Should there be a separation of school and profit? Many opponents of education reform seem to think so.
Case in point, a blog post at the Washington Post yesterday decried “outside forces that want to make big profits on the backs of our nation’s most vulnerable children.” Setting aside that the vast majority of private schools are nonprofit, the author apparently misses the fact that parents choose to send their kids to these schools. (Does it make sense to complain that other businesses are profiting “on the backs” of their paying customers?) In order to persuade parents to switch to private schools, they must offer parents something that the free-to-attend government schools do not. Even when a school choice program covers the full cost of private school tuition, the parents would merely be financially indifferent. To motivate parents to choose something other than the default government school option, private schools still must offer something better.
Moreover, it is absurd to think that profit—in the sense of financial gain—is limited only to the for-profit sector. Do teachers, principals, and other school staff from janitors to bus drivers “profit” from their salaries or wages? What of the profits made by the corporations that publish the textbooks that students read? Or construct school buildings? Or manufacture desks, whiteboards, pens, pencils, and playgrounds? Whether government- or privately-run, nearly every adult involved in the formal education process is earning a “profit” short of the parents who volunteer to chaperone the high school dance.
Those who denounce “profits” in education simply don’t understand the role of profits in a market. Perhaps they are confused because in the government-run education system with which they are familiar, there is little connection between financial gain and meeting the needs of students. In a competitive market, by contrast, profits (and, just as importantly, losses) provide valuable information. As explained in Herbert Walberg and Joseph Bast’s excellent book, Education and Capitalism: How Overcoming Our Fear of Markets and Economics Can Improve America’s Schools (which is celebrating its 10th anniversary):
In a capitalist economy, profits are the reward earned by firms that maximize the quality of services and goods, minimize overhead and bureaucracy, motivate their workers to achieve high and consistent levels of productivity, and avoid unnecessary expenditures. Successful firms sell better, cheaper, or better and cheaper products and services than do other firms. Customers notice, and business gradually shifts from inefficient to efficient firms. […]
Low-performing government schools don’t gradually lose customers and face the threat of closure, the way an inefficiently run business does. As a result, there is little urgency for reform. Their assets do not move from the control of those who have misused them into the hands of others who could do a better job. (Pages 98-9)
In our existing education system, only the financially well-off can afford to live in the expensive districts with high-performing government schools or to pay for private schooling. Without school choice programs, low-income families are locked out of these markets. Instead, their only option is the local, assigned, government school. If I blogged for WaPo, I might say that these underperforming schools are built on “the backs of our nation’s most vulnerable children.”
The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more […]
Public schools need more competition and vouchers is the answer. Related posts: Powerful Evidence for School Choice April 22, 2013 by Dan Mitchell I expressed pessimism a few days ago about the possibility of replacing the corrupt internal revenue code with a flat tax. Either now or in the future. But that’s an exception to my […]
John Brummett in his article, “A new civil rights struggle in Little Rock?” Arkansas News Burea, August 25, 2011, asserted the main role vouchers should have is “providing new models for regular public schools to emulate, not about replacing regular public schools.” The Heritage Foundation cares nothing about saving the public schools. If the public […]
Milton Friedman on School Vouchers _______________ Just the facts Mam. APRIL 18, 2013 5:17PM School Choice Works By JASON BEDRICK SHARE The evidence is in: school choice works. Yesterday, the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice released their third edition of their report “A Win-Win Solution: The Empirical Evidence on School Choice.” The report provides a literature […]
Milton Friedman – Public Schools / Voucher System Published on May 9, 2012 by BasicEconomics The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs […]
(This letter was mailed before Oct 25, 2012.) President Obama c/o The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20500 Dear Mr. President, I know that you receive 20,000 letters a day and that you actually read 10 of them every day. I really do respect you for trying to get a pulse on […]
The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more […]
Everywhere school vouchers have been tried they have been met with great success. Why do you think President Obama got rid of them in Washington D.C.? It was a political disaster for him because the school unions had always opposed them and their success made Obama’s allies look bad. In 1980 when I first sat […]
Milton Friedman – Public Schools / Voucher System (Q&A) Part 2 Published on May 7, 2012 by BasicEconomics __________ Max Brantley of the Arkansas Times Blog is always critical of the voucher system but has he taken a closer look at what has been going on in the public schools the last few decades with […]
Everywhere school vouchers have been tried they have been met with great success. Why do you think President Obama got rid of them in Washington D.C.? It was a political disaster for him because the school unions had always opposed them and their success made Obama’s allies look bad. In 1980 when I first sat […]
Since 1950 the staffing of public schools has skyrocketed but we are getting a good return on our money. We need to turn to the voucher system that Milton Friedman proposed.
The Friedman Foundation has published an excellent report detailing the administrative bloat plaguing our nation’s public schools. The School Staffing Surge: Decades of Employment Growth in America’s Public Schoolsshows dramatic increases in teaching and non-teaching staff over the past five decades despite modest increases in student enrollment.
