school supplies and lottery funding

Francene (WHAS-- 840 AM) is talking with Chip Polston, the Vice President for Communication with the Kentucky Lottery. Among other interesting facts, he noted that the funding from the lottery originally went to elementary and secondary education-- and now goes for a combo of merit and needs-based college scholarships. (As an aside, apparently, Kentucky has the strongest regulations on how the Lottery is allowed to talk about itself, making it more difficult to hear this sort of info.)

The premise for her show this morning is people complaining about having to spend more for school supplies. Of course, all of this misses the much larger issue: our country already spends more than $10,000 per student on average (as we do in So. IN and Louisville). Why isn't $10,000 enough to educate a child-- and to educate them well? That's the question...And the top answer? A government-run entity with significant monopoly power is unlikely to deliver top quality, concern for consumer preferences, or here, efficient provision.