Thursday, April 03, 2008

Advice: Look up the word "volunteer"

What is it when the government requires payment of an in-kind tax, collected in the form of mandatory service hours?

In the state of Ohio, it's called "volunteering."

When I look up "voluntary," though, I find something like "of your own free will or design; not forced or compelled." Hmmmmmm......

A survey, from a tv station web site:

If House Bill 519 passes, would you volunteer at your child's school or pay the fine?
Choice____________Votes___________Percentage of 1632 Votes
Volunteer ________926_____________ 57%
Pay Fine _________706 _____________43%

They should have offered another choice: "Move to another state, where there are actually some jobs that pay higher than the implied wage of $100 / 13 hours = $7.70/hour"

I volunteer a lot at my kids' school. But requiring voluntary donations is nonsense. I predict that teachers will NOT enjoy policing petulant parents. I mean, can you imagine the teachers at 2T's school, trying to tell Angus how to "volunteer"?

(Update: Speedmaster posted on this first, and better)

2 comments:

Tom said...

Ya can't judge a bill by its title.

Sadly, the Nutty News doesn't GIVE the title, but let's suppose it says something about required volunteering. I'm too lazy to look up the text of the bill -- we can HOPE it says something like that, because we all need a good laugh, but my point here is to retitle the bill without changing the concept.

Ready? How 'bout "A bill to impose fees for attendence at government schools, said fees to be $100 or a bater of 13 hours labor."

It still isn't libertarian, because schooling is still complusary and GovCo's schools get a BIG subsidy, but it's an improvement over the current situation.

See how a good title can improve a bill?

Speedmaster said...

Scary indeed!

I posted on this story too:
http://amateureconblog.blogspot.com/2008/04/bill-would-require-parents-to-volunteer.html