Lukas Miller
Instructor Stacey Knapp
English 1A
October 7, 2012
Proposition 30 Rough Draft
During the
span over the last several years, California and its people have endured a
great recession. We Californians have seen Governor Jerry Brown been forced to
make vital and drastic cuts to California’s state budget, from public safety to
state jobs and all the way to public transportation, but one department has
seen the worst and has been on the chopping block the longest, education. And
to make matters worse, Jerry Brown has already signed off $6 Billion worth of
trigger cuts to education state-wide from grades k-12 and Community College,
which is approximately 3 week’s worth of school, if either Proposition 30 or 38
do not pass in the November polls. Jerry Brown’s devised plan of Proposition 30
to help out public education and the public safety departments if passed will
result in an increase in sales tax of ¼ cent per dollar spent for 4 years, and
also an increase in personal income tax to those earning over $250,000 in a
fiscal year for 7 years. Although taxing the rich in our state might seem
harsh, it is truly the only way to get our state back on track and to help
create a better future for you states youth giving them a better education.
Passing Prop
30 will be deeply beneficial to our states already declining education system
which has endured bad budget cuts in recent years. And if prop 30 does not
pass, we will see extreme trigger cuts to the education system. Grades K-12 and
also community colleges will be losing approximately $5.4 billion, and also the
UC/CSU system will be enduring a loss of its own at approximately $250 million
each. Except that is not all that our state will endure, $50 million will be
cut from public safety department including police, fire, prison, development,
and wildlife departments. With all of these budget cuts in our near future if
prop 30 does not pass, this will cause unrest and a decline in our already
declining state’s economic system.
Some
arguments against prop 30 are that because in recent history politicians have
rasied taxes to they can have extra money in their wallets because we saw no
increase in budget to any state department but we saw increases in income. And
because that has happened the opposition believes that this measure is all just
a scam and education will not be seeing any new money because there is no
guarantee that the money will actually go to those departments in dire need. But
to accredit Jerry brown and to affirm that this is not true; all revenue that
prop 30 acquires will be placed into the Education Protection Account, and
therefore be dispersed among our state’s schools. And another argument against
prop 30 is said that it is unfair to raise taxes to just our states highest
earning tax payers because it looks like the government is just picking on them
for earning more but according to Thomas Piketty from an nytimes.com article,
he states: “In a way,
the United States is becoming like Old Europe, which is very strange in
historical perspective,’...‘The United States used to be very egalitarian, not
just in spirit but in actuality. Inequality of wealth and income used to be
much larger in France. And very high taxes on the very rich — that was invented
in the United States[.]” This quote symbolizes the actual inequality of the
wealthy people in the US, so higer taxation on the rich will actually show that
everybody in this country is equal because everybody deserves the same chance
to succeed that a millionaire holds.
Not only
does prop 30 hold control of our states education system but it also holds
control of our youth because without a proper education, they will not even
have a fighting chance to be successful in life. Because in a recent poll done
by nytimes.com about what employers, that at least hire 25% of their workforce,
look for in somebody that wants to work for them, the employers response was
this: “89 percent said
they wanted more emphasis on ‘the ability to effectively communicate orally and
in writing,’ 81 percent asked for better ‘critical thinking and analytical
reasoning skills’ and 70 percent were looking for ‘the ability to innovate and
be creative.” This Quote not only explains what corporate jobs are looking for
it explains that they need a properly educated person to fill the spot, and
without the support of prop 30, properly educated people will be even more
scarce because they simply cannot even pay their way through school. So not
only is prop 30 essential to our education, it is essential to our economy.
As a
student, a 19 year old, in their 2nd year of community college, this
prop affects me directly because I have to pay for my education. And if prop 30
does not pass that means I have to struggle even more. Because with the trigger
cuts to education that means teachers are getting laid off, there is going to be
fewer classes to choose from, more students in each class, more students on
waitlists, and also increase in unit cost for each class. I’m already on
student aid, and because of all the budget cuts Cabrillo will receive that
means it will be harder for me to take all the necessary units I need to even
qualify for aid. And because of that, the dream that every community college
student has of staying 2 years then leaving to a university will be nearly
impossible simply because they cannot take all the units they need to graduate
and transfer within the 2 years.
So why would
we want it to make it harder for our future generation to succeed? If prop 30
does not pass that means generations of students will not get the proper
education that everyone deserves, and therefore will struggle in life because they
could not get a great paying job simply because they could not afford college.
California’s education system used to be the epitome of all Education everywhere
in the US and now it is becoming a joke because of budget cuts, and if prop 30
does not pass then California will face an educational Armageddon. So let’s
take a stand and get it back on track. Vote yes on Prop 30.
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