Decision 2016

[Aldin]

The easiest example really is when my boss pays me to ask the question of whether or not he is funding my extracurricular activities. He is paying me for the work I do. He is not sponsoring the charitable donation I might make with my earnings. There is no line of sponsorship from my boss giving me money to me giving money to a charity. We can follow the dollars, but my boss has no culpability in how I spend the money he pays for the work I do.

~Aldin, skinflint

[dok]

OK Aldin, how about this: while you're watching the play at your local mosque, there's a box under your chair with a message from the hosts. You intend to read this note at the end of the play. The note contains some broad platitudes hoping you enjoyed the play.

However, also in the box is a radioactive atom, and a detector that can detect its decay. If it detects the decay, it activates a device that will add more text to the note, talking about all the different things the religious group will do with the money they raise from the play. Reading this note will make you realize that you gave to a religious group (and you will be OK with that).

Before you open the box, are you simultaneously giving to religion and not giving to religion? Is your status vis-a-vis religious donation currently subject to a wave equation?

- dok, who is glad that the Supreme Court didn't worry so much about intent when they ruled on this subject

[Swamper]

😂 y'all are cracking me up. I don't have any idea where this conversation has gone, but I know I don't really like plays.

[Ixe]

I remember hearing a dean of a university say one time that "not all dollars are green." In his case, he was remarking how some money is given and can be spent freely while other money is given and marked for specific projects. It was to explain to those upset over the seemingly wasteful expense of building a statue.

I think this concept partially extends to the argument you are having about money. Your boss, for instance, is essentially giving you "green" dollars that you can spend however you'd like and not necessarily sponsoring your hobbies. For vouchers, the dollars aren't quite "green" since they can only be spent in certain ways. Directly, the government is funding education. Now the effect in many areas is that this money supports religious schools at the expense of public schools. I can see how saying the government is establishing a religion in this case is up for philosophical debate.

However, I only put so much stock in intention over effect. In effect, government programs are causing secular schools to lose funds and religious schools to grow in some areas. That alone suggests that there are consequences for this program that need to be more closely addressed (although I'd say the education system has far more systemic problems).

[Dad_Scaper]

Originally Posted by Aldin

The easiest example really is when my boss pays me to ask the question of whether or not he is funding my extracurricular activities. He is paying me for the work I do. He is not sponsoring the charitable donation I might make with my earnings. There is no line of sponsorship from my boss giving me money to me giving money to a charity. We can follow the dollars, but my boss has no culpability in how I spend the money he pays for the work I do.

~Aldin, skinflint

Oh, if we are just making examples up freely, then two can play. Here's my new "easiest example": I give 100 people money to buy a pair of shoes, one for each. Each person must buy a pair. They can buy whichever color they want, between black and white, and some people will buy each. If they buy black shoes, they are funding a religious institution. I am therefore funding a religious institution.

I mean, if you want to walk back the whole hair-splitting about the definition of "funding," we can do that.

[Aldin]

@dok I apologize for my inability to understand what you are asking, but I truly don't get it.

@Swamper Heresy! The play's the thing!*

@Ixe Good points. I would say, however, that what it does is force education to be competitive. In theory, if purely secular institutions always offered a better education than an institution with religious affiliations then you would have more kids at secular institutions than there are today since I would argue that much of the draw to religious affiliated schools today is not the religious affiliation, but the higher standard of education provided.

Are there some who would force their kid to get a substandard education just so they could have Bibles in the classroom? Sure. I wouldn't do it though, and anecdotally most religious folks I know wouldn't either. Doesn't mean I'm right, but it does mean it isn't exactly a slam dunk in my mind.

@Dad_Scaper Okay... So...? How is this relevant?

~Aldin, feeling very confused by dok and DS

ETA Sorry... forgot to attribute
*Shakespeare (from Hamlet)

[All Your Pie]

Originally Posted by Son of Arathorn

I have to cut in here- I strongly disagree with the notion that the president-elect's cabinet runneth over with experienced and competent professionals. His top candidate for the head of the EPA is a climate change denier- pretty much the opposite of an experienced and competent professional for that position. He's picked lobbyists and magnates for key, important positions in government, and a doctor-turned-second-tier-Fox-voice for Sec. of Housing and Urban Development. Trump said he would "drain the swamp," and now he's doing the opposite.

Sorry, I must not have been very clear. My point was that the "he will surround himself with experienced and competent professionals" line was something I heard a lot from his supporters during the weeks leading up to the election as a way to counter the argument against his lack of experience. I totally agree with you--an EPA head that denies climate change and a secretary of education that has no experience performing any job related to education are terrible choices. Appointments like that make it clear that he has no intention of trying to address his shortcomings.

[Dad_Scaper]

Aldin, I thought we were working through whether a person purchasing a ticket for a play at a house of worship was funding that institution. And I thought that because, in fact, it's what we were doing. It was a fair hypothetical, I thought, exploring the way in which you were using the word "funding."

For reasons you do not explain, and one is left to guess, you walked away from that example and wrote about how you get paid for a service (work) that you provide. That's almost wholly unrelated to what we were talking about before, and not really helpful to the larger discussion of school vouchers. But if we're going to retreat to *other* hypotheticals, then there's no reason why I can't retreat to my hypothetical about shoes. Paraphrasing what I said earlier, our readers can decide whose example is more persuasive.

[Aldin]

Ah - I thought we were done with the play example since you left it for the reader to decide and I moved on to something that I felt was even better at describing the type of relationship I see involved with a voucher system. Namely, that it is the government paying the school for work done in providing an education. I'm fine with going back to the play example, but the idea that it is being advertised as a fundraiser does tend to make it less good as an example (since presumably schools will still actually have fundraisers to which the government would not be contributing and which have nothing to do with the tuition). Just trying to be as clear as possible.

~Aldin, whose last post double-posted with weird formatting for some bizarre reason

[Dad_Scaper]

Very well. I think the metaphor of someone paying you for the service you provide isn't helpful for several reasons, the most obvious of which is that there no strings attached and no purpose - not a subjective purpose, or an objective one - for the money other than payment for services rendered.

In a voucher program, there is an objective purpose in the giving of the vouchers: the compensation to a service provider for the provision of an education. You took issue with whether that was "funding" the service provider, which it is. That's how the service provider makes money (or one of the ways it makes money).

[dok]

Aldin, briefly, my post was mostly a joke reference to Schrodinger's classic physics thought experiment. You can google it if you care.

More seriously, it was my way of making the point of how it's a terrible idea for any legal or policy definition to hinge on the "intent" behind a payment. If that's how you want to think about things in your personal life, or as a moral question, that's fine, knock yourself out. But it has no real practical application from a policy perspective, which is what I thought we were talking about.

[Son of Arathorn]

Originally Posted by All Your Pie

Sorry, I must not have been very clear. My point was that the "he will surround himself with experienced and competent professionals" line was something I heard a lot from his supporters during the weeks leading up to the election as a way to counter the argument against his lack of experience. I totally agree with you--an EPA head that denies climate change and a secretary of education that has no experience performing any job related to education are terrible choices. Appointments like that make it clear that he has no intention of trying to address his shortcomings.