We had a lot of fun when Stefan, Dawn’s Swedish “brother” came to visit last month.
Sweden is the socialist country that works, or so they say. Stefan is a smart guy and understands my anarcho-capitalist philosophy. We didn’t talk much about the differences between his country and ours because we preferred to have some fun and besides, there isn’t much difference.
I might have mentioned something about my disdain for government schools to Stefan so he sent this:
I thought John Green must be a real person. And he is! Like most who are prominent advocates of government schools, he went to private school himself. The market speaks the truth that John Green can’t dispute. Any product purchased directly by an informed buyer will ultimately outperform those products forced on us by elitist do-gooders. I can’t think of a better example than government schools. Â
Thanks, Stefan, for my continuing education. And it didn’t cost you a dime.
alternativebyfritz 
How about a population of 9.6-million in Sweden vs. 316-million in the U.S.? Think that might make a bit of difference in a comparison of what works and what doesn’t work? Like maybe an apple vs. oranges comparison? Or how about the comparative verisimilitude in the variety of ethnicity, in immigration policy, etc. etc. One cannot legitimately compare aspects of these two countries owing to the multitude of differences. It would be like a drug company in a phase II trial that had humans as one group and hamsters as the comparison group.
Put 100 hamsters under water for 20 minutes and 100 humans under water for 20 minutes. Public school doesn’t work anywhere. We just don’t see the unseen potential.
Oh, I agree. And I wasn’t defending Stefan. Rather, I was making the point that a comparison of Sweden to the U.S. is an apples-and-oranges, meaningless analogy. That is, I was stating that public education might work just a tad better with 97% fewer people in the school population with whom to contend.