School Voucher System

[MT5678]

Well, you won't believe this: you would think that teachers would be somewhat leftist, and at least follow along with the teacher's union.
But my econ teacher began to start touting the merits of a school voucher system. He talked about public school inefficiency and how the market would spur competition among the schools.

Granted, schools are inefficient. But a voucher system is not the way to go. It would intrinsically guarantee that white-collar students go to rich colleges, while blue-collar ones would be screwed (go to a school with poorly paid, alienated teachers, drop out later to work). This would castify (a word?) the U.S. based on education (alright, it can't get much worse, but it cna with markets).

Moreover, the "market miracles" are merely fairy tales. If schooling is a market with extensive economies of scale, the market will become oligopolistic: Kaplan and Princeton Review now "train" over 75% of school students. ;)

[Schrödinger's Cat]

The school voucher idea is absolutely ridiculous for a number of reasons.

1.) Tuition would rise with the demand.
2.) In the countries which have voucher systems, and indeed our own, when you compare the same demographic of students the grades are about equal -- sometimes the public school even beats out the private institution.
3.) School choice can be done without vouchers
4.) It is prohibited by the constitution to support a religious school. If he's one of those fundies that doesn't believe in the separation of church and state ask him what he thinks about the prospect of a Muslim America.
5.) The European countries which have something similar to the voucher system are highly regulated to ensure the kids are getting education. The difference being minimal.

A better way to cure education would be wipe out school administration and create school democracy. Conservatives like to attack the teacher unions when in fact it's the administration and state ruining the public education.