Vouchers would shift the balance of power back to the parents and away from unelected judges. It would be very difficult for a judge to justify anti-discrimination rulings when parents can freely choose where to send their kids.

Also, childless social engineers who use the public school system as an outlet for their propaganda would be cut off at the knees. With less time spent on the social agenda, more time could be spent actually educating our kids rather than indoctrinating them.

Matthew asks: "But why would "the market" create more schools?"

Maybe he should read about Pat Taylor.

Taylor is a near billionaire who would probably be a billionaire by now if not for the money he spent sending the children to Louisiana to college.

Pat has donated million of his own dollars to support higher education. Many people do not know that because of the "Taylor Plan" children in Louisiana who meet modest GPA/ACT/Income requirements can go to collage free. He spent years guilting the lege to make this happen.

Pat Taylor has said many times that if vouchers because a reality he would open a dozen schools the next day. WHY? To make money. I'm sure that is enough to make Yglesias cringe, but too bad.

If Pat opened a dozen schools tomorrow, there would be a line outside the door to get students in.

As a national average we spend almost $10,000 per year per student on education and that does not include paying off the building!

Can you imagine the money to be made?

The most expensive private school in this state only cost $12,000 per year. (BTW that is where Payton Manning and his brothers went.) WHY on earth are we spending 10K a year on kids in public schools and not getting similar results? I promise you, those kids can freaking read.

The money wasted on education is appalling. The money to be made by someone who can actually run a school and teach our children is amazing.

Which actually answers my question. What are liberals afraid of???

That it would work.

And THAT is pathetic.

And, as Paul said, since public schools spend so much (read: waste so much) money, it would be a relatively simple matter to beat them and produce a better product (that is, a better-educated child).

When Schools Compete, How Do They Compete? An Assessment of Chile's Nationwide School Voucher Program: In 1981, Chile introduced nationwide school choice by providing vouchers to any student wishing to attend private school. As a result, more than 1,000 private schools entered the market, and the private enrollment rate increased by 20 percentage points, with greater impacts in larger, more urban, and wealthier communities. We use this differential impact to measure the effects of unrestricted choice on educational outcomes. Using panel data for about 150 municipalities, we find no evidence that choice improved average educational outcomes as measured by test scores, repetition rates, and years of schooling. However, we find evidence that the voucher program led to increased sorting, as the best public school students left for the private sector.

Basically, vouchers simply rearranged the deck chairs, rather than actually increasing performance. The paper is here ($5 to download). There's another excellent paper here (free) on the Chilean voucher experiment.

As this is the longest study under the best conditions possible for vouchers (i.e. no restrictions, universally available), it would do anyone well to actually read these before spouting the usual party ideology... (that's you Paul)

2) charge only the same or even a little less than public schools, but use a moral pitch (most parochial schools).

The idea that there are lots of qualified, good teachers out there waiting to be hired by new efficient private schools is ludicrous. We can't even staff the public schools we have. The only way to attract more people to the teaching profession would be to pay the teachers more-- but then you're soaking up the voucher money to pay the teachers the extra.

Honestly, I think teacher pay is the least of our problems. Frankly, they're paid pretty well for people with BA degrees and a 9 month work year. The problem with attracting competent teachers is the education bureaucracy, the feeling they're not supported in their mission, and the requirement in most states to get a degree in pedagogy rather than a subject even for teaching at the secondary level.

I'd note that college teacher pay is rather abysmal given the high barriers to entry--years and years studying for a PhD--and people are standing in line begging for positions.

There is a much better study closer to home. Go back and google again. (or did you find that one and choose not to use it???)

SINCE YOU CLAIM to be neutral obviously you would want to find which state I am talking about and bring the evidence here. Chile is a poor example for a number of reasons.

Since you claim you are more interested in the truth than party ideology, you goggle around and tell me why. What is the major problem with using Chile as an example?

BTW AT BEST you have said there is nothing wrong with vouchers. Ya gotta do better than that to be a true troll. Don't vouchers in some way prove bush to the the devil?

BTW I know the above answers without google. But since you are the poster boy for neutrality on this one, you tell me the answers to my questions.

There is a school here in town that charges $9816 a year tuition. That is real close to the the amount we (the tax payers) pay per year per kid. (I think within 100 bucks actually)

The private school offers a 12 month class for that price and has 2 teachers in a room of 24 kids. (summer session is optional and mostly playtime, but it is paid for.)

Do the math, 24 kids at $9816 = $235,584 a year. Dude, that is almost a quarter of a million dollars per classroom.

The owner told me 40% of her gross goes directly to the teachers. I'll save you the math. That is $47,117 a year and 2 of them share 24 kids. That is a 12 to 1 ratio but is actually better than that since you have a team effect.

If one teacher is out sick there is no wasted day while a sub has them build paper airplanes. The kids keep right on working. For that much money the kids get a hot lunch every day and a snack/juice break. All paid for.

After the teachers are paid, the owner has $141,250 bucks a year PER CLASSROOM to pay the rent, electric, lunch and other staff.

Anything the kids could want they get, the teachers are paid about double what they could get in the public schools around here and the owner is driving around in a $100,000 car and flying back and forth between here and Chicago (where she lives) at least once per week.

Now you try to tell me we should have a teacher pay problem???

With all due respect David, if you believe that, get out your calculator, you ain't thought it all the way thru.

Paul

And I would welcome anyone who can show me a single goverment school run like that anywhere in the country.

And if you use an LA Times study to study their success in Cleveland, you'll find that they don't work there either because... well Liberals say they won't work based on really deep thinking, meditation, and prophecy.

Liberals are far too open minded to actually support TRIALS of voucher programs. After all, we wouldn't want to waste money sending kids to PRIVATE schools. Those PRIVATE schools don't have teachers UNIONS. And everyone knows if you don't have UNION labor you might actually GET SOMETHING DONE!

Why do government employees unionize anyway? I thought the government for for the people!