There are certain requirements in most states that homeschoolers have to adhere to.

This is certainly not a normal home school situation. I know a lot of families who do home school, and nearly all of their children go on to college and many of them on scholarships because they are so well educated.

And honestly, the last sentence seems to indicate that Republicans are likely to let that situation go on. That's a load of prejudiced crap.

Just so it's known, the idiots at the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka are Democrats.

Think of it this way. If you were to design a quality classroom you'd probably start with a safe, clean (but not sterile) environment, limit the class size as much as possible, and staff it with teachers who actually care for the children above all, teachers who are concerned with their development in the world in which they live.

Now face the facts. For 99.44% of everybody, that describes their home. The exceptions are tragic, of course. But WHY OH WHY are you attempting to deny the best, quality education to the vast majority to a system that could never rise above mediocre?

Remember, the requirement for public schooling, isn't that your kids actually learn anything. The requirement is, that they be widgets pulling tax payer dollars into the educational Union machine by having their butt in the seat of the local public school.

It is like the school lunch program. The requirement there is that the kids are exposed to what the gubmint deems a healthy lunch, No one can actually make them eat it.

Whether they leave school with any kind of basic knowledge is irrelevant both to the teachers union, and to the state of Texas.

Also read the Texas state constitution. Bet like most other states, there is no requirement for schooling at all, after the eight grade, or when the child turns 16, which ever comes first.

By and large, these parents are probably doing a disservice to their children, but it doesn't rise to the level of abuse, and the standard for government intervention should not be *we think we can raise your kids so much better than you can*.

Parents definitely have a moral obligation to not raise their children in such a way that the children become a burden on society. To what extent does that become a legal obligation? It's hard to draw up objective standards that can be enforced. I know a lot of libertarians will disagree with me on this, but I think it's resonable for the state to demand that homeschooled children take minimal standardized tests at a few checkpoints. For example, a 10-year-old should be able to read and do math at least at a second grade level, and a 14-year-old at a sixth grade level. And they should have to pass the same tests that public school kids have to pass in order to earn a high school diploma.

This is a pretty minimal set of standards, and it certainly won't fix all problems. But it catches the most egregious cases, and it sets a marker. Now, the problem is, once the marker is set, how do you keep government from constantly moving it? That is a valid fear. With the governing class we have today, I can't offer an answer. So until we have a better class of government, I can't support any legal standards for homeschooling education. But the moral obligation still exists, and people who abuse the privilege should be called on it.

(And I will point out that there are all kinds of horrible things that parents can do that result in dysfunctional children, some of them much worse than withholding education. For a lot of these things, there are no legal standards, and society enforces the moral ones sporadically at best.)

The McIntyres are accused of failing to teach their children educational basics... The El Paso school district eventually asked the McIntyres to provide proof that their children were being properly educated

I'm pretty libertarian CD, but I have no problem requiring home schooled students to pass the same standardized tests regular students have to pass. And if they fail the same as regular students fail then no diploma. That is just accreditation.

The real question is should the government use force to change this situation. Like most of the others here I say until they actually fix themselves there is no need for them to bother others. In reality this sounds no worse than standard track classes in most public schools.

Isab gets to the heart of the matter: for every butt in a seat, the school district get $X from the state, and $Y from the feds. That is in addition to the local taxes they levy.

Also: for the teacher's unions, the children come in about fourth or fifth in order of priority. First priority is raking in the dues, the second is to have a well paid union rep, the third is to promote their pet political causes (almost always Democrat), and then if they have time, try to educate the children. That's after they've done their work to protect the bad teachers from being downsized.

Of course, with helicopter parents dropping in, can those children be effectively educated? give little Johnny anything less than an A and you might get an earful from Heli Mom and/or Heli Dad, and possibly another from PC Principal who also got an earful from Mr. & Mrs. Heli. "Inflate the grade and make the problem go away".

I'll provide some context to that the last sentence as a political crack. It's an Austin station and Austin is bright blue progressive bastion of moonbattery, so the reporter is simply catering to the local prejudices.

Look at it this way:

Ruby, why aren't you teaching Billy Joe how to read?

