Nathan Newman wrote:
> Attached is a rightwing attack on private school vouchers. There's some
> truth to the arguments here- the fact is that the biggest difference between
> a private and public school under a voucher system is the unionization
> level, which could be rectified over time with organizing.
>
> So what do folks think about the arguments here. Is the Left missing the
> socialist boat opposing vouchers?
>
According to this article the Left is already behind the voucher system! The one
reasonable point I see in this article is that the voucher system as described
is more expensive. However it should also be noted that the increased
expenditure would direct government money away from a public non-profit system
into a private system that could very well include for-profit schools.
>
>
>
> For years, the Right has promoted educational vouchers as an alternative to
> public schools. This has always been a delusion. The schools that take
> vouchers become the province of government regulators, while the money for
> the vouchers is taken out of the hide of taxpayers already being looted for
> public schools. Vouchers increase, not reduce, government involvement in
> education.
>
> Take a gander at the recently implemented and much-heralded Florida voucher
> program. Kids with good or even passable academic records are not eligible.
> Only the worst students from the worst public schools are allowed to use the
> voucher. Some voucher proponents hope to see this program expanded to
> everyone, but that still would not address the real issue.
So instead of facing the problem of public schools that are not doing their job,
students are shunted offto other private schools. But as the athors note, most
private schools will not be willing to accept the regulatory regimes imposed on
them.
>
>
> Leave aside their discriminatory impact and cost, and consider only their
> effect on schools themselves. At best, vouchers are an expensive attempt to
> reinvent the public schools, a doomed effort. At worst they are an attempt
> to force private schools to operate exactly like the public schools.
> Considering all the red tape the private school subjects itself to, they are
> a giant step in the wrong direction. (You can read the 181-page Florida law
> here.)
>
> After the government gets through with them, these private schools might as
> well be public schools. They must:
>
> * file huge and ongoing financial reports to the state (no internal
> privacy);
>
> * submit to all federal anti-discrimination laws (no single sex or
> faith-based schools);
>
> * accept scholarship students "on an entirely random and religious-neutral
> basis without regard to the student's past academic history" (dumb bunnies
> and Wiccans must be given the red carpet);
>
> * only "employ or contract with teachers who hold a baccalaureate or higher
> degree, or have at least 3 years of teaching experience in public or private
> schools" (loving Moms need not apply);
>
> * "accept as full tuition and fees the amount provided by the state for each
> student" (read: price controls);
>
> * "agree not to compel any student attending the private school on an
> opportunity scholarship to profess a specific ideological belief, to pray,
> or to worship" (read: no independent curriculum);
>
> * grant the government veto power over disciplinary procedures, such that no
> vouchered student can be kicked out.
>
> We are talking about mountains of paperwork here, and a sacrifice of all
> independence. It's understandable that only a few private schools in Florida
> have been willing to subject themselves to the regulators. Let's hope that
> those who refuse this control don't face financial constraints that will
> suck them into the voucher system.
While most of these regulations are laudable rather than deplorable. as the
author claims, he is surely right that most private schools will not opt in to
the voucher plan. The plan might attract a few entrepreneurial types who will
see a guarantee of a buck to be made through following the rules and getting a
guaranteed payment per student. But with price controls, the logical plan is to
teach the maximum number of students for the minimum amount of expenditure. Why
would anyone expect better quality? Oh yes, the neo-classical leftists god,
competition! Almost forgot. Must be market socialists them socialists.
>
>
>
> exBut don't vouchers save money? Actually, the opposite is true. The Florida
> voucher plan will increase spending over present levels by $1.2 billion.
> Moreover, any money that is saved on tuition is not returned to the
> taxpayers but dumped back into the public school system. Making matters
> worse, public schools declared bad enough to permit their students to attend
> welfarized private schools get increased government funding. All told,
> taxpayers are going to be pillaged.
>
But why wouldn't it make more sense to put the money paid to the private schools
into the poor public schools in the first place? There are huge increases in
expenditure here but instead of being focused on improving the public system the
increases go also to the private sector.
> No wonder the Left is increasingly interested in vouchers. It's a
> big-government program that increases, not reduces, the role of government
> in education, and will turn any institution taking vouchers into a carbon
> copy of state schools themselves. For example, the notoriously liberal Urban
> League of Miami argues for the constitutionality of vouchers, even though
> under federalism, their constitutionality shouldn't be in question (as
> versus their wisdom). What the Urban League likes is the welfarist aspect of
> the program. It's food stamps for education.
>
Because some of the new leftist types are very much, as libertarians,
pro-choice. As libertarians they pretend to empower folk. Unlike the capitalist
libertarians though they don't "empower" by leavingthe folk to choose within the
tender mercies of the market but within the structure of liberal values
they wish to promote. But why not just allow some choice within public schools
that embody those values
and adequately fund those schools instead of using this expensive voucher
system?
> Writing in the July 1999 Atlantic Monthly, liberal commentator Matthew
> Miller chides the Left for not seeing the inherent advantages of vouchers.
> They increase education spending, give preferences to the poor, and subject
> private schools to public control. From the socialist perspective, he asks,
> what's the problem? Good question.
>
The problem is that most private schools will not accept vouchers given the
restrictions. The other problem is that the money would be better spent
reforming the public system.
> The real mystery is why conservatives, libertarians, or religious activists
> would cheer the Florida or any other voucher plan. Perhaps they have begun
> to believe their own neoconservative rhetoric about educational inequality,
> the plight of the poor who can't afford fancy schools, and the unjust
> privileges given those who can afford good schools. Notice how it is the
> schools, rather than the little darlings in them, that are always at fault?
>
> As a thought experiment, Miller proposes a new federal $8 billion spending
> program, so bad students in six big cities can take their F's and sometimes
> criminal behavior to private school at our expense. Incredibly, in
> interviews, Miller got Republican candidate-in-perpetuity Lamar Alexander
> and libertarian lawyer Clint Bolick of DC's Institute for Justice to endorse
> the idea. Again, that's a wholly new $8 billion federal program, endorsed by
> a self-proclaimed conservative and libertarian!
>
> If American education is to have a future, it's not through more government
> spending, control, and centralization. It is through increased local and
> private spending and control. The ideal is zero government involvement. Why
>
Perhaps, the libertarians et al hope to keep the voucher system and dump
restrictions such as exist in the Florida plan. Perhaps they see too that the
voucher system would help hasten the demise of the public system, starving it of
funds by diverting government funding to the private sector. That does not
seemunrealistic.
Cheers, Ken Hanly
