Schools are spending a lot more per student, and getting less learning, notes Marguerite Roza of Georgetown's Edunomics Lab. Education spending rose by 56 percent since 2013, outpacing the inflation rate of 35 percent, while reading and math scores fell, she writes. The average school spends $16,700 per student.
"I don’t think this is the canary in the coal mine," the University of Washington’s Dan Goldhaber told the Washington Post. “This is a flock of dead birds in the coal mine.”

Some states have improved reading and math scores since 2013, Roza writes. Louisiana and Mississippi have erased Covid learning gaps for fourth graders. Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia also have seen progress.
Other states, such as Arizona, California, Florida, Massachusetts, Oregon and Washington, have lost ground in fourth-grade reading and eighth-grade math, key predictors of future success, "even as investments skyrocketed."
In Washington state, she writes, "per-pupil spending has essentially doubled in the last decade (far outpacing inflation); meanwhile 8th grade math scores are in free fall."
The Urban Institute adjusts reading and math scores for student demographics, such as the percentage of students living in poverty, with disabilities and not yet fluent in English. That enables high-poverty states such as Louisiana and Mississippi to pass low-poverty states like Washington and Massachusetts in the rankings.
Oregon's adjusted scores are the lowest in the nation in fourth-grade reading, and almost the lowest in eighth-grade math. Also lagging are Alaska and West Virginia.
Adjusting scores makes unappealing jurisdictions look better than they are.
The left coast has long been an attractive place to live; but its Democratic governments are so inept that they are chasing away populations in spite of their advantages, a situation that classical liberals should take advantage of by exposing transgressive failures for what they are, and cooperating with the better policies of the new majority party, at least until its overreaches remove its popularity, as well.