Counterblaste

In 1604, a European monarch was moved to write a treatise on a new social problem. King James I of England, of King James Bible fame, was upset by the introduction of an addictive new product to his realm. He predicted this product would damage certain parts of the body, such as the lungs, and applied a stiff excise tax to curb its use.

We're talking about tobacco.

You can read King James' treatise here. It's recommended for fans of early-modern English.

The CDC publishes periodic reports on tobacco use in the 50 states and DC. The counterblaste continues, more than 400 years after the King of England couldn't stem the tide. The CDC just published its 2009 report on tobacco use, which may be read here. This post provides data from the CDC report as visual information.

We begin with tobacco use by men. Combined use of cigarettes and smokeless tobacco products are ranked from highest to lowest state. The CDC report covers population subsets that use both forms of tobacco. That data was used to eliminate overlap between cigarette and smokeless use ratios.

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Fun fact - ratios of cigarette use are higher for men in all but eight states. The states in which female cigarette use is at least one percentage-point higher are: Arkansas; Idaho; Kansas; Montana; North Dakota; South Dakota; West Virginia; and Wyoming. (It should be noted that men in Wyoming and West Virginia are heavy users of smokeless tobacco).

We now look at use by women. Fun fact - the three states with the highest ratios of female smokeless users are: Alabama (2.5%); Indiana (2.4%); and Tennessee (1.9%).

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The third presentation juxtaposes adult tobacco use with higher education attainment. Higher education attainment is defined here as the proportion of adults who've earned a bachelors degree (or higher). Education attainment data is from 2008 and was published by the Census Bureau. Note the correlation between high levels of tobacco use and low levels of higher education attainment, and vice versa.

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Fun fact - more adults use tobacco than have obtained a bachelors degree in nine states, including: Alabama; Arkansas; Indiana; Kentucky; Louisiana; Mississippi; Missouri; Oklahoma; Tennessee; West Virginia and Wyoming.

While the CDC surveyed 432,607 adults, its survey was limited to persons with land line telephones. The CDC reports that persons who rely exclusively on cell phones are twice as likely to use tobacco. If survey results differ from reality, the only logical conclusion is that reality is worse.

Accepting that no one sees tobacco in a positive light, our next presentation compares current (2009) levels of tobacco use with state cigarette taxes in 1995. Big tobacco still held sway in historic "tobacco states" 15 years ago. Higher levels of tobacco tax are associated with lower consumption, so the converse must hold true. Comparing current levels of tobacco with tax rates in effect 15 years ago makes sense because, as we all know, nicotine is highly addictive.

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Fun fact - four states had a cigarette tax of less than ten cents per-pack in 1995: Kentucky ($0.03); North Carolina ($0.05); South Carolina ($0.07); and Virginia ($0.03).

In context of public disapproval of tobacco, 15 years was a long time ago. State legislatures have had more than enough time to see cigarette taxes as the most effective deterrent to long-term public health issues, such as lung cancer. Anti-public smoking laws gained traction years ago. Have the states wisely applied retail economics to reduce their tobacco problem?

The Federal government finally got religion and quadrupled its excise tax in 2009, from $0.24 to $1.01 per pack. Have a look at state tobacco taxes in 2009 and then we'll compare 1995 with 2009.

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Uh-oh. 2009 tax levels indicate that the states with the biggest tobacco problem, who needed to raise taxes the most, in fact did the least. Pennsylvania and Montana are exceptions. Let's have a look at differences between 2009 and 1995 tax levels to zero in the culprits.

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Fun fact - five states didn't raise cigarette taxes by a single penny between 1995 and 2009. More than 20% of adults are tobacco users in four of these states:
(1) Florida ($0.34 tax / 18% use);
(2) Mississippi ($0.18 tax / 27% use);
(3) Missouri ($0.17 tax / 26% use);
(4) North Dakota ($0.44 tax / 24% use);
(5) South Carolina ($0.07 tax / 23% use).

South Carolina is its own special case. South Carolina's cigarette tax remains a pathetic $0.07 per pack. With regards to the health of its citizens, failure of the South Carolina legislature to take appropriate action can only be described as cruel and irresponsible.

To put cigarette tax in a broader context of responsible vs. irresponsible politicians, the ten highest-tax states average $2.23 per pack while the ten lowest average only $0.30.

Does any of this really matter? Has any scientific evidence been established that demonstrates higher levels of cardiovascular disease, stroke and lung cancer in states that have high levels of tobacco use and low tobacco taxes?

You be the judge:

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Who has $250,000?

Higher education is an inherently unfair market. Elite private universities practice hereditary privilege while the state colleges and universities, home to three-quarters of America's undergraduates, suffer a dearth of resources. American higher education perpetuates a system of inherited wealth and power while ensuring that the middle class must struggle just to stay in place.TheRaven proposed a simple policy fix that would level the playing field. The idea is so hot that it will never see the light of day.

Accepting higher education as it is, a quest for education attainment really turns on value concepts for the overwhelming majority of parents and aspiring students. Where are the colleges and universities that haven't consigned their "star" professors to research roles (with graduate students handling teaching duties)? An undergraduate degree at an elite private university can top $250,000. This price is completely out of reach for most Americans. Best education for lowest price is the name of the game.

