Zukerberg’s $100M Lesson

– James Piereson & Naomi Schaefer Riley, Wall Street Journal

“What happened with the $100 million that Newark’s schools got from Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg?” asks a recent headline. “Not much” is the short answer…

The bulk of the funds supported consultants and the salaries and pensions of teachers and administrators, so the donation only reinforced the bureaucratic and political ills that have long plagued public education in the Garden State…

In 1993, philanthropist Walter Annenberg sought to improve education by awarding $500 million to America’s public schools…

But the $1.1 billion in spending that resulted, thanks to matching grants, accomplished little…The funds wound up in the hands of the unions, administrators and political figures who created the problems in the first place…

We Respond & Your Comments

On October 3 union backed Our Oregon launched its drive for a ballot measure that’ll raise $2.5 billion from taxes on large Oregon corporations.

“I think this kind of investment into Oregon…will bring a dramatic improvement to Oregon’s economy,” said Ben Unger, executive director of Our Oregon.

It’ll improve the economy because the government can create more jobs by sprinkling the money over its political base than leaving it with companies that could use it to create jobs. Right, Ben?

Of course it’s “for the children” – because some of it will be dumped into schools. Ask Mark Zukerburg & Walter Annenberg how that works out.

And it’ll force companies to pay their “fair share.”

Our take: Whenever you find “investment,” “for the children” and “fair share” in one place – you can bet somebody’s dollars will be cycled through government to unions.

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