Ruby: Well, because he's going to be raptured soon.

OK...same question.

Ruby: Well, because he's going to die soon.

Bearing in mind that there is absolutely no evidence for either answer being true, except in the second, it will happen 'eventually'.

Some people have to be dragged kicking and screaming into modernity.

I home school my eldest daughter using the K12 program, I pay a monthly fee and buy course materials and her mother and I assist her when she needs it. The model suits her well and she's light years ahead of her peers. (I sent her to a private school for a semester to gauge her)

The point of home school should be to give the best education possible, not to keep children stupid so they can be magicked into the afterlife.

Even if this rapture crap WERE going to happen...why would you want to be stupid in heaven? Does God value stupidity and ignorance that highly?

Bah, I've got to go drive my pirate to work.

I'm curious how the we don't need no stinking home school educational requirements types here feel about vaccinations. Okay for those parents not to vax their kids?

Teaching people about the magic jesus carpet and only about that isn't abuse? The hell it isn't.

FWIW, far from being Jesus types and conservatives, the only kids I've known to be homeschooled are Jewish and liberal and doing brilliantly studying at home, and though Jewish, are not studying Judaism or anything like that at home. 3Rs mostly, and they take some classes with other kids at various alternate schools.

There's no reason that homeschooled kids shouldn't have some basic educational requirements set down for them. That goes for the ultra hasids in NYC who probably need a ton of that.

this sort of thing happens ONLY to make an example of certain people...

now, the Uncle may well have the purest of intentions, but once you get the GOVT involved, best of intentions go awry... mostly they don't care, unless it is actually affecting their money.

one datapoint. A retired spec.ed. teacher I know, for years went to a student's house, to make sure all children made their way to school. ultra low income, mom may be a prostitute, fathers are multiple and unknown. All those strikes against them, doesn't mean those kids aren't innocent, and worth trying to help, is the teacher's perspective. Eventually the younger kids are removed from the home, but the 2 eldest remain, because they can kinda look after themselves.

So, Teacher retires, and nobody from the school bothers to go to the home looking for the students. The eldest hasn't been to school in a few years now, and may well be turning tricks. She is ADHD, with a side of manic depressive, and never did take her meds. Whereabouts currently unknown, though her mom seems to think she preggers, at 15.

The 14 year old also has all that plus learning dissability... but WILL come to school, if somebody goes looking. But this year no-one did, so she never went to school... The teacher discovered that she was hit by a car trying to cross a 10 lane interstate, and now she is mostly paralyzed, and has even worse brain damage.

Now a ward of the state. The youngest are supposed to be in the foster system, but nobody seems to be able to figure out where they are.

This is something like the definition of a C.F. from top to bottom.

But the state doesn't particularly care about any of that, and they only do something if there is a particularly savvy person to make them.

The Docs were going to let the paralyzed one die [which may or may not have been best] because the mom pretty much is learning disabled herself, and she didn't know what to ask of the doctors that said, "there's nothing we can do." Well, the kid refused to die, so...
The social caseworker assigned, started asking questions, and miraculously, all sorts of aid is now happening once the kid is a ward of the state.

So, what causes those wheels of GOVT to turn, and why do they get in to motion sometimes an not others? What part of all this is seemingly a waste, and what isn't? Does it only care if the correct button is pushed? Do they care because a group is not under their control, and not asking for anything?

In the beginning the article parents are really not doing well for their kids, and maybe the uncle was right to say something, but I have no doubt that the wheels of the GOVT moved, because these people were outside of it.

When so many fall through the cracks, you have to DO something to actually draw The Eye™ to you.

So they placed her in ninth grade, because she had never learned anything. Why not just give her a New York City High School diploma, since eighty percent of the city high school graduates can't even read?

https://www.rt.com/usa/nyc-graduates-unable-to-read-011/

Meanwhile, Griggs vs Duke Power has ensured that employers cannot use aptitude tests, because, discrimination. You can find examples of failure in nearly everything, but I don't think home schooling is the biggest problem with education in this country. I don't think it makes the top ten.

"Some people have to be dragged kicking and screaming into modernity."

