The Daily on Friday had an article discussing the Regent’s new request for a 10% increase in higher education funding for the 2010 budget.  Regardless of the state budget situation the state legislature has a responsibility to fulfill the request.

I’ve used this space before to explain that proper funding of higher education is a moral and economic imperative.  I’ve explained – and here’s a scientific study from Californian backing it up – that for every dollar the state invests in higher education, it makes three dollars in increased tax revenue alone, so vast is the economic value of a university education.  At a time and place when the transition from a blue-collar economy to a knowledge-based economy is hitting harder than anywhere, the foolishness of failing to fund higher education is astounding.  We can tweak trade agreements all we want, we can bail out the Big Three all we want, but manufacturing jobs are not coming back.  The only road to economic success in the new economy runs through colleges and universities.  Either the state of Michigan understands that and restores funding to it’s universities, or the state be condemned to permanent status in the underclass of American states.

The funding of education is not just an economic imperative, but a moral one.  Michigan’s universities, especially this one, have maintained their status among the world’s elite, but have done it on the back of rapidly increasing tuition.  Though one cannot blame the universities, they have to maintain their quality, one can blame the legislature for cutting off roads to higher education and success for low-income students and inhibiting the social mobility that embodies the American dream.

The Daily says that “state funding has declined in each year from 2004 to 2008, except in 2007. The University was hit with about a 10 percent reduction in 2004.”  While technically true, this vastly overstates the State’s commitment to their economic engines.  With inflation around 2-3% a year, real funding has been cut consistantly and oftn drastically in recnet years.  Usining dishonest nominal terms disguises the magnitude of their betrayal.

Michigan now spends less on higher education per student than any other state.  Less than Mississsippi, less than Alabama.  There is no excuse for this.  If we have the money to lead the midwest in incarceration spending, we have the money to educate our citizens.  The legislators, especially Republicans have decided they’d rather disproportionately punish non-violent offenders than fund the intelectual and economic revival of the state.  If they do so again, they should be punished in 2010.