Cost of illiteracy

[Tom Zurinskas]

>From: RonButters at AOL.COM
> > There is plenty of data that crime and illiteracy go together.
> >
>
>So obviously crime causes illiteracy, not pronunciation.


Why read books when you can steal them and sell them :)

For those who've expressed interest in illiteracy, see below.


What are the monetary costs of illiteracy?

Briefly, the types of costs can be categorized as:
(1) the cost of taxes for government programs that illiterates use,
(2) the increased cost of consumer goods as a result of the cost of
recruiting suitable employees when so many are unqualified, the cost of
training employees in basic knowledge they should have learned in school,
and the cost of preventing and correcting the mistakes and inabilities of
illiterates in the workforce, and
(3) the cost of taxes for truancy, juvenile delinquency, and crime directly
related to illiteracy.

The 1990 total of these types of costs, the latest readily available
figures, is at least $3700 per year per taxpayer.

In addition to these direct costs, there are the indirect costs from
financial interests we have in any business or organization being hurt by
illiteracy. Almost every business or organization-including that of our
employer-is hurt to some extent by illiteracy. In addition to the three
items above, if the business or organization is involved in any way in
preparing or selling printed material of any kind, their prospective
customers are almost cut in half by illiteracy. In addition, almost every
business or organization must compete with businesses or deal with suppliers
with more literate foreign workers.


http://www.educationnews.org/An_Interview_with_Bob_Cleckler.htm

An Interview with Bob Cleckler: About Our Literacy Crisis
Thursday, December 15, 2005
Michael F. Shaughnessy
Eastern New Mexico University
Portales, New Mexico 88130

_________________________________________________________________
Use your PC to make calls at very low rates
https://voiceoam.pcs.v2s.live.com/partnerredirect.aspx

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org