The courts have ordered the state to ensure that all of its school districts receive equitable funding. Two basic ways of doing this have been discussed. The first would re-direct some of the money currently allocated to local schools toward under-funded schools in New York City. The second is for the state to generate more revenue by raising taxes, and then have the majority of that new revenue go to under-funded schools.

Neither of these proposals is likely to gain local support. We'd either be giving up something we already have or be paying more to support what other people get.

But, the courts did not rule the way they did to stick it to Auburnians. They ruled that way because the current system is unfair. Currently, New York City schools receive only 37 percent of state education money, yet educate more than two-thirds of the state's economically disadvantaged students. In other words, families in the city cannot afford to fund their schools to the degree that we can, yet they receive less state aid.

But, here's a question. Why can't residents of New York City pay for their own schools? Yes, the city has a high concentration of poor people. But, it is also home to some of the richest people in the world, let alone the state. How come their schools are not benefiting from that extreme wealth?

The answer is that the people who have money do not necessarily own lots of high-valued property in the city. Instead, they use their wealth to purchase vacation homes in the Hamptons and luxurious yachts.

But, it is not likely that the schools in the Hamptons need the property tax revenue generated from these expensive vacation homes. Likewise, the schools of fish in the sea do not need the revenue that could be generated by the yachts. That's the fallacy in funding schools with the property tax. The wealth that exists in a particular locality isn't always used to fund local schools. Instead, the wealth goes away and is used to fund schools somewhere else. That's how spending discrepancies develop.

However, if schools relied less heavily on property tax revenue and more heavily on income tax revenue, it wouldn't matter if a wealthy person chose to spend money on a summer home in Bermuda. Local wealth would still fund local schools.

Previously in this column, I called for the complete abolition of the school tax. I proposed that the way to ensure equitable education for all Americans was to pay for it entirely with the federal income tax. Though I still hold that belief, no court has ordered that all schools in America be funded equitably.

A court has ordered that all schools in New York must be. We can obey that order by funding schools solely through the state income tax. Since people around here make less money relative to people in other parts of the state, this is one proposal with a chance of garnering local support. Who wants to pay property taxes anyway?

Schuster's column appears Mondays in The Citizen. He can be reached

at yetti539@hotmail.com