10th Amendment Decreases International Competitiveness of American Workers

US is structurally unable to train a quality workforce in a time of economic stagnation and rising socioeconomic inequalities. Constitutional restructuring must be started now to avoid future superpower crisis unseen since Soviet Union's in the 1980s.



Even an incompetent weak leader is occasionally prodded into doing something right for his country ( even if to get re-elected). No Child Left Behind bill which was co-sponsored by Edward Kennedy was signed by George W. Bush in 2001. United States took a major step towards improving the quality of its workforce.

At least that's what appeared to happen if only 10th amendment didn't get in the way of creating a national standard for America's children. United States never had a national education minister to properly oversee the country's competitive development versus international rivals. A national education standard regardless of class or race to which all students strive to makes solid geopolitical sense. Yet even at the height of the cold war American constitutional arrangement stood in the way. Such a standard (that many leading Western nations have long had) would help culturally equalize the population, narrow the gap in worker quality between different regions, and allow national leadership to effectively track how much economic value an average American student can bring to the world's table. As of today it is rather difficult to assess where an average American elementary kid stands in comparison to a kid in Australia, Canada, or France.

United Nations tries to do some tracking with its Human Development Index (on which United States is 19th, sliding down, and about to be surpassed by Italy of all countries). UN's task is drastically complicated by major structural and cultural roadblocks:

1) Structural obstacle---The 10th amendment which results in each state setting its own standard,and the different ways of measuring, assessing, and comparing state wide education levels between 50 parts of American federal union. Even state wide standards took a while to implement and had to be nudged with No Child Left Behind. In many older northeastern states local governments have inefficient archaic 19th century structures, compete with each other for educational resources, and are poorly coordinated from the state's political center. Large states (old as well as newer ones in the Midwest) are prone to inefficiency, redundancy, and waste resulting from American over-emphasis on local educational controls. American Union's economically poorer regions as well as regions dependent on one crop or resource export also have their education system come under undue influence of wealthy protestant clergy or local oligarchs with political clout. When federal money is provided to states as incentives for restructuring, secularism is not strictly and uniformly enforced as a condition for aid. This results in a qualitative drop in demographic grasp of hard sciences necessary for high technology production and development. Even demographically smaller states have been given two senators by the founding aristocracy. This allows agricultural and resource extraction oligarchs to have relatively cheap influence on senators and governors in states like Iowa.

2) Substantial qualitative gaps between private schooling of the rich, middle class public schooling, and public schooling for the poor. The geographically large 300 million multi-ethnic federal union also suffers from often large cultural differences between regional, racial, and ethnic populations that translate into significant splits within the state wide education system.

No Child Left Behind reaffirmed the political notion that backward underdeveloped regions (such as Mississippi and West Virginia) should be left in charge of setting their own education standards. The above mentioned problems were thus codified and in many ways worsened. Some backward regions blatantly lowered their standards to receive Federal resources for adhering to NCLB act. Since NCLB had no enforcement provisions, tax payer money from states with solid education flowed to reward states that publicly hurt their own students' future. Predictably this occurred in states with high populations of poorly educated and disenfranchised peoples not belonging to ruling ethnic coalition (American south). A situation was created (and federally encouraged) where a High School student in one region of the American union thinks he has an A- in math and English whereas that A- can be a C+ in other regions. Millions of American citizens, their families, and institutions are being psychologically tricked for years to think their grades mean the same throughout the whole country. NCLB however, at least forbid reliance on the average test scores within the states. This was important since hyper educated upper class whites often skew the mean test scores up artificially (the way a millionaire walking into a gas station would bring up the average income of all the patrons in the station).

When High School children around the country reach the time to take a nationally standardized SAT test, many are in for a rude awakening. A "good student", from a rural locality in a state that doesn't try to modernize might think his high grades prepare him well. However he often scores worse than a "good student" from a state that tries hard to modernize and implement European style standards and assessment.

In 2005, the then chairman of the federal reserve Alan Greenspan has identified that American students compete well globally at 4th grade level but that there is a drop off in average quality after that. Greenspan, one of the biggest defenders of the free market, has pinpointed the lack of educational investment for high schools as the leading cause of widening gap between the rich and the poor.

"The income gap between the rich and the rest of the US population has become so wide, and is growing so fast, that it might eventually threaten the stability of democratic capitalism itself" - Alan Greenspan in a public testimony.

Such shocking statements by a man who oversaw nation's fiscal policy have gone unnoticed by most of the union's population. A chart of mean 2008 SAT scores by state can show the extent of the socioeconomic divide that is pushing US towards potential social instability in the future. What is most striking and telling about the state of economic inequality in US is that the states with the highest average SAT scores have the lowest amount of students taking the exam.

