Economy

Harriet offered the following analogy to Senator Espero and to Representative Lynn Finnegan: Suppose you were an administrator of a hospital which derived its revenues from direct payments from patients, payments from insurance companies, and donations from charitable foundations. Suppose that your charitable donors told you that their portfolio had declined and their donation to your institution would not match the previous year. How would a hospital dedicated to its mission respond? An institution in such a situation might try load shedding: use more out-patient care instead of in-house treatment, reduce post-surgical stays if this will not significantly impede recovery, send non-critical ER walk-ins to the day clinic.

Some children do not need the full DOE treatment.

Hawaii Revised Statutes compels attendance, for children age 6-18, with exceptions as specified.

[§302A-1132] Attendance compulsory; exceptions. (a) Unless excluded ...
Attendance at a public or private school shall not be compulsory in the following cases:
(1) Where the child is physically or mentally unable ...
(2) Where the child, who has reached the fifteenth anniversary of birth, is suitably employed ...
(3) Where, upon investigation by the family court, it has been shown ...
(4) Where the child has graduated from high school;
(5) Where the child is enrolled in an appropriate alternative educational program ...; or
(6) Where:
(A) The child has attained the age of sixteen years;
(B) The principal has determined that:
(i) The child has engaged in behavior which is disruptive to other students, teachers, or staff; or
(ii) The child's non-attendance is chronic and has become a significant factor that hinders the child's learning; and
(C) The principal of the child's school, and the child's teacher or counselor, in consultation with the child and the child's parent, guardian, or other adult having legal responsibility for or care of the child, develops an alternative educational plan for the child. The alternative educational plan shall include a process that shall permit the child to resume school.... [L 1996, c 89, pt of §2 and am c 162, §2]

The legislature could qualify condition (4) with a provision that the DOE must accept the GED from any student 16 years old or older and must accept any equivalent measure of high school completion, such as British school O and A level exams, at any age.

Harriet recommends that the legislature modify condition (4) as follows
(4)Where the child has graduated from high school or has
A) passed the GED by age 16 or later or
B) passed the British GCSE exams in English, Math, and Science with a score between A* and C (inclusive) at any age or
C) attained scores above the mean on the verbal reasoning and quantitative reasoning sections of the Graduate Record Exam at any age.

If it is fraud for a mechanic to charge for the repair of a functional motor, and if it is fraud for a physician to charge for the treatment of a healthy patient, then it is fraud for the DOE to charge for the instruction of a student who does not need our help.