Consider this question and its implications: If we have proof that a public policy, if enacted, will not only save taxpayer money but improve the lives of people, why isn’t it a top priority with lawmakers, policymakers and parents?

In the early 1960s, a landmark study called the High/Scope Perry Preschool Study sought to find out why the Ypsilanti Public School District was unable to halt rampant school failure. What was found is a number of students were moving to Ypsilanti from a part of the country where students were not going to kindergarten and there was no home involvement to prepare them.

David Weikart, a special education director at Ypsilanti, began a preschool program. He and his colleagues thought if, in fact, it is better for students to have begun in kindergarten as their classmates did, it would reason that improvements should be found if they started school even earlier than that.

In 1965, both Head Start and the Bureau for the Education of the Handicapped began prompting a demand for preschool especially for children in poverty and those with special needs.

There were a few early childhood schooling programs in the U.S., but Ypsilanti’s program was the most effective and its teachers were sought out as trainers.

Last week, the Mankato community heard from yet another study underlining the benefits of early childhood programs. Art Rolnick, senior vice president of the Federal Reserve Bank in Minneapolis, spoke to a gathering of businesspeople, educators and politicians on a study detailing the financial return of early childhood investments.

Rolnick examined a handful of longitudinal studies on the long-term effects of early childhood programming. Using the famous Perry Study as the focal point, Rolnick determined that students who received early childhood programming were more likely to be literate by sixth grade, graduate on time, attend college, stay off welfare, stay out of prison and have a healthy personal life.

Here are the specifics of the Perry Study, the findings of which were staggering. A longitudinal study using a control group of those who were in Ypsilanti many years later, found that:

n Only 7 percent of preschoolers had been arrested five or more times compared to 35 percent of those without preschool.

n Adults with preschool education were four times more likely to earn more than those without preschool. Almost three times as many owned their own homes and 59 percent had received welfare at some time in their life compared to 80 percent with no preschool.

n Seventy-one percent with preschool graduated from high school or earned GED certificates compared to 54 percent from the control group.

n Fifty-seven percent of women in the program were single parents compared to 83 percent who were not.

Several area organizations and programs are rising to the challenge. Minnesota Early Learning Foundation was created as a way to find cost-efficient means of investing in early childhood education.

One of the foundation’s flagship programs, Parent Aware, involves preschool scholarships that parents can redeem at any facility that is deemed high quality after undergoing a rigorous review. Blue Earth and Nicollet counties were included in the Parent Aware pilot program and have several preschool facilities that have earned high-quality rankings.

Also, the Greater Mankato Early Learning Initiative is a coalition of area businesspeople and community members that support early childhood efforts locally. The initiative is responsible for coordinating the READY! for Kindergarten program, which was adopted in Mankato as a way to prepare children for school.

According to the Ready 4 K Web site, only 50 percent of Minnesota’s children are fully prepared for kindergarten.

Among the things Rolnick — and by many other farsighted advocates in Minnesota going back to the early 1980s — think is important are early childhood “scholarships.” Other needs include expanding buildings and infrastructure for Head Start and other early childhood programs.

While this movement has largely been among the intellectual and educational class, some easing on public policy at the federal level may finally be appearing.

The pitch is simple. If we can use taxpayer money to bail out auto companies and banks with little guarantee of return, then “bailing out” our children — which actually has a proven return — is a no-brainer.