Upper classes that also often have the tools and extra wealth to influence political direction of the state/locality perpetuate chronic lack of public education funding while getting qualitative preparatory advantage via private schooling. Private schooling techniques and methods have continued to improve in United States even as overall quality of life declined. US private education for the upper classes is some of the best in the world and analogous to the American medical industry. The states with the highest mean SAT scores not only have the least amount of people managing to even try to pass the test but they are also amongst some of the poorest states in GDP per capita.

This is taking into account the distorting effect that those earning over $100,000 a year have on the average GDP per capita evaluation. Midwestern regions of the union as well as the non-diversified export states are under oligarchic control as blatant as that seen in parts of South America (where GINI index of inequality is even higher than in US). Midwestern and the Southern regions are much poorer than their entrenched strongmen claim. Announcements of high SAT scores or more people getting into college serve to perpetuate the illusion of rural development.

Perhaps the best example of oligarchic influence on political power centers is shown by Washington DC. Many nations of the world are judged by the social conditions of their capital cities. Capital cities often show the microcosm of the overall society itself since that's where the most power elites are concentrated (whose thoughts in turn shape society). In US, due to its decentralized federal structure, that is less of a case (considering the importance of state capitals, financial/cultural hubs of New York and Los Angeles, and strategic port cities) but still worth a look.

District of Columbia has the highest GDP per capita, the lowest mean SAT scores, and the highest SAT participation rate (and subsequent disillusionment). Lets dissect this innocent data.

The gap between private schooling for children of oligarchs and public schooling for the poor has never been more on display than in the capital of the former superpower. 1/3 of the city's population is functionally illiterate whereas the SAT scores resulting from elite private schools (that are grew 13% annually since 2001) don't even make much of a dent in mean SAT calculation. The mere fact that DC manages to have such low mean SAT scores (while its mean GDP per capita is the highest in the nation) shows that mathematically distorting effects of high SAT scores on average score calculation can only go so far. We wont see all the bourgeois upper class high schoolers scoring 1600 equivalent on the new SATs whereas the richest 1% living close to country's leadership have a drastic effect on mean calculation.

New York for instance has same level of participation rate in SAT taking as DC and is only 45th worst mean SAT score performer (DC is 51st worst). However, New York is 6th highest by GDP per capita (DC is first) and we see that nation's capital is 34% more socioeconomically unequal than even the state with the financial heart of the American union, Wall Street. Such striking gap in wealth and ethnic culture is unthinkable in Europe's capitals (even now that they are becoming culturally segregated by immigrant and native neighborhoods). Even Moscow, with the flashy belligerence of its oligarchs has not reached such a level of gilded age extravagance. Such reality in the beginning of 21st century should make any American pause about direction of the country. Past Western accusations that involved materialism gap between Soviet elites and average Soviet citizens begin to sound ridiculous in comparison to counter Soviet accusations of material gap in capitalist urban areas. Washington DC, of course, also has the best medical care in the country to keep its elderly Brezhnevs functional for decades.

After taking an explanatory background detour we return to the issue of worker competitiveness. Political realities make even a rabid modernizing president unable to create proper educational assessment of citizenry within his own country. Lack of national educational standards will continue to make rural regions of the country more uneven compared to economically growing urban areas. We have seen how group think of American elites has led to the financial bubbles as well as to the nationally draining occupation of parts of Asia. Doing an American perestroika-style restructuring when the economy is stagnating or declining runs the risk of massive failure. Undergoing needed restructuring itself will require nothing short of a constitutional convention or a number of new amendments. The entrenched regional powers in more distant parts of the union will not allow such a restructuring to happen or to properly succeed even if it begins. Large swaths of the American population in rural areas are thoroughly indoctrinated with ideological nationalism. Many sincerely believe the American federal union is in a rather fine shape compared to more consolidated, educated, industrialized, and egalitarian countries of the world. Many also sincerely believe that if they just work harder (to make capitalism more pure), the superpower will be set on the right path. Unfortunately, many of these ideological conservatives are the elderly and about to gain even more power as baby boomers retire. Their neural patterns are thoroughly indoctrinated and they are not as open to education via new forms of media like the Internet.