Your "modernity" may be my totalitarian SJW nightmare.

Fortunately in a free country, we have the right to be Amish, or fundamentalists or whatever, at least for the time being.

I see the alternative, of government enforced educational conformity to be so much worse, than the perceived *problem* of a few parents doing a less than spectacular job,

This family is the exception for homeschoolers, not the rule. Could government use cases like this to further try to involve itself and regulate homeschooling? Yes. But keep in mind that Texas is generally very friendly to home schooling, and vouchers, and charters and other alternatives to the traditional public school system.

My assumption is that these children will not have any type of diploma or records from any accrediting body- so they're not going to to be able to claim that they have actually graduated from high school, and they won't have a GED, either. There are plenty of kids who attend public schools who are illiterate.

The whole situation is pathetic, and the parents have done the children a serious disservice, but I'm not sure that I would define it as abuse. No one is being beaten or starved or locked in a closet for hours. It certainly isn't doing the right thing for their children, and I question the mental fitness of the parents. I just don't know if it qualifies as "abuse." I mean, there are people who comment on this blog who claim that sending your kids to public school is tantamount to "abuse."

". I just don't know if it qualifies as "abuse." I mean, there are people who comment on this blog who claim that sending your kids to public school is tantamount to "abuse."

Yes, and Glenn Reynolds, a legal scholar, and respected blogger claims this also.

I believe, that in many cases, he is correct.

neglectful parents come in all stripes, not just religious. Google "unschooling". That these parents leaned on religion as an excuse doesn't really make this a religious issue. It's neglect. Lets deal with it as that, and not try to defame religious people with these parents actions.

I'm leery of letting government intrude in peoples right to teach their own children, but IF a neglect claim is made against a homeschooling parent, then they should be able to provide proof of their childs learning-that's not asking too much.

neglectful parents come in all stripes, not just religious.
____________________________________

Reminds me. From page 332 of the 1996 book "Cults in our Midst" by Margaret Thaler Singer (psychologist) and Janja Lalich (researcher):

...Teenagers raised in such groups need considerable training in how to live in a multiethnic, multicultural, multiracial world with ecumenical practices. Never instructed in how to live in a democratic world, they learned instead to exist in a fascist one, where followers echo the leader's values. One teenager and his parents came to me for help because the boy had attended only cult schools. Now out of the cult, he spouted the venom of the cult leader and was being beaten and ostracized by others at school; he was terribly confused. He sobbed as he told me, "I told the class what the leader taught us — that the Pope and the United States Postal Service were part of a Communist conspiracy — and everybody laughed at me and said, 'There goes crazy ["Joey"] again.' After school they beat me up and say they will get me." Through the school principal and teacher, we worked out an educational program for him, and eventually he and his parents instructed the class about cults, showed educational films on cults, and discussed how to avoid getting recruited...

If these people are the exception to homeschoolers (and my limited experience certainly suggests they are), then the other homeschoolers intent on getting their kids a good education probably would have few objections having some standards set for them and following them.

And again, in my limited experience they don't, but well, do they?

...Teenagers raised in such groups need considerable training in how to live in a multiethnic, multicultural, multiracial world with ecumenical practices. Never instructed in how to live in a democratic world, they learned instead... "

Considering that 95 percent of the world is not this way, but in fact, great lip service is given to this wet dream, by the socialist elite;

I say you are doing your children an incredible disservice in letting them be brainwashed by the public schools to believe that this is the way most societies operate.

At least the fundamentalists have that going for them. They aren't filling their children's heads full of socialist drivel. They have their own flavor of drivel, but that is another argument.

If these people are the exception to homeschoolers (and my limited experience certainly suggests they are), then the other homeschoolers intent on getting their kids a good education probably would have few objections having some standards set for them and following them.

And again, in my limited experience they don't, but well, do they?

Posted by: jerry at November 2, 2015 12:47 PM

I don't think most home schools object to being held to the same standards as public schools, but since most public schools don't have any standards at all, for graduation or proficiency, usually this is just a way to make their life difficult, and force them to get the imprimatur of the gubmint on their curriculum.

