We The People, Should Make Adult Education Funding Mandatory! With illiteracy among adults at an all time high and the economy tattered, it seems that the politicians are making poor use of our taxpayer dollars. I'm no economist, but bailing out – excuse me, rescuing – banks, seems to be a somewhat backwards approach. As far as I can determine, the banks are handed a $700 billion gift, unloading the bad debt they were holding. One audacious rescuee held a public party over their largesse, to the tune of $440,000 dollars. Still, the banks refused to make loans, even amongst themselves. It seems logical the the big $700 billion piece of legislation should have contained a provision that required the banks to ease up on credit, with certain sensible parameters of interest rates. Apparently, there was no such provision, forcing world governments to infuse the banks with cash. The question no one has adequately answered is, what does this strategy do for the common worker now? It will be a very long trickle-down process. Perhaps a better strategy would be to work from the bottom up. As it stands now, people in poverty will simply stay in poverty. Middle class workers are still losing their jobs and homes. By the time banks decide to ease up and give small businesses loans to keep them in business, the middle class worker is going to join the impoverished. If such tremendous funds can be found to rescue the largest corporations in the world, surely we, the people, can demand that an intensive program of adult education funding be a substantial, mandatory infusion into the society at large. Poverty is largely attributable to a lack of education. If a child grows up poorly educated, they are not qualified to fill jobs that contribute to the prosperity of the overall society. Were we to put our collective foot down with the government, insisting that adult education funding be available to all, we could break this cycle of poverty and prevent the middle class from falling into poverty, as might well become the case. Many of the large manufacturers of goods in this country have laid off American workers in favor of cheaper overseas labor. The auto industry and textiles are good examples. If someone's worked as a textile worker for the last twenty years, they don't have competitive skills in the marketplace when they're laid off. The best solution is to, through adult education funding, retrain that individual in another sector, so they can continue to make a living, paying their mortgage and their taxes. For those who have no viable skills and don't have the money to attend school, adult education funding would be a boon, not only to them, but to the rest of society and the economy. We often hear politicians allude to the fact that our children are the future! Let's put our money where our mouths are. If we all wrote to our representatives, demanding adult education funding, the economic benefits might be far more quickly realized, and at a fraction of the cost of 'rescuing' banks. Let's rescue the people! Summary Many people believe that adult education should be funded publicly in order for everyone to get a good education. Illiteracy is still a problem in this country and things need to be changed if we are to compete globally. This idea will also help displaced workers who need to change careers in order to survive. Related Articles Free GED Test Preparation Public Education Issues Related Sites