Photo: Milwaukee Public Schools
MPS classroom
The Virginia governor’s election last November was won by Republican Glenn Youngkin using public school issues as wedge issues to win in that purple state. So now the Wisconsin Republicans are trying to copy that strategy. They are recycling their same old attacks on Milwaukee Public Schools by promoting their various ways to privatize the public schools that educate a large percentage of children from poor families. Unfortunately, this experiment of privatization has failed the city children but pleased the rightwing anti-government campaign check writers, enriched many private individuals and corporations and saved some horrible private schools.
These Republican legislators have shown no interest in understanding the real issues facing a big city school system and certainly have shown no concern for the children. If they understood inner-city education issues, they would understand that poverty affects all aspects of life, especially the schools. And if they cared about low-income children, they would try a few policies that have been shown to be very successful, including a child tax credit which has done a spectacular job of reducing child poverty.
The private voucher schools have been around for about 30 years, and the school voucher folks have fought against having their students tested. When their students are tested, the tests usually show no significant differences between the public-school students’ test scores and those of the private schools. This is not to say that there aren’t some strong charter schools and some strong public schools functioning in low-income communities.
This time it is suburban Sen. Alberta Darling leading the charge against the Milwaukee Public Schools. Darling introduced a series of bills on behalf of the special interest groups that want to continue to privatize Milwaukee Public Schools and actually break up MPS.
When in Crisis and Disarray, Republican Legislators Attack Milwaukee
Currently the Republican Party is in crisis and disarray, with many still claiming that Donald Trump won the 2020 presidential election because they are afraid to cross Trump and publicly state the fact that he lost. Even Sen. Ron Johnson admitted Trump lost. The rightwing of the party is calling on Speaker Robin Vos to resign and the Republican gubernatorial primary is quickly getting rather nasty. So, when they are under fire, Republicans know one thing that brings some level of agreement and that is to attack Milwaukee.
Many people remember former Gov. Tommy Thompson’s line when he was speaking to a group in northern Wisconsin about the importance of having a major league baseball team in Wisconsin and how it benefits the entire state. But when it came to fund the construction of the stadium, he wanted to excite his audience with his “stick it to ‘em” comment about putting the construction costs of the Brewer’s baseball stadium on the Milwaukee and Waukesha taxpayers. It was a great applause line for him. So, it is always a perplexing issue of why outstate Republicans seem to despise Milwaukee when many of them have never set foot in the city or even the county of Milwaukee other than State Fair Park. Rather than try to figure out why they hate Milwaukee, I would rather point out why they shouldn’t.
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The state government provides many services to all its residents like our excellent higher education systems, both the universities and the technical colleges, that literally change people’s lives. It provides money for K-12 education and monies to offset property taxes for day-to-day operations like snow removal and law enforcement. It funds roads especially beneficial for rural areas and it provides medical assistance through Badger Care which keeps rural hospitals alive.
So Where Does this Money Come From; Who is Paying the Bill?
The major sources of revenue coming to the state come from sales tax, income tax, corporate tax and a variety of smaller sources. Some counties are net contributors, sending more to the state than they receive in various benefits, and other counties are net takers receiving more benefits from the state then they contribute. They are essentially welfare counties.
You don’t need a Ph.D. in economics to figure this out. Where is most of the income tax coming from? The larger population counties, with Milwaukee County and Dane County leading the pack, have a larger share of higher income individuals and a higher pay scale for all level of jobs thereby paying much more income tax to the state. And if you have more people with higher income spending money, sales tax revenues will be greater. Finally, where are most the major corporations located?
Counties like Milwaukee, Dane and Waukesha are major net contributors to the state coffers, while smaller, very red rural counties are net takers. They benefit greatly from these larger net contributing counties. Without the major net-contributor counties, the lower income red counties would look much like a third world country. So why do they hate Milwaukee and Dane counties? They should be saying thank you, instead of applauding lines like “stick it to ‘em” and sending legislators to Madison to step on the necks of Wisconsin’s Golden Goose counties that support them.
