Not to beat a dead horse here, but guess what? The cost of education is going up. That means 11-12 % tax increases across Vermont according to the December 1 letter released by the Vermont Department of Taxes this week.
This comes as the legislative sub-committee charged with implementing Act 73 concluded its work with a recommendation that school districts voluntarily merge. Act 73 was to have produced a plan to drastically shrink the number of school districts in Vermont in an attempt to save costs by closing schools and creating larger classes in fewer buildings.
The conclusion of the task force was that closing schools would not save much money and would not result in better educational outcomes.
So, what might save money? What is driving up costs? Health care for starters, as well as aging infrastructure, declining enrollments, lack of federal funding for special education and mental health services, public funds being bled off for private schools, etc. The list is long.
But what if simple steps were taken to at least try and reduce health care costs. There are some 34,500 active school staff in the state’s Vermont Education Health Initiative (VEHI) program.
Average taxpayer-funded premiums in 2024 ranged from $9,734 to $32,727 annually, based on the plan. Per VEHI releases this fall, premium hikes are expected to go up 7.3% next year. There are 8,000 state of Vermont employees covered by health care and there are 15,000 people employed by the University of Vermont Health Care Network. Another 20,000 people are employed in Vermont towns. 35,000 are enrolled in Vermont Health Connect.
Is there no way to aggregate these people and their benefits to achieve some kind of (any kind of) bargaining power and/or economy of scale?
Vermont is notorious for its overwhelmingly high health insurance costs. In 2010 former Governor Peter Shumlin ran on a promise of creating a single-payer system. It led to Vermont Health Connect which all of us were to join and too few have.
Rather than more education task forces, maybe we should be revisiting the single payer concept when the Legislature reconvenes in January.
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