On the tax thing, though, there is something really screwed up. the Tennesse budget (i.e. spending) is higher per captia than Georgia, Florida, and North Carolina, yet we achieve poorer results. Especially in some areas of health care, where we spend a higher percentage of our budget than any of these states, despite a fairly innovative program which costs a s**tload of money and may or may not be working, but we won't go there.

And I love the way the guv came out with all these education program ideas that would cost another $400 to $600 million that we don't have, then accuses the people of Tennessee of not caring about education because we won't hand over a blank check. Ohhh, we're a bunch of meanies hurting the little children. We need to stop using kids for extortion and blackmail.

The truth is, state spending for education is higher percentage-wise than these other states, but we are consistently 49th in this, 47th in that, etc. And now bright young college freshmen are questioning whether they want to attend a university that seems to excel only in football.

Fine, bring on a reasonable income tax, and get rid of the Hall tax (that punishes entrepeneurship and investment) and lower the sales tax and eliminate it on groceries and prescription drugs. But use the money wisely and manage the damn finances like any responsible business would.

When you spend a lot of money and don't get results, there is only one party to blame: management. If a publicly traded business were run like this state there would be shareholder class action lawsuits out the wazoo.

Ok, I feel better now.

I would like to tell him (Big Don) this isn't Kansas so get your damn dog and go home.

Among the Guv's education initiatives are things like reading programs for pre-school. New and worthy idea but unfunded and dead w/out _some_ revenue proposal (I.T. or otherwise).

I will say that given the sorry revenue solution that we've come up with at present I don't understand the cost of living increase for state employees.

It's not all that simple.

I say less tax on beer, that's really all I care about.

Skip

Cheers,

I don't think money is the problem. Distribution and allocation of money, maybe, and maybe just plain old mismanagement.

Tennessee spends the highest percent of its budget on education, and has the highest in state tuition of TN, FL, GA, and NC. Yet, it has the lowest graduation rate, the lowest freshment retention rate, the highest student to faculty ration except Florida, and the lowest percentage of classes with under twenty students.

Kansas taxed me an additonal $85.00 every pay period just to live there, they also charged me an outrageous automobile tax...not very different from the new automobile tax going into effect in October...Everything is taxed to death in Kansas.

However, they have a lottery and they're school system, though I hate to admit it, is far better than ours. I don't think UTK is to blame. The problem with our education system lay within the public school system and expecting people to pay for 5 years of college or $40,000.00 if you're lucky, forking another couple thousand bucks for testing and licensure then expecting those same people to work for less than $25,000 a year and not give them the liberty to do their job. Not learning how to read by the time you're in college is NOT the college's fault. It's a problem that roots way before elementary school. TN tax money is not going toward education and it never will, it's simply a faux platform all government uses to try and get us to willfully pay additional taxes.

The problem we come into in TN is that people living and working in TN do not make 1/2 the income people in KS do. Six months out of college I was offered $65,000.00+benefits, vacation,&bonuses doing a job I already did in Knoxville at $25,000.00. Of course I took the job in Kansas only to return to TN for personal reasons and I don't regret leaving Kansas because I learned money wasn't everything....anywho! 'nother story for 'nother day.

I think the tax on beer, tobacco, and other 'luxury' items is ridiculous too. The correlation between beer and STD's is absurd and how the government could ever justify that crap is beyond me.

Unfortunately, by the time these poor kids get to college, TN has the lowest university entrance high school GPA of TN, GA, NC, and FL.

As for salaries, TN has the next to the lowest average salary, and the lowest economic output per capita.

Oops, looking at 1990 numbers. Later numbers have TN with the second highest average salary among TN, GA, FL, and NC (far below GA, and only fractionally higher than NC), but still the lowest economic output.

I have heard so many complaints from the people who live here and the people who live in SC as far as their education systems is concerned. The majority of people I have dealt with have felt it pertinent to pull their children out of the public school sector and resort to home schooling. Of course maybe I've just been exposed to a remote number of locals who can afford to quit their job and home-school.

But, here's a pretty good place to start for some nationwide comparisons:

Resign immediately. You are a lying sack of shit. End your "listening tour" where you've only traveled to organizations who have their hands out begging for more state funds.

Up yours, Gov.