Massive investments in education are not enough if their target is not social equalization of the American workforce. Since United States lacks economic egalitarianism, the least it can do is build egalitarianism of standards in math, English, and science. We must not allow the average American worker to educationally decline to such a degree that even incentives of low taxes and lack of union protection prevents foreign investment. This story, of Toyota deciding to open a factory in Ontario instead of southern US, is a foreshadowing of whats to come. Toyota decided that although America has workers willing to work for less (and local authorities provide tax incentives)it is still more profitable to open a factory in Canada since Canadian workforce is better educated and better medically covered. Considering the rate of income growth in US slowed to below growth in inflation in 2008, we need to start thinking about what to do about the 10th amendment. It's THAT serious.

Humanitarian Aid Priorities

The targets of humanitarian aid over the last few decades have been badly misplaced to the detriment of leading nations and third world recipients. 




Lets say somebody forced you to give 500 dollars away but gave you the option to choose who to give it to. Lets say they also gave you the option of giving same amount in the form of a gift or labor. Would you give it to your loved ones and/or friends or would you give it to total strangers? It might seem like a no-brainer since you can help your family out with something they need, brighten the day of somebody you know, see tangible results and improvements right away, and even get a bit of that money back through improved relations and reciprocity. The benefit of improving a stranger's life pales in comparison from the perspective of self interest.

We all know how people shriek when other people force them to give away their resources through the muscleman of the government. We are familiar how many Americans would rather give the same resources to somebody close to them (themselves or their families) than other fellow citizens. This is not an article about that. Neither is it about the philosophical debate on possibility of unselfish action. All human action is done to expand influence within the world in a variety of creative ways. Even something like suicide that seems blatantly against the person's self interest expands that person's influence after death since it is such a powerful act.

This article is about proper prioritizing of private humanitarian aid. This type of aid is considered non-coerced and voluntary giving of personal resources to others. Many individuals around the world, particularly Westerners, seem to have their prioritizes of this type of resource giving mixed up.

Let's start with describing 3 of these primarily Western humanitarians (although non-Westerners have been making inroads recently when it comes to giving):

1) Religious people -

In United States in particular they are a large number since poorer education in large swaths of the country allows such demographic to be numerous. They point to how much Americans contribute to private charity compared to other countries. They are these Americans. They say since Americans are so generous on average (compared to Europeans), government shouldn't get involved in humanitarian aid. A point is made that people who already give a lot would give more if it wasn't redistributed under the barrel of the gun and if citizens could personally decide on the target of the aid. They say that they don't want government to take fruits of their labor and spend it on practices that their internalized moral dogma prohibits. This point is as valid (and powerless) as a Green party member not wanting his tax dollars going to the military. The religious humanitarians don't see that funding for contraception and abortion for poorer American citizens produces Christian results. Government funding that they are against reduces poverty, disease, death, suffering, crime, and "ungodly" behavior that economically disadvantaged are more at risk for such as earlier teen sex.

Christians, if they are predisposed to giving, would rather give the money to their local church or religiously based humanitarian organization. These in turn can spend it on local or third world missionary work that uses food and medicine as an incentive to show up to church. Third world is often more of a focus for large churches than local humanitarian work since they can convert more desperate people abroad. A lot of the money does find its way to feed, clothe, and provide medicine when it's not used on stamping out fairy tale literature and mega church expansion. Let's leave alone for now the perpetuating cycle of poverty and misery that just feeding and clothing the poor creates.

2) Secular middle class humanitarians -

These are a lot more numerous in Europe but are also prevalent in all Western urban areas. These people acquired just enough education about the international situation to be able to adequately compare their middle class lifestyles to the rest of the world. Many of these people have sufficient neural emotionality to feel above average levels of empathy for others. They get involved in raising awareness about the suffering but are less inclined to give actual money since that money does not strengthen the power of the church internationally as is the case with the religious people. Their contribution in food and medicine does not come with additional benefits of imposing a moral worldview on the third world poor, and as such has less influence.

Secular humanists are strategically more predisposed to lobbying government to increase its aid through tax revenue although many undoubtedly give personally as well. The "bleeding hearts" as the rural religious like to call them, often have to pick and choose their humanitarian aid considering the amount of suffering in the world. They don't have a church to do the thinking for them so fads are created in terms which society to give to. Many also like to get involved in actually traveling to the third world and helping the needy themselves. That has the benefit of showing the target of resources spent. It also provides more self growth through an exciting well rounded foreign trip that is lacking with study abroad to safer societies.

3) Oligarchical philanthropists -

We know about how charity can help with tax write offs and company image, but many philanthropists are genuinely helping third world peoples with tangible large scale schemes. They are the ones who start the organizations that the urban activists get involved in. Although the reasons (for starting the organizations) are often fad based or economically self serving to better public image, the end result is that billions of dollars flow to other countries.

