Oct 31 2008
Erickson, Brown Debate the Issue in House District 124
One issue both candidates agree on is that the area needs more help getting its students educated. Their plans to make that happen, however, are where they differ.
“We have a lot of funding. I think South Carolina is fourth in the nation for education funding,” Erickson said. “The problem is where those dollars are.”
The dollars are unevenly split, for one. The money a school receives should depend upon the number of children it has and every school in the state should receive the same dollar amount per child so there are no desparities between the rich and the poor. Furthermore, more dollars need to make it to the classroom and less on administrative bureaucrats who offer little practical value.
Meanwhile, Brown wants to see a change in how those education dollars are first collected. Brown said his plan of using income tax to fund all recurring school operating costs will lower property taxes.
Yeah, that’s just great. Screw the working people. Most South Carolinians already pay a 7% income tax. How much more does Brown think it can be raised before it drives people to Georgia and North Carolina?
In talking about health care funding, Brown got a swipe in at Erickson. Brown supports universal health care and said his opponent voted against a cigarette tax increase that would have helped fund health care.
I guess Brown hasn’t paid attention to the failure of “Romney Care” in Massachusetts and the dismantling of TennCare in Tennessee. Maybe he could take a lesson from Hawaii which just this month ended their universal health care for children because it was too damn expensive and people were abusing it.
Erickson is the better choice in this race.