If any public school can't teach your kid how to read or do math, they just stick a nice letter in the file telling everyone how hard they tried, but the kid will be labeled either learning disabled, austitic, or socially disadvantaged.

That is how the public schools deal with "standards" that they can't meet.

If a homeschooler tries the same thing, they will sic Social Services on your ass..

If you're sending your kids to public school (or private school) and not supplementing their education with dinner table discussions about current events, work-related topics, or keeping up with their lives, then you're doing them a major disservice.

Relying solely on the public school system to socialize and educate your child is putting them in the hands of a bureaucracy, politicians, and unions that have little interest and no incentive to actually educate the little darling.

Even if you're not homeschooling, you should be home schooling.

Ooh! Ooh! I know the answer, Teacher, I know the answer!!!

Annual national standardized tests.

Their heads will explode.

"I say you are doing your children an incredible disservice in letting them be brainwashed by the public schools to believe that this is the way most societies operate. "

Yes, Isab, but the point is that this is the way this society has operated, from the very first. It took a lot of people holding their noses for Puritans and Anglicans and Quakers to do anything together without killing each other before the British had a chance. The answer was to repudiate the theocracy some of these parents seem to hope for.

And personally I don't really have a problem with firing squads for anyone wanting to replace the Constitution with their mash-up of Scripture.

I'm happy to hold homeschoolers to the same standards as we do state run schools. But let's be honest about what that is.

1. You take a standardized test every few years.
2. Based on the test we give you one of three labels.

And that is it. Since homeschoolers already don't get state or federal funding you can't exactly withhold it. If we are going to sic Social Services on parents for this then we need to sic Social Services on plenty of teachers and administrators too.

Now now Jim you shouldn't threaten violence against the president even if he believes in all kinds of magic mumbo jumbo.

"Yes, Isab, but the point is that this is the way this society has operated, from the very first. It took a lot of people holding their noses for Puritans and Anglicans and Quakers to do anything together without killing each other before the British had a chance. The answer was to repudiate the theocracy some of these parents seem to hope for."

Humm, You must have studied a different U.S history than I did.

What united all the various incompatible sects in the American colonies was for the most part, their economic interests. And only for a very short time, in very specific situations...

Which was about the only things they agreed on. If you had called them *ecumenical " "diverse", or *multicultural* they would have laughed in your face.

They practiced a very limited form of tolerance, because it was in their individual and group economic interests to do so.

Banishment was a common punishment for running afoul of the various colonies, and early state governments, and vigilante justice quite frequent for violating community and social norms.

It was not the reasoned republic you imagine it to be.

Clever to use this case as the one to set precedent. Hard to find any value in children learning nothing because they're waiting for the rapture. There are others where the teaching materials believe in the Fred Flintstone school of time, with dinosaurs and humans co-existing. But testing creation "science" in the courts wouldn't go well, as there are so many bible thumpers in Texas. Good luck!

Another thing along these lines is the "online high school." My nephew was well on his way to a scholarship at MIT or Cal Tech when his mom -- who cannot let go -- transferred him into one of these online travesties. Now he believes he is not eligible for either school because he's never been in a science lab. He did get a perfect score on the physics portion of the SAT, but he doesn't have the confidence to even apply. He has almost no socialization and spends the majority of his time spouting off about LGBT issues instead of getting ahead academically. I'm all for LGBT, but the laser focus on only that is extreme for a 16-y-o.

Gee. If you claim that government shouldn't have a say in what you put in your body, why would you say they can have a say in what you put in your brain?

It's gonna take some time to go through all the comments here, but I'm actually homeschooling so I thought I'd drop a few factoids in:

1.) Laws very (widely) by state on requirements for homeschooling (e.g. in VA we need to register and show "adequate progress" by one of several methods, must hold a high school diploma, etc).

2.) Private school students are (usually) not required to do the same standardized tests as public school students (I'm no legal expert, but the exact requirements probably vary by state)

3.) In some states, homeschools are considered private schools and are treated as such legally.

