The Key To Obliterating Income Inequality: Education

While progressive are always going on about the harmfulness of income inequality, sometimes it seems that people overlook the obvious solution to the issue. Income inequality is expected to receive increased attention in the coming months, with President Obama expected to focus on the issue in the State of the Union address in the beginning of the year.



Not only does President Obama wish to call attention to the issue, but other politicians have marked it as an area of focus as well. For example, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren came into the spotlight after speaking out against moneyed interests, and New York City’s new mayor Bill de Blasio won the mayorship after making income inequality a central campaign issue.

Just Politics or Real Change?

Yet discerning citizens should be aware of the fact that such calls to attention by political figures are rarely more than political maneuvers that do little for those who are truly afflicted with income inequality problems. Many politicians focus too much on taxation issues and other highly contentious political issues rather than placing the stress on education: the foolproof path out of poverty.

Even when politicians do focus on education as a method of fighting income inequality, they are not often the best equipped to understand the real roots of the problems. While they might work towards greater affordability for college education or making pre-K or after-school educational program universally accessible, they rarely focus on the quality of the education- as wealthy locales, get more info, repeatedly show better educational opportunities than poorer areas- provided or the mentality issues that many children and families face when they are trapped in an endless cycle of poverty.

Supply vs. Demand

It seems that the supply side of education is often neglected in preference of the demand side of the equation. While efforts are often made to improve accessibility to a sometimes appallingly mediocre education, not enough thought is put into how best one might go about engaging in supply side efforts such as improving the quality of teachers, curriculum structure, school supplies choice, and more.

One example of education reform that turned out to be highly effective is seen in the schools of the city of New Orleans. Despite the fact that 92 percent of the students came from poor backgrounds and were on free or reduced cost lunch programs, the graduation rate of the city schools is higher than the national average after reforms were passed that involved laying off the majority of the city’s public teachers and insisting upon accountability from the city’s students.

Getting to the Root of the Issue

While there is no magical cure for the complex issues that influence income inequality and educational failings within a country, it’s time to understand the value of real, quality reforms over political rhetoric that makes us feel good but doesn’t produce results. Yet educational disparities between lower and higher income areas are at the root of many of the political issues of a variety of political controversies that often receive more attention but could be avoided with more equality among educators across the country.