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Victoria Wilson

Victoria Wilson's picture
Plymouth, MN
Commenter for
2 years 42 weeks

Recent Comments

Posted on 10/21/11 at 01:56 pm in response to Report shows Somali kids test kindergarten-ready: Why?

Joe-You make my point. Virtually everyone cares about their children, understands the importance of education, and values unpolluted rivers and safe streets. The issue is whether individuals can or are able to do the work necessary to create and maintain public goods such as strong schools, clean environments and crime free communities. It’s not about caring more or being more virtuous.

The Somali family is able to dedicate an adult’s working hours to supplement the education of...

Posted on 10/05/11 at 10:16 am in response to New report shows dramatic differences in lives of Minneapolis residents of color, whites

Since there is a consensus that mixed-income schools place a lighter burden on the public school system with more favorable results for the least advantaged, I would be interested to see the graduation rates for affluent kids in mixed-income schools versus affluent schools. If affluent families could see that their children are likely to perform as well in a mixed-income school, perhaps Minneapolis schools could retain a larger number of this demographic.

Posted on 09/30/11 at 10:31 am in response to Stadium study: Will it address all of the right questions?

What makes the discussion of the economics of an NFL team so interesting is that, as a product, it has a substantial private goods component as well as public goods component. Since these goods play out on different economic fields which respond to different rules, the conversation quickly become murky and muddled.

Just to clarify, public welfare is an example of primarily a public good (a good we all agree to provide to anyone in our community). You would never hear the rational...

Posted on 10/03/11 at 07:20 pm in response to Stadium study: Will it address all of the right questions?

Paul-I didn’t mean to infer anything about virtue(moral excellence; goodness; righteousness). I said “a team experience allows citizens of all income levels and backgrounds to relate to each other equally as spectators.” Listen to employees after a big game. Despite their role in the office, everyone can contribute to reliving the highlights, or the low-points of the game. This is important because people are more empathic to people they know, more willing to compromise with them and more...

Posted on 09/23/11 at 10:19 am in response to Affluent suburbs challenge Twin Cities' unique tax-base sharing law

The Fiscal Disparities Act illuminates an interesting aspect of group structure in the production and consumption of public services, or what I like to call public goods: goods that a community agrees to provide to everyone in a that community (public education is a public good, so is our transportation system-we all contribute to it and we all can use it).

The Fiscal Disparities Act denotes that groups (employees, vendors, suppliers, subcontractors, customers) associated with...

Posted on 09/14/11 at 03:46 pm in response to How to make sense of the latest Minnesota student test results

Maybe it is time to re-think what we, as Minnesotans, agree to in providing a public education. It seems to me that the academic achievement of a child is influenced by three factors; their natural ability, their teachers and materials, and their familial support. Clearly the state cannot change a child's natural ability, but we can test to assume an achievable norm for average ability. We do provide the teachers and materials, and we analyze this process to excess.

But lastly,...

Posted on 08/23/11 at 04:23 pm in response to Awaiting MPS placement feels a bit like 'Waiting for Superman'

"The film’s devastating conclusion depicts numbered balls tumbling from wire cages as the kids and their parents watch. The odds-beating schools in the movie are all filled by lottery, and most of the kids in the auditoriums where the lucky were chosen ended up losing."

I guess the question I would ask is why an auditorium full of concerned parents do not self-organize to achieve the educational goals for their children. Isn't that how reform occurs? People with a common goal,...

Posted on 07/08/11 at 09:38 pm in response to Grover Norquist looms over Minnesota's budget impasse

I believe that those who seek smaller government feel there is a natural mechanism for the provision of public goods, and each small community should organize themselves to utilize it for the care of their own members. This system creates the greatest efficiencies as choices and outcomes are experienced first hand, and lead to the careful expenditure of resources.

What is odd about the Norquist pledge is that it artificially sets a price limit on public goods. If one truly believes...

Posted on 05/09/11 at 05:04 pm in response to Vikings stadium: From a metro planning perspective, Metrodome site is superior

About forty years ago Jane Jacobs described the real estate surrounding large enterprises like Hospitals as a "border vacuum." The undulation of large numbers of unfamiliar people coming and going from universities, convention centers, stadiums and the like discourage the settlement of everyday folks who are looking to enjoy their property in quite contentment. So great is the influence of a significant structure on the surrounding neighbors, that a buffer is created.

You can see...

Posted on 05/10/11 at 09:42 am in response to Vikings stadium: From a metro planning perspective, Metrodome site is superior

@ David

I think Jacobs would say that it is not discomfort from people coming and going that causes the vacuum, but rather the lack of work the visitors contribute to the maintenance of the area. A local neighbor would call the MTC to notify them of graffiti on a bus shelter, a visitor probably would not. Neighbors may organize to help the homeless, a visitor may not. Eyes on the street-a well know Jacobs phrase-keeps crime down. If a visitor witnessed a crime, they would be more...