A Wise Investment
As the Dow Jones soars, the stock market of human capital is hitting
an all time low.
Americans pour billions into companies that provide goods and services,
cyber promises, and vaporware. If any of those companies fails to
develop quality products, we eventually withdraw our financial support.
While quality costs money, it ultimately impacts the corporate bottom
line, and everyone knows that raising the corporate bottom line
is serious business.
Raising children is serious business too, but we rarely mention
dollars when children are the bottom line. Admittedly there are
a few differences between children and commercial products. Unlike
software or widgets, children are fun and easy to produce, and the
production costs are low. But like commercial products, children
need maintenance and support or they tend to malfunction. Business
understands that good development and support cost money; why don't
the rest of us?
We claim that children are our most important commodity. Yet, for
six to eight hours each day during the most important years of their
lives, we entrust them to people earning poverty-level wages. In
1996, the poverty level for a family of four was $16,036. According
to Occupational Outlook Handbook figures for 1996, the mean annual
salary for pre-school workers was approximately $13,000 per year.
That same year, restaurant workers earned $13,900, bartenders $16,000,
and sanitation engineers $17,000. Clearly, our burgers, booze, and
garbage have a brighter occupational outlook than our babies.
We reward and respect the people who handle our money and our computers,
but how many of us encourage the best and the brightest to become
teachers? When I announced that my Phi Beta Kappa college graduate
son had gotten his first job, people were all smiles. When I told
them he was working at a pre-school, their smiles turned glacial.
Undoubtedly the announcement would have received a better reception
if he had chosen a career on Wall Street, since we Americans spend
more money managing our money than we spend managing our children.
Smart investors put their money into financial instruments that
promise the best return on investment. Research shows that early
education is critical to a child's mental and physical development;
yet the biggest private donations go to colleges and universities-institutions
that fine tune the mental disciplines that were developed in the
early years. It's ironic that savvy corporate donors subsidize the
last four years of formal education so much more heavily than the
first four. If big donors really wanted to get the biggest bang
for their educational buck, they'd sink millions into pre-schools.
Yet, in the kiddie business, it appears that the product becomes
valuable only when it's older or when it self destructs. While the
mean salary for pre-school teachers in 1996 was only $13,000, the
salary for elementary/secondary school teachers was $37,000, and
for college professors it was $51,000. If Bill Gates had followed
this investment strategy, his baby Windows 1.0 would never have
made it to Windows 2000 adulthood.
Along with private investors, we need government support for our
children. Why is it that congress allocates billions of dollars
when our fighter jets blow up, but when our children blow each other
up, they allocate 1,000 points of light? When the Pentagon needs
money, congress adds it to the budget; when the schools need money,
they hold hoagie sales. After all these years, one of the most successful
early childhood programs, Head Start, is still not fully funded.
For once I'd like to see a four-star general at a fund raiser asking
if we'd like fries with that.
We need to solicit private and corporate investors to support our
most important growth industry-our children. We need IPOs (Investments
in the Potential of our Offspring) to fund educational programs
that work. We need corporate heavy hitters. First Union has its
name on a stadium. Why don't they fund a chain of pre-schools where
well-trained teachers get paid as much as bank managers?
Our children are our growth stocks. If we invest now, we probably
won't realize an immediate profit, but future growth is guaranteed.
It's the investment of a lifetime.
  
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