The right to education under the double squeeze of the house and the household registration
Freedom of movement, housing, education, which are basically guaranteed in almost all over the world, but in the great socialist China, people always have too much to say, and they don't know where to start, and there is a sad feeling that people say much and are equal to not saying. Let's start with the tragic experience of a small couple in Beipiao. Phoenix.com reported that a small Sichuan couple sold their original house and took on millions of loan debts in order for their children to go to school in Beijing, but they were full of hope and finally decided not to sell the homeowner, because after the Spring Festival,—— house prices skyrocketed again. The house is gone, and the children face the tragedy of not being able to read. In fact, I have no interest in the details of how the contract between the two parties is disputed, who breaches the contract, who is responsible, these are really not interested, the little couple has also filed a lawsuit, these own court judgments. It's just that in this helplessness, there are too many social problems, such as a cattle in the throat, not spitting up. In big cities such as Beijing, there are two ways for children to enroll, one, born well, parents are local hukou, congratulations, you can go to public primary school, second, good birth, parents have enough money, and did not catch up with the purchase restrictions on foreigners, have bought a house in Beijing, if your life is better, it may be a good school district. In fact, it's not just Beijing, it's basically the same in every city in the country. If you are a migrant worker, whether you are a black collar worker moving bricks or a white-collar worker in the office, do not have a local hukou, and cannot afford a local house, your children, if they are lucky, can choose to attend a school for the children of migrant workers, otherwise they can only go back to their hometown and become a glorious left-behind child. I really don't want to say more about the politically correct nonsense of how the hukou system has played a "positive" role in history, let alone refute the conjecture that the opening of the hukou system will cause overcrowding in big cities. Freedom of movement is not only a fundamental human right, but also a driving force for social progress. Without a free flow of talent, this is a great obstacle to economic development, and the so-called structural reform must not bypass institutional reform to reduce the cost of social transactions, and the barriers to the labor market caused by the household registration system are a cancer that must be first cut. This problem is also far more urgent than the economic obstruction of the labor law proposed by Minister Lou. If the innate inequality of human origin is further imprisoned by the hukou system for upward mobility, then the inequality of education, with the complicity of the monster of hukou, has further aggravated the transmission of the inequality trend to the next generation. The continuous surge in housing prices caused by the kidnapping of the national economy by the real estate industry has become the last straw that crushed the "Chinese dream" of a new generation of outsiders. With the call for real estate destocking, various stimulus policies have been set off across the country, resulting in skyrocketing housing prices in first-tier cities. We believe: all men are created equal, aren't they? "Wang Hou Xiang, Ning has a kind of care", is it just a slogan? Regardless of where parents were born, what class, whether they are wealthy, highly educated, or even work hard, this should not be an excuse for the inequality of education in the next generation. Little children cannot choose whether their parents are rich or hard, they cannot choose where they were born. Children are not the private property of their parents, but the wealth of the whole society. Therefore, the responsibility for fairness and justice falls on the shoulders of society and the government. The inequality of educational resources is an important reason for the popularity of school district housing. The difference in the quality of school education is objective, as in another true nonsense favorite of the little pinks, indeed, "there is no absolute equality". But it is precisely this recognition of the fact of objective inequality that should be the direction and driving force of educational reform. The reform should promote the relative balance of basic education resources between regions, and also promote the relative fairness of resources within regions. For schools, the biggest resource, apart from the reputation accumulated by history, is nothing more than teachers and funds. The latter two resources can be regulated by policy. The teaching force can completely implement the rotation system, so that teachers in public schools can move within the region, which can promote the balance of education quality between schools to a certain extent. Can funding be tilted towards "backward" schools? Can the increase in government financial demand for schools also increase? Migrants also contribute to the local area, can the investment in new schools be based on the actual number of migrants rather than the local household registration population? Beijing is said to have closed schools for migrant children, so the diversion of these students to public schools in their original jurisdiction must not be fully accommodated. After all, education is a major matter of people's livelihood, has a bearing on the future of the nation, and should also be the top priority of structural reform. As China's economy declines, GDP growth slows, and the country begins to consider expanding the fiscal deficit by 3% or even 5%, how can this deficit be used, and where can it be more meaningful to invest than to invest in education? Of course, big cities like Beijing also leave a door for the children of migrants who do not have houses to go to school, but the threshold is still very high. Foreigners enrolled in public schools in Beijing must present the "five certificates": parents' work permit in Beijing, residence permit, household registration booklet, temporary residence permit in Beijing, and township certificate where their household registration is located. However, in order to apply for this unlicensed, a total of 28 certificates are required. It's horrible to think about, and this kind of regulation is actually discrimination against brick-moving parents who are not highly literate and work at the low end of the job. Although progressive in a sense, it is actually a kind of puzzle. Similarly, in some places, the point system is based on the parents' conditions, and only when the score is enough is the child eligible for school. This, in essence, is the same as bundling housing, bundling hukou, it's still a kind of puzzle. It is still far from the idea that all people are born equal, and that compulsory education is equal for all. The entanglement of household registration, housing, and enrollment together can be said to reflect the dilemma that many Chinese have to face. China's urban population is about 749 million, accounting for 55% of the total population. Beijing has a population of more than 30 million, a resident population of less than 20 million, and half of whom do not have a hukou, and these people will face the problem of their children going to school. I sincerely hope that the country can take a step forward in the household registration system and education reform, which is a problem that will be faced sooner or later, and what the government needs to do is not to raise the threshold for the children of immigrants to go to school, but to sincerely serve the foreign builders, accept them as new locals, and provide their children with fair and quality basic education. This is not only the embodiment of the implementation of the slogan of "freedom, equality and justice" advocated by the core values of socialism, but also because children are not only the parents, but also the wealth of society.