A Lesson Our Country Doesn't Need

My last two posts have been along political lines- and with today being Tea Party/ Tax Day, I decided I would continue on with trend.

I read the following post a few days ago over at Mostly Cajun. And as I mentioned yesterday, it's sometimes hard to tell what is real and what is fake on the internet. But whether or not this story is actually true, the point it makes hits the nail on the head.

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An economics professor said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. The class had insisted that socialism worked - and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer for all, for society. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

He said that all grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone was given a B. The students who studied hard were upset, and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who hadn’t studied much for the first test had studied even less, and the ones who studied hard weren’t motivated to study hard again, and they decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second Test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for anyone else. All failed …. and the professor told them that the socialism they wanted would ultimately fail, as they had, because the reward of success normally goes to those that work harder, but when government takes the reward away; few will try so no one will succeed.

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I can see total truth in this story just from my own high school experience. I had a friend that studied hard. She wanted those A's. One day, we had a very hard test for a very big part of our grade. The teacher ended up grading on a curve.

My friend did get an A. However, it really frustrated her. She studied her bottom off to get a good grade, but the lazy, dope smokers- who didn't flip a page, got a better grade than they deserved.

Of course the dope smokers loved it. They all hooped and hollered in the back of the classroom, then went out to the parking lot after school to toke it up in celebration. They were rewarded for their lack of effort. How did that make them better people?