4.) A large segment of the homeschooling population does NOT do it for religious reasons (there are secular homeschool groups, for instance)

5.) Not a fact, but my experience indicates you get a lot of people who homeschool for non-religious reasons who do so because their kids need extra services - either because of some handicap/medical issue or because they are advanced - and the schools could not accommodate them.

Many homeschoolers do awesome jobs at educating their kids, not just academically, but also in things like civics (I'd never heard of that growing up in public school), cooking, housekeeping, personal finance, etc.

Many (most) also seem to dislike the notion of ANY more mandated testing than is currently required in their states (and might even support reducing it). The reasons are usually among the following:

1.) I homeschool because my child has a disability and the public school was just letting him/her fall behind. If I had to meet grade level stuff, I'd be screwed because I'm playing catchup (and the school would also be screwed if the child was in one). OR I am homeschooling a child with a significant mental handicap and we are focusing on life skills, not multiplication (etc), because this is most relevant to increasing my child's ability to be a productive/independent adult life.

2.) There are issues with the content/quality of the tests, including material with obvious agendas that we disagree with (global warming, socialism, progressive tax system, capitalism, whatever).

3.) Once we submit to some testing, the government will start to increase it - mandating proficiency in things well beyond reading/writing/math/science. Will topics like sex ed end up being tested? Eventually, perhaps.

4.) Testing is a financial burden on families that already support a school system they do not use and are providing all educational materials to their students. Many poor families in bad areas are homeschooling (to protect kids from violence, and actually provide an education) and they might not have the resources to pay for testing.

If Jesus didn't want us to have that touchdown He wouldn't tell us to pray on the 50 yard line!

"Clever to use this case as the one to set precedent. Hard to find any value in children learning nothing because they're waiting for the rapture."

What's worse: that, or teaching kids that Manhattan and Florida will be under water, and all of the polar bears will be dead by 2025, because of global warming? I know the difference: in the former case, it's a lot easier to make the parents look like fools in the media. Is that a basis on which we should govern?

To Cousin Dave:

Well, maybe not as early as 2025, but what makes you think those things WON'T happen by 2050 or so? Unless we take drastic measures?

From Sept. 2014:

http://news.yahoo.com/wildlife-numbers-halved-over-past-four-decades-wwf-225611591.html#

By Mariette Le Roux

Wildlife numbers have plunged by more than half in just 40 years as Earth's human population has nearly doubled, a survey of over 3,000 vertebrate species revealed on Tuesday.

From 1970 to 2010, there was a 39-percent drop in numbers across a representative sample of land- and sea-dwelling species, while freshwater populations declined 76 percent, the green group WWF said in its 2014 Living Planet Report.

Extrapolating from these figures, "the number of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish across the globe is, on average, about half the size it was 40 years ago," it said.

The 52-percent decrease confirmed mankind was chomping through Nature's bounty much faster than the rate of replenishment, the WWF warned...

(snip)

In a way, it also reminds me of those in the media who predict that the global population will go into reverse soon after 2050. How and why would that happen, given that the global population failed to drop between 1929 and 1939 OR between 1939 and the end of 1945?

I have no idea what liberals are thinking when they make that prediction - but when conservatives say that, I assume they're really saying: "No need for we Americans to have fewer babies than we want - we're never going to get as crowded per square mile the way they are in Indian cities! Plus, we'll never run out of resources!"

(I admit that article didn't mention climate change - I just used it to point out that some things are happening faster than we think. So is global population, compared to what was happening in all the centuries pre-WWI.)

To Conan:

I've mentioned before that parents need to acknowledge that it isn't the fault of teachers that every year, there's more important knowledge to keep up with in history, science, literature, etc, that didn't exist the year before. Therefore, parents need to stop fuming about the shortage of detail in, say, American history courses, since there was less American history to learn a generation ago, and they should learn to enjoy reading aloud whichever books they feel should be used in schools but aren't, whether it's history, a biography of Isaac Newton, or a particular edition of Hans Christian Andersen's tales. Of course, it's just as important to do that in a way that kids ENJOY - and that will make them want to read more useful, challenging books on their own.

If Jesus didn't want us to have that touchdown He wouldn't tell us to pray on the 50 yard line! ~ Posted by: Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at November 3, 2015 6:59 AM

When did Freedom OF Religion become Freedom FROM Religion?

