Does anyone out there actually believe getting a high school diploma does anything to increase an individual's productivity? I thought it pretty clear by now that people advance through the educational system to their abilities. You can fiddle with methodologies and testing all you want, but the raw material is what it is.
Government funding of scientific research is the problem. About two thirds of scientists make their living off the government, directly or indirectly. We need less of that, not more. Scientists need to stop making ultimately useless death machines for the DOD and other government agencies and they need to start working on technologies for the free market. Eliminating DARPA and throwing all the scientists who depend on it out of work would be a good start. They'd be forced to come up with business ideas.
The problem with health care in America isn't that too many aren't "covered," it's that too many can't afford medicines and procedures because they're too expensive. Costs and prices need to be driven down. That would happen right away if you eliminated the tax deductibility of health care benefits. (Maybe give an offsetting tax credit to make it political palatable.) Millions of people would opt out of their employer provided plans and go comparison shopping for much cheaper high deductible plans so they could pocket the savings. This consumer driven pressure would force insurance prices down dramatically. The high deductibles of these cheap plans would have people comparison shopping for the cheapest medical services, which they basically don't do now. This would drive down prices dramatically.
Eliminate DARPA? The majority of what they fund is really cool, useful technology that just happens to be a little too risky or costly for businesses to fund (especially with capital harder to come by today). Look over their list of projects; you'll find a shortage of "ultimately useless death machines" and an abundance of worthwhile science and engineering. I doubt you could have made a convincing business case for building the ARPANet -- too expensive, and how are you going to earn money from it? -- but it turned out to have been worth doing anyway. Likewise for most of the DARPA projects I've been seeing.
Government funding of scientific research is the problem. About two thirds of scientists make their living off the government, directly or indirectly. We need less of that, not more. Scientists need to stop making ultimately useless death machines for the DOD and other government agencies and they need to start working on technologies for the free market. Eliminating DARPA and throwing all the scientists who depend on it out of work would be a good start. They'd be forced to come up with business ideas.
The problem with health care in America isn't that too many aren't "covered," it's that too many can't afford medicines and procedures because they're too expensive. Costs and prices need to be driven down. That would happen right away if you eliminated the tax deductibility of health care benefits. (Maybe give an offsetting tax credit to make it political palatable.) Millions of people would opt out of their employer provided plans and go comparison shopping for much cheaper high deductible plans so they could pocket the savings. This consumer driven pressure would force insurance prices down dramatically. The high deductibles of these cheap plans would have people comparison shopping for the cheapest medical services, which they basically don't do now. This would drive down prices dramatically.