Two veteran instructors tackle quality and cost issues in a new book titled Higher Education? They wrote an insider look and were recently interviewed by theAtlantic. They generally damn the Ivy League as a collection of over-priced education brands. Responding to a comment from yours truly, one of the authors (Claudia Driefus) had this to say:

If we had a child looking at schools now, we'd look first to the value state universities--of which Virginia has several. In our book, "Higher Education?" we have a chapter, "Schools We Like," based on some of own visits and research. It's an impressionistic list--but parents might find some "out of the box" ideas there. A condensation of that chapter appeared in the Chronicle of Higher Education and is also on our blog, www.highereducationquestionmark.com

I popped on over to the author's blog and found an interesting list with a few surprises and confirmation of what may be the best unknown higher education option in America, a genuine honors university hiding in a state system. The President of this university has been at the helm for the past 18 years. U.S. News & World Report named him one of America's Best Leaders in 2008 and Time magazine named him one of America's 10 Best College Presidents in 2009. His academic and professional achievements defy summarization. He also appeared in a documentary film titled 4 Little Girls.

This university enrolls almost 10,000 undergraduates and close to 3,000 graduate students. There are 480 full-time and 250 part time faculty teaching in 42 majors, 41 minors and 17 certificate programs in the physical and biological sciences, social and behavioral sciences, engineering, mathematics, information technology, humanities and visual and performing arts.

Top-quartile average SAT score is 1,362 and more than 40% of undergraduates are minorities. Resident tuition and fees are $8,872 and 72% of freshman live on campus. U.S. News & World Report named this school the #1 “Up and Coming” university in the nation and fourth among all colleges and universities in the nation for commitment to undergraduate teaching.

Not only do these two people provide strong endorsement from experience but our authors had this to say about UMBC:

University of Maryland-Baltimore County. The Meyerhoff Scholars Program has greatly increased the number of African-Americans in the biological sciences and engineering. In addition, although the university is a research institution focused on science and engineering, undergraduate instruction in the liberal arts is not an afterthought. President Freeman A. Hrabowski sets a tone at the top that says teaching undergraduates is important, and the faculty knows he means it. Of all the research universities we’ve visited, it is the place that has most capably connected research with undergraduate education.

The excerpt from Higher Education? that was published in the Chronicle can be found here.

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UPDATE 8/19/10: The concept of higher education as value investing is catching on. The author of a new book called Debt Free U, in an interview with the NY Times, says: "Attending an in-state public institution is the easiest and most powerful way to reduce the cost of college".

Dreaming upwards

Higher education is central to upward mobility, which is in turn the core of the American Dream. There's been a fair amount of press coverage lately on threats to our collective dream. Many students, particularly minorities, do not complete their degrees. Student indebtedness is rising. The Ivy League doesn't merit serious consideration by 99+% of America's youth.

The debate often goes astray, even in the web's most enlightened community, where recent discussion of "white privilege" needed a reminder that the real issue is bigger, broader and deeper. This post repeats a comment added to that discussion, which you can read here.

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The problem with a concept like white privilege is the word white. The question or issue is framed in context of a single, supposedly monolithic group. All white people are not created equal. Their ancestry differs as much as does the history of Europe. Their American experience is strongly influenced by varying degrees of temporal dislocation from immigrant forebears. The tough question is simply ...is there privilege in America? Easy answer, the tough part is then what?

A look at Ivy League student demographics would show steady progress towards ethnic diversification. What about economic diversification? If race and ethnicity are tossed aside and "privilege" is defined along economic lines, the pattern of inherited advantage is clear. I'd argue the economic elites have sought cover under America's public obsession with race. From their perspective, dealing with a black girl from the south side of Chicago who had the temerity to instruct her French instructor (as a sophomore) is easier than combing West Virginia, Arkansas, Alabama or Mississippi to find a rare, white scholar.

Black affirmative action provided an unintentional diversion from a legacy of prejudice towards disadvantaged whites, not limited to obvious social and economic disadvantage found in the 12 States of Stupid. Higher education financing has been a rigged game from jump. Solidly middle-class families in New York and New Jersey with kids who are merely intelligent have also been locked out of the Ivy League.The issue really is about fairness, meritocracy and wealth redistribution.

"Not for profit" is a convenient misnomer. It means profits are not subject to income tax, as opposed to legislation that specifies an organization shouldn't make a profit. Rich, private universities not only turn a profit on education services, they also reap income from endowments provided by generations of rich alumni. The system is aided and abetted by our tax code to further concentrate wealth and power according to inherited privilege. Scholarships are simply the cost of good public relations. Do you know many impoverished or struggling Ivy League graduates over the age of 35?

Here's a blindingly simple fix that rebalances American higher education towards its greatest strengths. State colleges and universities are the true engines of upward mobility. State university systems are under tremendous, long-term financial strain. Instead of cutting back on the only education opportunity available to the American majority, why don't we boost funding to public higher education by killing off the not-for-tax status of private universities? This will work if such change also mandates payment of increased tax revenues into a trust fund that is disbursed solely to public colleges and universities.

The elites can continue to drop $200,000 for a Columbia undergraduate degree, Columbia will pay taxes on its income (including investment income from its endowments) to New York and the Federal government and Federal receipts will be apportioned back to state institutions based on relative full-time-equivalent enrollment (or some such). This solution would create a color-blind, elective wealth transfer that balances education, opportunity and heredity without need of commissions, investigations or recriminations.

Who votes for democracy in higher education?