{"id":4973,"date":"2026-07-20T23:40:22","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T23:40:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/metrotransitreview.com\/?p=4973"},"modified":"2026-07-20T23:40:22","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T23:40:22","slug":"new-york-public-schools-have-become-a-legal-racketeering-conspiracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/metrotransitreview.com\/?p=4973","title":{"rendered":"New York public schools have become a legal racketeering conspiracy"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Soaring spending, falling enrollment, continued academic mediocrity: New York state\u2019s public-education trends mirror the city\u2019s, and for the same reason: This system serves the financial interests of adults far more than the educational needs of children.<\/p>\n

Read more Box office success of \u2018The Odyssey\u2019 proves audiences crave classics \u2014 not woke Hollywood nonsense<\/a><\/p>\n

The numbers are in the new Citizens Budget Commission report: The Empire State spends far more per student than any other state, about $32,000 a head, with total outlays rising year after year (nearing $100 billion) even though it serves 12% fewer students than 15 years ago.<\/p>\n

(Indeed, K-12 public-school enrollment fell in every <\/em>New York county from the 2009-\u201910 to the 2025-\u201926 school year.)<\/p>\n

But the results are middling at best: On gold-standard National Assessment of Educational Progress testing, our students score right in the middle on reading and a bit lower on math.<\/p>\n

Massachusetts, which ranks first, spends 23% less <\/em>per student than New York.<\/p>\n

(By the way, black students in low-spending Mississippi now outscore their Bay State peers in reading.)<\/p>\n

New Jersey also outdoes New York on the NAEP, while spending 17% less. <\/p>\n

One part of the problem are the bizarre Empire State\u2019s rules that effectively let the Assembly speaker choose the members of the Board of Regents, who oversee the State Education Department.<\/p>\n

And the current speaker, Carl Heastie, needed teacher-union support to win the job \u2014 in large part because the unions have long made Albany power their No. 1 political goal (not that they don\u2019t wield immense local power, too) .<\/p>\n

Read more Trump orders airstrikes against Iran for 10th straight night \u2014 after vowing to avenge deaths of US soldiers<\/a><\/p>\n

This doesn\u2019t let Gov. Kathy Hochul off the hook: She still has huge power over the state budget, yet goes along with the ever-rising school spending, including the insane \u201chold harmless\u201d standard that prevents cuts in state funding though enrollment drops \u2014 even in areas where it\u2019s down 20%.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the gov boasts of her administration\u2019s \u201crecord investments\u201d in school spending, though those \u201cinvestments\u201d plainly only pay off for the people employed <\/em>in public education, not the actual students.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

It\u2019s not just <\/em>the teachers\u2019 unions that feed off this spendapalooza: Local political machines exploit the public schools in a host of ways, with jobs and contracts distributed to office-holders\u2019 allies. <\/p>\n

But the bottom line is that New York state spends 81% above the national per-pupil average on public schools purely to benefit adults, not kids.<\/p>\n

The high costs to taxpayers and the poor return to students is another reason for the slow exodus out of state: New York is too busy redistributing wealth to favored players to truly <\/em>invest for the future. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s basically one vast racketeering enterprise, immoral as hell even if it\u2019s completely legal.<\/p>\n

Read more ESPN lays off NFL analyst Ryan Clark in stunning move as first wave of expected cuts begins<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The bottom line is that New York state spends 81% above the national per-pupil average on public schools purely to benefit adults, not kids.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4972,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion"],"yoast_head":"\nNew York public schools have become a legal racketeering conspiracy - Metro Transit Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/metrotransitreview.com\/?p=4973\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"New York public schools have become a legal racketeering conspiracy - 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