When free education was introduced the number of schools was 197 according to a recent speech of the president. Now there are over 10,000 schools with nearly a million students. Those who introduced free education never visualized this massive increase in the numbers and did not address the issue of how this future expenditure could be funded from taxation.

The budgetary allocation in 2008 is Rs 100 billion whereas in 2004 it was Rs 42 billion. The expenditure in nominal terms has increased by 138% but this is only in nominal terms. Our politicians make this claim that they did not reduce the expenditure on free education and free health. But this is true only in nominal terms and not in inflation adjusted or real terms which is what matters. During this period 2004 to 20008 the increase in the Cost of Living Index was 160% exceeding the nominal increase of 138%.  

The Austrian School Economist wrote about the pernicious effects of compulsory free state education. He stressed the natural diversity of children and their aptitudes for learning making the point that "One of the most important facts about human nature is the great diversity among individuals. Of course, there are certain broad characteristics, physical and mental, which are common to all human beings. But more than any other species, individual men are distinct and separate individuals. Not only is each fingerprint unique, each personality is unique as well. Each person is unique in his tastes, interests, abilities, and chosen activities…….

``The development of individual variety tends to be both the cause and the effect of the progress of civilization. As civilization progresses, there is more opportunity for the development of a person’s reasoning and tastes in a growing variety of fields. And from such opportunities come the advancement of knowledge and progress which in turn add to the society’s civilization. Furthermore, it is the variety of individual interests and talents that permits the growth of specialization and division of labor, on which civilized economies depend……..

``Civilization shows the greatest degree of specialization. Distinct functions become more numerous. Mechanical, commercial, educational, scientific, political, and artistic occupations multiply. The rudimentary societies are characterized by the likeness of equality; the developed societies are marked by the unlikeness of inequality or variety. Only robots on the assembly line are equal. Civilized human beings, therefore, are unequal in most of their personalities. This fact of inequality, in tastes, and in ability and character, is not necessarily an invidious distinction. It simply reflects the scope of human diversity. Since abilities and interests are naturally diverse, a drive toward making people equal in all or most respects is necessarily a leveling downward. It is a drive against development of talent, genius, variety, and reasoning power".

He argued that with set classes of forty or fifty students and the same teaching textbooks and teaching materials, the system of State Education could provide only a dull uniformity. Such a monopoly of education in the State would cripple economic development and lead to a descent to a rudimentary state instead of promoting civilization- He said "a creed of equality and uniformity is a creed of death and destruction".  

Free education and equality of opportunity

Such uniformity spells injustice to the dullards who cannot absorb any instruction, to those with different sets of aptitudes in different subjects, to the bright children whose minds would like to be off ——in more advanced courses but who must wait until the dullards are hounded once again  —- who lose interest and precious chances to develop their great potential".

The claim that free education enhanced equality of opportunity is suspect. It did so for the first one or two generations of students but today it is not valid. There are different standards of quality in the free government schools and parents have noted these differences and seek admission to the better schools. Unlike in the past they can send the children to more distant schools in the urban centers given the low cost of subsidized transport. Since the supply of vacancies in the schools in demand is far less than the demand for them, the bureaucratic procedures are not able to suppress the black market in school places that has naturally emerged. So money passes in the trade for school places. The more affluent parents can send their children for private tuition. But the majority of parents can afford only mass tuition. Where then is the free education or the equality of opportunity?

But what is worse is that the economy is no longer able to absorb the products of our schools and universities. This is particularly true of university graduates. Poor parents have been cheated for they send their children to the universities in the hope of high paying jobs in the executive and managerial grades of the service industries. But there is no growth in such jobs and there is a mad scramble for the few jobs available. Eventually they are frustrated and rebel against a society that inveigled them into this trap.

The high expenditure on education funded by the State has meant that the State had less money to spend on development. In fact prior to the present regime most if not all development expenditure on infrastructure etc were funded by foreign aid. But foreign aid has dried up for various reasons and the present regime while waging a war also increased spending on infrastructure which has led to a fiscal and balance of payments crisis.

Other countries realized the opportunity cost of State funded free education and gave priority to development of industry emphasizing only the training in vocational and technical skills for the children and the youth. So the claim of free education having provided equality of opportunity is a myth propagated by the middle class who are the main beneficiaries of free education in the prestigious schools. All the State schools in this category should be made fee levying and/or charged a capitation fee.

The most damaging aspect of compulsory free State-paid education is the failure to cater to the different needs of children. Some children are duller and should be instructed at a slower pace; the bright children require a rapid pace to develop their faculties. Furthermore, many children are very apt in one subject and very dull in another. They should certainly be permitted to develop themselves in their best subjects and to drop the poor ones. Whatever the standards that the government imposes for instruction, injustice is done to all.

The State’s monopoly in education is not only to repress the growth of specialized, partly individualized, private schools for the needs of various types of children; it also prevents the education of the child by the people who, in many respects, are best qualified — his parents, and the clergy.  The effect is also to force into schools children who have little or no aptitude for instruction at all. It so happens that among the variety of human ability there is a large number of subnormal children, children who are not receptive to instruction, whose reasoning capacity is not too great. Without the ability to learn systematic subjects, they must either sit or suffer while others learn, or the bright and average students must be held back greatly in their development while these children are pressured to learn.

In any case, the instruction has almost no effect on these children, many of whose hours of life are simply wasted. If these hours were spent in simple, direct experience where they would be better able to absorb, they would be healthier children and adults as a result. But to dragoon them into a school for a formative decade of their lives, to force them to attend classes in which they have no interest or ability, is to warp their entire personalities.

Someone has said that it was due to the free education system that our people are humane. Whether our people are humane or not is best judged by reading the Sinhala newspapers which report daily the brutalities indulged in by our people in both village and town..