Summary 



The property tax in New Hampshire has been increasing during 

 the past twenty-five years, largely as a result of rising costs of public 

 education. Equal educational opportunity is not apparent because of 

 extreme variations in the social and economic conditions of local districts 

 or towns. This study has attempted to determine the existence or non- 

 existence of definite patterns of expenditures or economies of scale by 

 the local rural school districts. 



When relating the number of pupils or population to expenditures 

 per pupil, the averages indicate some economies of scale. The devia- 

 tions from average are great particularly among districts of small pop- 

 ulation and a correspondingly small number of pupils. This divergence 

 declines and, in fact, becomes quite narrow among the larger districts. 

 The amount of variance, however, cannot be explained on the basis of 

 population alone. 



The 154 districts were grouped according to equalized valuation 

 per pupil without reference to population or any other grouping. High 

 taxable wealth per pupil is associated with a small proportion of the 

 taxable property in farms and in total resident property, and with a 

 large amovint owned by non-residents. The proportion of taxable prop- 

 erty owned by residents declines from about three-fourths to one-third 

 as equalized valuation increases above $15,000. Expenditures per elemen- 

 tary pupil increases rapidly with an increase in taxable wealth per pupil. 

 This relationship is not so apparent for high school pupils. 



Costs per pupil are extremely high for small high schools. Expend- 

 itures per high school pupil are much less for districts not maintaining 

 a high school, regardless of the number of pupils. The average costs per 

 elementary pupil declines as the number of pupils increases. However, 

 six districts which maintain no schools and have fewer than 100 pupils, 

 send all pupils to neighboring districts and thereby avoid high costs 

 per pupil. There is no general tendency for expenditures per pupil to 

 decline under conditions of high tax rates or a decline in popvilation. 

 The distribution of population according to age groups is not of suffici- 

 ent significance to justify further investigation in relation to costs. 



In general, school districts having a large proportion of taxable 

 property in farms, also have a large proportion of taxable property 

 owned by residents. The pattern here is for low expenditures per pupil. 

 Teachers' salaries are lower and high school transportation is not pro- 

 vided. There is no evidence here of ability to provide equalized educa- 

 tional opportunity, even at high tax rates. Those districts having less 

 than forty percent of taxable wealth owned by residents have a high 

 equalized valuation per pupil and per capita. The school expenditures 



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