In most states, most students are graduating high school financially illiterate. They are not taught about credit, budgeting, insurance, savings, retirement or other concepts and practices that can help them make rational financial decisions.

This is according to a national study conducted by the Council for Economic Education, an advocacy organization that trains scores of educators to teach economic and financial literacy.

The facts are grim. Although 43 states have economic and personal finance education in their K-12 standards, only 19 states actually require that schools even offer such a course. What’s more, only 22 require that students take a course in economics.

...

An overwhelming majority of Americans agree that schools should teach financial literacy. In the study by the Council for Economic Education, 89 percent said so. It’s time for all of the states to mandate this instruction so that our kids can more skillfully navigate these difficult economic waters that we’re in right now.

Wisconsin’s biggest “welfare queens”

Conservatives just love to throw out the phrase “welfare queens” as an attempt to stereotype recipients of public benefits, but here’s an interesting fact:

Wisconsin’s biggest “welfare queens” are actually some of Wisconsin’s biggest businesses, as noted by the state’s own BadgerCare enrollment data. Here’s a list of the top 5 employers with the most employees/dependents receiving BadgerCare benefits.

Walmart
McDonalds
Aurora
Menards
QPS Staffing

Of course Sen. Scott Fitzgerald wants lawmakers to be able to accept contribution checks from lobbyists while the legislature is still in session.

As the legislative session winds down, the state Senate’s leader is putting on the fast track a bill to rewrite campaign finance law to allow lobbyists to hand off clients’ campaign checks to lawmakers and other elected officials during the legislative session. Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R-Juneau) is promoting the bill alongside one that would address when groups running political ads must disclose their spending. Supporters say that measure would simply put existing rules in law; opponents contend it would make it easier for groups to avoid disclosure.

Fitzgerald and Sen. Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin) introduced the bills late Monday and Lazich — the chairwoman of the Senate Elections and Urban Affairs Committee — held a hearing on it Wednesday. She plans a committee vote on it Thursday, prompting protests from Democrats who said the measure was moving too quickly.

Yeah, because what could possibly be shady about lobbyists being able to make campaign contributions to legislators at the very same time those legislators may be taking action on bills the lobbyists have an interest in? This just cements what so many of us already know: Republicans care more about their campaign coffers and currying influence to their contributors than they do about doing the work their constituents elected them to do.

I try to keep up with NewsMax’s slavish devotion to Scott Walker despite my adverse physical reactions to the stuff. This recent NewsMax piece is standard for them.



I noticed, to my disappointment, that it links to this Washington Post story which practically gushes.



Check out this excerpt:

“Walker, in effect, operated as the county executive, chief of staff, press secretary and campaign strategist all at once. He ordered up briefing documents, spun out talking points, recruited the help of a local conservative talk-show host and even wrote a quote for a state lawmaker to issue in her own words.”

Walker shines as a “decisive” decision maker says Helderman.

The ultrarich shattered many records last year, buying notable works of art, shiny baubles and sleek toys. A rare 1967 Ferrari Spider went for $27.5 million. Francis Bacon’s “Three Studies of Lucien Freud” sold for $142.4 million. And 12 bottles of 1978 Domain de la Romanée-Conti, described by one expert as “as close to perfect as wine gets,” landed in someone’s collection for a cool $476,405.

The world’s club of ultrawealthy individuals, or those with $30 million or more in net assets, added about 5,000 new members last year and now stands at around 167,000, according to the latest Wealth Report, an annual compendium of all things rich from Knight Frank, the property management firm. Over the last decade, the ranks of the über-rich have swelled by 59 percent, and the register of billionaires climbed 80 percent, to 1,682, according to Knight Frank’s data.

...

If the wealthy made a mistake en masse last year, it was holding gold, which fell about 28 percent. A big chunk of the respondents in the survey said they would probably reduce their stake in the metal this year. The ultrarich, however, continue to collect jewelry, watches and wine, while the biggest jump in popularity went to art.

An index of classic cars has had a five-year gain of 121 percent. Coins have risen 91 percent and rare stamps are up 50 percent.

A sudden, surprise attack on the ability of Wisconsin citizens to know who is trying to influence their vote at election time was launched without notice yesterday, when State Senator Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin) and State Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R-Juneau) introduced Senate Bill 654. They also introduced another horrible measure – Senate Bill 655 – that would lift the current limitations on a lobbyist's ability to make campaign contributions and allow them to contribute more frequently.

And they are rushing both of these awful measures to a public hearing in the Capitol on Wednesday with the intention of trying to get them passed and enacted into law during the few remaining days the Wisconsin Legislature is in session this year. They should be opposed and stopped cold. An executive session on the measures could occur as early as this Thursday.

Senate Bill 654 would take Wisconsin in exactly the opposite direction that the rest of the nation is headed in the wake of the 2010 Citizens United vs. F.E.C. decision. It would codify into Wisconsin law "protection" from disclosure of phony issue ads. It does not take a genius to see that all outside groups would head in that direction in order to influence elections and escape disclosure of their donors.

The end result would be that Wisconsinites will have no idea who is behind almost all of the money from outside special interest groups seeking to influence their vote in elections in Wisconsin. The money could come from anywhere inside or outside of Wisconsin, and Wisconsin voters would not know it's origin. No other state is headed in this direction.

Deep in the heart of Texas, in the very center of what public-school advocate Diane Ravitch called the "education-industrial complex," public-school activists from every corner of the United States met last weekend to launch a nationwide movement to defend public education against corporate takeover and phony, test-driven "reform."

The Network for Public Education founded by Diane Ravitch and Anthony Cody, met for the first time in Austin on March 1 and 2 to sound the alarm about high-stakes testing, mass school closures, and the corporate take-over of public education, and to rally a nationwide movement to resist.

Karen Lewis, the dynamic president of the Chicago Teachers Union joined Texas school superintendent John Kuhn on stage at the Lyndon Johnson museum at the University of Texas, to give a barn-burning joint keynote address:

...

School closings, a "test-and-punish" model of education reform that labels high-poverty districts as "failing" and invites their takeover by private companies, and the replacement of democratically elected school boards with "CEO's" are among the threats to the basic, democratic institution of public education, Kuhn and Lewis pointed out.

http://uppitywis.org/blogarticle/press-conference-walker-only-gets-only-one-question-regarding-jo

Governor Scott Walker recently held a press conference with Wisconsin reporters.

The first three questions were not about the John Doe scandal.

Finally, seven minutes into the press conference, Mary Spicuzza of the Wisconsin State Journal asked John Doe-related question of whether or not his staff is allowed to use private emails to conduct official goverment business. Two reporters then followed-up with details on this question.

Walker then said, "These aren't the droids your looking for," and the reporters quickly moved onto another topic.