All these humanitarians have their priorities seriously mixed up. It's not even the fact that they are just increasing poverty and corresponding suffering from generation to generation by disproportionate expenditure on food and medicine. 99% of the money does not go to actual utilitarian reduction of long term suffering such as hiring expensive Western teachers, bringing condoms, textbooks, and sterilization procedures.

The true outrage is that these people's only publicly stated humanitarian focus is not their own families, communities, and countrymen. A middle class woman who writes a 200 dollar check to be spent on some tsunami relief does not use that money to buy a nice present for her mother, father, uncle, sister, brother, husband, and child. Sure, she might be wealthy enough to give all of them even nicer gifts but the fact remains that she could give to people actually close to her even more if she didn't write that check. Some things are zero sum games and a personal income is one of those things. Are all American families so smoothly functioning and so happy together that even a dollar can be spent to be sent abroad? Over 50% divorce rates seem to indicate the opposite. Does giving $3000 worth of personal labor to work for some humanitarian organization bring more joy than spending $3000 worth of personal labor to help out one's own flesh and blood? If it truly does, then logically, the foreign strangers are the real family who should be lived with.

One might argue that a person is single and hates his or her distant relatives. In that case, is there no suffering in one's own community? Why travel to a distant land when many American children can use a boost in contraceptive education or funds to get to college? Surely one's neighborhood and community can be well off and its members roughly co-equal. Then why not give to a domestic humanitarian organization that will bring needed resources to fellow tax payers, fellow language speakers, fellow contributors in one's country's competition with other states abroad? The suffering in the richest countries is of course materially different than suffering in the poorest but that doesn't mean vast differences in contentness levels.

A poor rural American in Appalachia or New Orleans might be 20 times better off materially than a rural man in a poor African province but it doesn't mean the African is 20 times as psychologically distressed. Individual psychology is remarkably adaptive. Studies in psychology have shown that peoples' physiologies and their conscious appraisals of how content they are are remarkably stable. A man who wins a lottery and a man who losses a leg return to roughly the same level of self reported contentness level after a few years. A man born in Africa, raised illiterate, and who did hard labor to survive can be just as psychologically content as a person who was born into poverty in New Orleans, worked hard to survive for many years, and then lost his wife in a divorce. An illiterate person who never left his region also does not have the self consciousness to really assess the hole he is in compared to those in wealthier countries to be too distressed about it. Yes there are actual famines, wars, and disease in Africa. However, unless 99% of aid is contraceptive and educational, the situation is just worsened since only that type of aid can decrease fertility rates and improve economic methods.


When millions of Americans are uninsured, borderline illiterate, have access to inadequate nutrition, are poor, and burdened with excessive birthrates, the sheer outflow of money to the third world is borderline treasonous. Richest countries becoming socially and economically destabilized can have drastic effects on the poorer societies. Large developing nations, like China, Brazil, India, and Russia, understand this and know that there are plenty of their own citizens who need aid even though many Africans and Central Americans are dirt poor as well.

There is a slogan that is very appropriate. "Think globally. Act locally." Lets start adhering to that. If one has to give, it is better to give to family and loved ones and then his countrymen. World government does not yet exist and as the economic crisis has shown there is plenty of rot within our own society that has to be addressed. Private outflow of money abroad for charity purposes has to be banned. Too much has left the country instead of being invested into infrastructure, economy, and country's citizens. Only national governments should be in control of giving proper developmental aid to other societies. The government should encourage humanitarian aid organizations to provide domestically and can create a list of targets for them. Maybe Bill Gates should be appointed as the economic developmental officer of Appalachian schools rather than be allowed to waste his wealth on bettering foreigners. Maybe the international community should finally pressure the Vatican on the condom policy so millions don't die from AIDS and don't leave many children to suffer as well. If it takes Iran level marginalizing and alienating of the Vatican, as well as refusal to meet with Vatican's leadership, so be it.

That's not to say that aid to other societies should stop completely but it should go through national leadership. Government has the power to attach proper strings to make sure fertility of third world poor is decreased and proper investments into schooling provided. Sometimes aiding poorer societies can help prevent destabilization on the richer country's borders. Treason is a very crude word and often misused. But when a grown man who believes in ghosts ignores the poor in his own neighborhood and gives money to help foreign poor through some third world church, treason is the only word that springs to mind. When an educated urban woman spends energy and her money to help foreigners and not her own family or fellow citizens, treason is the only word that springs to mind. Such sensibilities obviously have intention of betterment and help but the priorities are disastrously misplaced.