If the coach wants to pray, let him. If others, without coercion, want to join him, let them.

Why this animosity toward anyone who expresses any hint of religious belief and holds a government job? Are we only to hire atheists to teach our kids?

It's the French Revolution all over again. If this continues, we'll be eliminating Sunday from the calendar to prevent people from praying on it, just like the Revolution did.

"Well, maybe not as early as 2025, but what makes you think those things WON'T happen by 2050 or so? Unless we take drastic Measures?"

Who the fuck is *We* Lenona, and what drastic measures are you prepared to coerce me into taking?

After that, please explain how your scientific calculations indicate that those drastic measures you think the US should be taking, will make one iota of difference in the grand scheme of things, while the rest of the world's contribution to CO2 continues to rise?

I am also going to assume for the sake of moral consistency, that you live in a solar powered cave somewhere with a composting toilet, and eat and drink nothing that has been produced elsewhere and moved by truck.rail or air to your location....

No? to any of these? I suspected as much.

I seem to remember that in the test for measuring your carbon footprint, it didn't matter which answers you gave so long as you said you were living in the U.S. - once you'd admitted that, your footprint was too big. Period.

However, I do not have Internet access of any kind at home, or a car, or kids. The lack of the first two CAN be inconvenient, but I've learned to live with it - and the same goes for the lack of air conditioning. Plenty of Americans would accuse me of masochism because of any one of those facts. If Jeremy Irons' documentary "Trashed" is any indication, we'll all have to restrict ourselves in similar ways pretty soon.

I seem to remember that in the test for measuring your carbon footprint, it didn't matter which answers you gave so long as you said you were living in the U.S. - once you'd admitted that, your footprint was too big. Period.

However, I do not have Internet access of any kind at home, or a car, or kids. The lack of the first two CAN be inconvenient, but I've learned to live with it - and the same goes for the lack of air conditioning. Plenty of Americans would accuse me of masochism because of any one of those facts. If Jeremy Irons' documentary "Trashed" is any indication, we'll all have to restrict ourselves in similar ways pretty soon.

Posted by: lenona at November 3, 2015 4:45 PM

Why don't you read the excellent science on the subject instead of watching politicized documentaries?

Nothing you do, or fail to do, will make a damned bit of difference in the long run.

If you think doing without the Internet or AC, is even close to what a lower class individual lives like in a second or third world country, you need to get out more.

We have AC and heat in our house in northern Japan, just can't afford to turn it on much at all.

Biggest seller in the fall is these cheap tin wood burning stoves which the majority of Japanese in our rural area use to keep from freezing to death in the winter.

They can afford the heating oil, and electricity even less easily than we can. No surprise there. When Japan shut down the nuclear reactors, electricity and heating oil prices sky rocketed.

"Well, maybe not as early as 2025, but what makes you think those things WON'T happen by 2050 or so? Unless we take drastic measures?"

I could go on and on -- global warming is the biggest scientific fraud since Lysenkoism. But here's two specific things:

1. It's already happened before. Surely you are familiar with the Medevial Warm Period, when the Earth (at least the Northern Hemisphere) was substantially warmer than it is today. The Vikings colonized Greenland and wine grapes were grown all across England. It didn't put London under water, and there's no evidence that it put anything on the North American shelf under water that isn't under water today. Ocean levels don't actually correlate with atmospheric temperatures very much.

2. Global warming is not happening now (sorry, thermometer-readers, but the infrared satellite data is conclusive), and has not happened for about 18 years. There's a growing body of evidence that global temperature changes are driven primarily by solar variations. If global warming is driven by solar output, what can we do to stop it? Probably nothing. Similarly, if declining solar activity leads to global cooling (which there is starting to be a bit of evidence is happening), then all the CO2 output in the world isn't going to reverse it.

"If global warming is driven by solar output, what can we do to stop it? Probably nothing."

That sounds like a challenge Cousin Dave. I say I can change the climate and all I need is a couple million dollars a year and some retired power plants. I won't guarantee accuracy though. I think I can do +/-5C range.

