Economic philosophies and policies become politically divisive issues because they pertain to deeply held values about the role of government in a society. Yet in spite of the vast chasm that disconnects economic conservatives from economic liberals, ultimately all persons share in common end goals that include quality of life improvements. The main difference between economic liberals and economic conservatives is, therefore, linked to how essential services and social services should be funded and managed. An economic liberal promotes social welfare and a collectivist approach, whereas an economic conservative believes in the free market and private sector solutions to social problems.
Two pressing economic policy issues of great interest to me personally include tuition costs and student loans. A related issue would be funding for public schools, and especially teacher salaries. I tend to waver between conservative and liberal responses to educational funding. On the one hand, I like the idea of extending public funding for education into undergraduate level schooling so that a four-year degree is accessible to all Americans. On the other hand, I understand that to realize the goal of free undergraduate education, Americans would have to pay more in taxes. Yet because the value of education is tantamount to almost everything else in terms of promoting the general welfare and promoting a robust economy in general, I do believe that the nation would ultimately benefit from a publically funded tuition program for undergraduate education. After all, the debt incurred by student loans would be more than offset by the increase in taxation (Page & Clawson, 2019). On this topic, I would veer towards the liberal side but am open to different points of view.
Economic conservatives espouse an education policy that would end up promoting provincialism, which goes against the principles of higher education and critical thinking in general (Dreher, 2018). While government bureaucracy can absolutely become bloated and inefficient, the liberal approach is more aligned with the values of education itself. Economic liberalism makes more sense on paper, but whether it is financially feasible remains to be seen.
References
Dreher, R. (2018). Education policy. The American Conservative. https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/education-policy-eric-wearne-too-big-to-fail/
Page, M. & Clawson, D. (2019). It’s time to push for free college. National Education Association. http://www.nea.org/home/62740.htm
