by this thing. You think it’s okay for half a million children to get sick with a possibly life-altering infection?
I can’t say the words I want to say to you.
So 99% safe is not safe enough. Would you require 100% safe or would 99.9% safe and only 50,000 students being infected be tolerable in exchange for in class learning?
Are you willing to sacrifice your child?
Dr. Ravitch,
Is is safe to conclude that you do not think that 99.99% safe is safe enough to open schools?
Threatened Out West, I’ll say it. I will in a rare instance choose to get in touch with my inner rude New Yorker. I’m from NYC originally.
Teaching Economist, with any luck, you will become part of the 1% you speak of . . . I will willfully assume that this infected segment will simply die. Therefore, if you become part of the 1%, no one will have to listen to your endless drivel.
As Linda Richman would say:
“Teaching Economist . . . . . is neither teacher nor economist.”
DISCUSS amongst yah selves . . .
(Shmendrik comes to mind . . . .)
As I suspected (and indicated in my response below), TE is merely baiting people here.
Dimwitted people like TE are nothing if not predictable.
That’s the word I was thinking of but couldn’t remember. TE “baits” others by asking provocative questions that are strictly rhetorical.
I bet you were also thinking of “dimwitted”, but would never admit it.
😀
I’ll give him this much.
TE is entertaining.
Like shooting fish in a barrel with a shotgun.
Not incidentally, TEs completely transparent baiting not only shows how dumb he is but also demonstrates beyond any reasonable doubt that he is not interested in an honest debate.
How ONLY purpose in proposing his BS 1% assumption was to bait people.
That’s my definition of dishonesty.
Stupid and dishonest. Quite a combination.
“Suppose we could change practices so that instruction was 99% safe from infection in the sense that there would only be a 1% chance of being infected at school over the course of the next school year.”
What if?
What if grass were blue?
What if night were day?
What if economists knew
About the things they say?
Your what if scenario is very unlikely without a vaccine before the school year starts.
Can we calculate?
Confirmed cases in the US currently stand at 4.83 million, which is about 1.5% of the US population.
Thats after a significant fraction of the US popluation sheltered in place for over a month and the economy was largely shut down nationwide! (Rather significant mitigating measures, IMHO)
So, without a vaccine, your 1% infection in schools “assumption” would be just a “see bit”optimistic even if one assumed confirmed cases are indicative of all the people infected by the virus.
But in all likelihood, they are not. And they are probably too low by an order of magnitude.
The CDC did a study that puts the infections at between 6 and 24 TIMES the number of confirmed cases. In 7 out of 10 states, they found estimated cases to be about 10x confirmed cases.
https://www.statnews.com/2020/07/21/cdc-study-actual-covid-19-cases/
That would put the actual infections at between 9% and 36%.
So (without a vaccine) your “1% chance of being infected” assumption (in a place where large numbers of people congregate daily in close proximity!) In all likelihood has — and will continue to have – little if anything to do with reality. (Which is a nice way of saying it’s probably total BS)
Perhaps no one ever told you, but “What if ?” scenarios that are not based in reality are a complete waste of time. And to base calculations on them as you have done is pure , unadulterated mathturbation.
But it’s quite clear that you are trying to bait people with your “what if only 1% got infected in schools (“99% safe”) BS (it’s actually pathetic how clever you thiink you are)
And on a related note, i’m still waiting for the link to the “posters” who said they would not return to schools until they were “100% safe.”
I think that the discussion here makes it clear that nothing less than 100% safe is safe enough for public schools to reopen. Given this, I think it unlikely that there will be any in person public school in the coming year. Perhaps the fall of 2021 it will be safe.
Your comments here make it clear that nothing short of a nuclear explosion under your chair will divert you from a preconceived notion that you are trying desperately to “prove” (in the economic [non]sense)
And that you chose the profession that suits your “damn the torpedos , full speed ahead” attitude to a T.
Congratulations! You are ideally suited to disregarding facts and reality and for being certain in the face of significant uncertainty (the opposite of a scientist).
“Economics could be a Science if More Economists were Scientists”
https://neweconomicperspectives.org/2013/10/economics-science-economists-scientists.html
Folks like you and your fellow mathturbator VAManujan are preventing that from happening.
In case you have forgotten, let me remind you.
VAManujan would be the fellow who did the Nobel-winning (Raj … I mean VAManujan can always hope) “study” based on Chetty picking.
He’s also the fellow who has demonstrated beyond all doubt with his own words that he does not know the first thing about statistics (in particular, that he has no clue what statistical significance means — and what it does NOT mean).
As a refresher and for your reading pleasure, that is all laid out here
https://dianeravitch.net/2020/02/19/study-stop-and-frisk-increased-dropout-rate/#comment-3000184
The “Be-out-for-yourselfism” has probably been around since we slept in trees, under bushes, or in caves.