In the days of state-level tax revolts, California showed the rest of the country how to attract residents and businesses. Now it seems hell-bent on repelling them. “The taxpayer-funded public education system in California is broken,” Vicki Alger of the Independent Institute writes. “It costs residents nearly $66 billion dollars annually, resulting in an average per student cost of more than $12,000.”
“In fact, K–12 education represents the single largest share of the state’s entire general fund budget, nearly 43 percent. Yet student achievement places California among the bottom five states in the nation in reading and math. Currently, nearly one out of five high school students does not graduate, and just 43 percent of those who do graduate meet California’s four-year college course requirements.”
