Noam Chomsky - The U.S. Education System

the comics but um indicates isn't doing like what we're seeing budget cut people know you let her go without thank God well that's a really important issue the the public education system was one of the real major achievements of this country was the first country to have a really broad mass education system that contributed enormously not only to the cultural health of the country but to its economic growth that after the Second World War there was a major period of economic growth in US history was the several decades after the Second World War a substantial reason for that was a GI Bill which allowed a huge number of people not enough unfortunately but a huge number of people to go to college who would never been able to do it and those days college was cheap public education was free I mean I went to college 1945 and I happen to go to the logo I went to the local school you know never but the local school happened to be the University of Pennsylvania which which is private but it was a hundred dollars you know and that you can get it and you can easily hit a scholarship so education was basically free and for the GI Bill of the huge number of people and that had an enormous impact so all that's being reversed if there's an attack on public education which is with any precedent because all the way from kindergarten up to the universities so it takes a the university's budget a personal experience a couple of months ago I travel around a lot giving talks I happen to give a talk at in Mexico City at the National University and put an impressive university couple hundred thousand students very high level very engaged in fact salaries are ridiculously low by our standards but they work facilities are pretty good it's free that's a poorer country you know but public education is free furthermore in Mexico City itself there's a city run college which is not only free but had open admissions so anybody can go and if they need help to get in to get remedial training I was there too pretty impressive also high standards well that's a poor country I happen to go from there to the Bay Area in California it's maybe the richest place in the world outside of the Gulf Emory they the public education system is being systematically destroyed tuition is so high in the major universities that it's just for the rich it's a fact it's at the level of Ivy League colleges work for this year for the first time more funding for the public institutions is coming from tuition than from the state in a rich state not Mexico and this is happening all over the country I mean a majority of estates by now the tuition in the public universities is higher than funding now it's not because of the lack of wealth and it's not because of the deficit which is complete Forrester's is easily the show it's because of the decision to destroy public education the in California for example the great universities which are being will be proud almost certainly be privatized they're almost private now you know very high tuitions that big endowment and so on and that means the rest of this is the system it gets kind of lowered to low level technical training well you know for the economy of forget the human cost for the economy of California that's very serious California became rich in large measure because of the high level education system well the people who are running the program that top one-tenth of one percent of the population they don't care I mean their kids will be fine you know they don't use the public education system that's privatized they can pay for it a phenomenal wealth and there's a change and this is generalizes over the country we have to recognize a significant change in the nature of contemporary state capitalism from the 70s you go back to the 1950s the CEO of the firm's a General Motors had to care about the future of the firm that had had brand loyalty you know the firm had to persist and so on so they tried to build it so it would persist that's not true anymore the CEO of a General Electric which is mostly a financial institution old after it was make money in the short term I mean and of course they get bailed out by the taxpayer if it goes wrong but if the company itself declines it doesn't matter they walk away with their golden parachute that's the new system and it's for the country they don't really care about it along with the financialization of the economy came offshoring of production so if you can make more profit by using a super cheap exploited labor in China let's say without environmental constraints and so on fine having to harm this country severely but that's not their concern so we're getting into a situation where the future of the country just doesn't matter for the people for the decision-maker and it's going all the way down to elementary school I want to tell you there's a huge attack on teachers I'm in an effort to try to shift the blame for for for the financial crisis and a general economic crisis away from you know goldman sachs to the public school teachers and the firefighters so ludicrous you can hardly believe that it getting away with it and there is a backlash like in Wisconsin significant backlash but it's certainly going on and it is absorb so you're right there's a major effort to destroy the public school system now I think the fundamental reasons behind that it's not just that the rich don't care I think the same thing lies behind the attack on Social Security Social Security is a phenomenally successful program has almost no administrative costs I mean far less than privatized insurance and so on very cheap works very well keeps a lot of people alive it doesn't mean much to people in higher income levels you know they get a small amount they forget it but for a lot of the population that's what keeps them surviving particularly after the huge economic collapse and collapse of the real estate bubble so it's a white attack social security well partly it's of no benefit to the rich but there's a deeper reason I think that it's the same reason as the public education system I can't prove it but this is what it looks like coming the public education system and Social Security are based on a certain principle namely the principle that we care about other people social security means you care that a disabled Widow across town than a food B or let's say I don't have kids in school but you know I'm happy to pay school taxes because I care that the kid across the street this concept of sympathy and social solidarity is considered extremely dangerous there's a major effort propaganda effort to try to drive into people's heads they should only be concerned for yourself now there's nothing new about this you go back in Americans good to learn know about American history you go back to say 1850 the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution and incidentally the period of the freest press in the United States there are hundreds thousands of newspapers a lot of readership the direct participation that are written the factory workers and others and one of the main themes that was angered at what was called the new spirit of the age gaining wealth forgetting all but self that was the new spirit of the age in 1850 and it's been a tremendous effort over the years to somehow drive that into people's heads and drive out all normal human feelings and you know it's had some success and I think you see it in the willingness of parts of the population at least to try to kill the elements of the society and the culture that are based on care and concern for other people and to try to turn people into crazed the maniacs who care about nothing but themselves well that's all as pretty dangerous again it was happening in some small country you know it'd be a shame but when it's happening in the richest most powerful country history it's very dangerous

Channel: Chomsky's Philosophy

Views: 58,984

Rating: 4.9413409 out of 5

Keywords: education, tuition, wealth gap, greed, solidarity, school, chomsky, college

Id: br8n_3x6MDo

Length: 10min 15sec (615 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 12 2016