Enriching Children, Enriching the Nation: Public Investment in High-Quality Prekindergarten

By Robert G. Lynch

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• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1932066284
• ISBN13: 9781932066289
• Release Date: May 2007
• Publisher: Economic Policy Institute
• Length: 135 Pages
• Weight: 0.65 lbs.

Customer Reviews

the social benefits of investing in high-quality pre-kindergarten education

Lynch--a professor of economics with specialties in public finance and comparative economics--gives a dollars-and-cents analysis of the financial, budgetary benefits which would be derived from significant investment in high-quality prekindergarten from "raising GDP, improving the skills of the workforce, reducing poverty...strengthening U.S. global competitiveness" and lowering crime rates. Costing $6,300 per prekindergarten-age participant for more than a $40 billion start-up cost and over $30 billion per year for a number of years, within 17 years costs would be down to zero considering money saved from reduced poverty and crime programs, for example, plus taxes from more workers at higher incomes. If started within the next few years, "in 2050, every tax dollar spent on a universal prekindergarten program would be offset by $2.00 in budget savings and [Federal and state] governments would be enjoying $96 billion in surpluses due to their prekindergarten investment." In a policy-wonk, academic sociological style with charts and tables and for example, one appendix titled "Explanation of the methodology for estimating the budget, earnings and crime effects of investments in prekindergarten," Lynch succinctly, yet comprehensively puts forth the financially-based argument for the socially-desirable enterprise of good prekindergarten schooling for all American children.