Tennessee begins free community college plan

Re:Tennessee begins free community college plan by pjc50 on Thursday April 24, 2014 @11:57AM (#7641072)

So, I googled for "24 billion" to get an example of the sort of thing the US government spends that kind of money on without a second thought. I was expecting to find some piece of military hardware. No, it's even more ridiculous:

http://money.cnn.com/2013/10/16/news/economy/shutdown-econom...

$24bn is the estimated cost (to the economy as a whole, rather than the government as a specific billed item) of the totally unnecessary government shutdown last year. It is literally the amount of money Congress can waste without thinking, or while trying very hard to avoid thinking.

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Re:Tennessee begins free community college plan by cobrausn on Thursday April 24, 2014 @12:05PM (#7641124)

I'm aware of how the government spends on other inane things - my point was that spending the 24B on this is probably not going to happen in the current political climate, regardless of whether or not you think it is a good investment.

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Re:Tennessee begins free community college plan by humanrebar on Thursday April 24, 2014 @12:36PM (#7641313)

I think it would sell well, assuming you're raising someone else's taxes or cutting an unpopular budget line item.

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Re:Tennessee begins free community college plan by GFK_of_xmaspast on Thursday April 24, 2014 @01:26PM (#7641631)

The only taxes you're allowed to raise in the US any more are on poor people.

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Re:Tennessee begins free community college plan by humanrebar on Thursday April 24, 2014 @01:38PM (#7641698)

Which taxes on poor people have been raised?

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