Of course all of that is an invitation to war. And actions even by the majority of the populace have no significant effect.

If you think doing without the Internet or AC, is even close to what a lower class individual lives like in a second or third world country, you need to get out more.

Posted by: Isab at November 3, 2015 5:58 PM

I never said that.

However, if a lot more First World types reduced their electronic consuming habits that way, maybe Third World residents would be able to study for school by electric light when necessary.

Other things Americans don't typically do (but I do):

Cook from scratch whenever doing so means you will avoid buying processed foods that include palm oil (it's destructive to rain forests - the Girl Scouts helped publicize this problem in 2011). Palm oil is used a lot more often than you might think.

Don't buy plastic bags at all. (I don't think I ever have.) Free ones come from all over - and even THOSE can be avoided, sometimes. I use only the minimum number of free bags to take when I go to open-air produce markets or to use for garbage - and bread bags for lunches.

Eat tiny meals, especially after a certain age. Learn to enjoy feeling hungry an hour or so before meals - it beats feeling bloated. Wasting food (as in rotting food in the fridge) means wasting all the resources that went into making it. True, eating tiny meals makes it pointless to go to restaurants, since their portions tend to be large, or overpriced if small, but one can spend money on other places.

Learn to put long-term luxuries over short-term ones, at least - there's less waste involved that way and you'll have more money for your needs and for any needy people you care about. Besides, by definition, short-term luxuries (like takeout food) tend to be forgotten by the next week at the latest, so what's the point?

"However, if a lot more First World types reduced their electronic consuming habits that way, maybe Third World residents would be able to study for school by electric light when necessary."

No Lenona. None of this is true. Increased or decreased energy usage in the US does not affect energy prices in any other nation. And especially not in '3rd world' nations.

I'm all for living cheaply and maximizing the return on your spending. But nothing you are doing has a significant effect on anyone else's life style. It also is not significantly changing the global environment. As Isab pointed out highly politicized documentaries are rarely truthful.

"However, if a lot more First World types reduced their electronic consuming habits that way, maybe Third World residents would be able to study for school by electric light when necessary."

Lenona, where do you come up with this stuff?

You can't generate electricity in the US, and somehow transport it to Africa or Asia. The electric Easter bunny doesn't deliver it in a basket.....

Technology isn't fungible, as Ben implied. And when you don't have a stable government it is impossible to maintain the generation facilities or the lines.

My husband worked his ass off trying to bring electricity to the rural areas in Iraq. (Sadam Hussein kept control of the country by only allowing power in the areas of Baghdad that his supporters controlled).

And merely being an American doesn't mean that your "carbon footprint". (A made up term with no clear definition) is necessarily too large.

When the market sets energy prices, it is the fairest measure of the actual value. When the government distorts that energy market, by either banning efficient technologies or subsiding inefficient technologies, it becomes increasingly unfair, especially to the poor.

Well, this thread slid topics, but I feel compelled to point out that electricity prices are NOT market driven in this country.

They are utilities and quasi-monopolies (sometimes actual monopolies) because you can't REALLY decide which company you want to put the power lines in your neighborhood and into your house. Sure, you may get some choice in which you buy from, but really, the electrons don't know which plant they started at - which is why the US government gets to regulate them (interstate commerce because you don't know which state your power originated in)!

Power prices are based upon regulation and, if you don't like how yours is running (ours gave out grants for something like African Heritage Interpretive Dance), you complain to your PUC (public utility commission) which is in charge of rates. Rates are set so investors get a "reasonable" rate of return and prices stay "reasonable" for consumers. PUCs are state-level agencies, I believe.

@Shannon

Yes, in this country, most but not all electric companies are heavily regulated utilities, much like the airlines and the banks.

Power would be quite a bit cheaper, in my opinion, if they were not.

I know several people who live quite comfortably off the grid, which is a viable option if you really, really don't want to do business with them.

However, that is beside the point. Electricity prices to a great extent are market driven, because the fuel that the power plants run on, is priced by the market.

It is just a matter of how much your local government is willing to hide the actual price with taxpayer kickbacks, and subsidies.