As we detailed in a recent report on growth in non-teaching positions in public schools across the country, student enrollment has increased just 8 percent since 1970, while the number of teachers has increased 60 percent, and the number of non-teaching administrative and other staff has increased 138 percent. (continues below chart)
The Friedman report, authored by Ben Scafidi, PhD, takes an even longer look, demonstrating that since 1950, public school enrollment has increased 96 percent, while the number of teachers has increased 252 percent and the number of non-teaching personnel (administrators and other staff) has increased an astonishing 702 percent. “Put differently,” Scafidi notes, “the rise in non-teaching staff was more than seven times faster than the increase in students”:
Between 1950 and 2009, the pupil-staff ratio declined to 7.8 students per public school employee from 19.3 students per public school employee. By 2009, there were fewer than eight public school students per adult employed in the public school system. The drop in the pupil-teacher ratio also was large—the pupil-teacher ratio was 27.5 students per teacher in 1950 and only 15.4 in 2009.
Scafidi also shows how this administrative bloat has affected schools on a state-by-state basis (and uses an interactive map to make the point). Of note: “Nine states with declining student populations had significant increases in public school personnel—D.C., Iowa, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, and Vermont.”
The Friedman report notes that the dramatic reduction in class size over the decades has not led to increases in student achievement. Why? As Scafidi reports, an increase in teacher quantity has not produced an increase in teacher quality:
As public schools have reduced class sizes continually since at least 1950, they have had to hire more teachers. And, the evidence is in—the disparity in effectiveness across teachers is considerable. Accordingly, state governments and local public school boards should have been more concerned with improving teacher effectiveness than lowering class sizes.
Continuing a trend of growing staff positions in our nation’s public schools won’t create the types of improvements that the system so desperately needs.
Instead, public school districts should trim bureaucracy and work on long-term reform options for better targeting of taxpayer resources. And decision making should be decentralized, placing staffing and other decisions in the hands of principals, teachers, and parents.
Finally, parents—and teachers—should have options. We’ll never see improvement in our nation’s education system without providing students with a choice about which schools—public, private, virtual, or homeschooling—will best meet their unique learning needs.
___________
Thank you so much for your time. I know how valuable it is. I also appreciate the fine family that you have and your commitment as a father and a husband.
Sincerely,
Everette Hatcher III, 13900 Cottontail Lane, Alexander, AR 72002, ph 501-920-5733, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com
Max Brantley of the Arkansas Times Blog reports today that Mitt Romney is for school vouchers. I am glad to hear that. Over and over we hear that the reason private schools are better is because they don’t have to keep the troubling making kids. It reminds me of this short film that I saw many [...]
Milton Friedman – Public Schools / Voucher System (Q&A) Part 2 Published on May 7, 2012 by BasicEconomics __________ We need to get competition back again among schools and the voucher system is the best way to do that. D.C. Public Schools Spend Almost $30,000 Per Student Ericka Andersen July 25, 2012 at 10:00 am [...]
Milton Friedman – Public Schools / Voucher System (Q&A) Part 1 Published on May 7, 2012 by BasicEconomics ___________ We have to turn to the school voucher system if we want competition between schools and want to lower the cost of education. Chile’s Amazing School Choice Revolution September 29, 2012 by Dan Mitchell I wrote back [...]
Johan Norberg – Free or Equal – Free to Choose 30 years later 5/5 Published on Jun 10, 2012 by BasicEconomics In 1980 economist and Nobel laureate Milton Friedman inspired market reform in the West and revolutions in the East with his celebrated television series “Free To Choose.” Thirty years later, in this one-hour documentary, [...]
Everywhere school vouchers have been tried they have been met with great success. Why do you think President Obama got rid of them in Washington D.C.? It was a political disaster for him because the school unions had always opposed them and their success made Obama’s allies look bad. In 1980 when I first sat [...]
Johan Norberg – Free or Equal – Free to Choose 30 years later 4/5 Published on Jun 10, 2012 by BasicEconomics In 1980 economist and Nobel laureate Milton Friedman inspired market reform in the West and revolutions in the East with his celebrated television series “Free To Choose.” Thirty years later, in this one-hour documentary, [...]
Johan Norberg – Free or Equal – Free to Choose 30 years later 3/5 Published on Jun 10, 2012 by BasicEconomics In 1980 economist and Nobel laureate Milton Friedman inspired market reform in the West and revolutions in the East with his celebrated television series “Free To Choose.” Thirty years later, in this one-hour documentary, [...]
The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more [...]
Milton Friedman on Hayek’s “Road to Serfdom” 1994 Interview 2 of 2 Uploaded by PenguinProseMedia on Oct 26, 2011 2nd half of 1994 interview. ________________ I have a lot of respect for the Friedmans.Two Lucky People by Milton and Rose Friedman reviewed by David Frum — October 1998. However, I liked this review below better. It [...]
Johan Norberg – Free or Equal – Free to Choose 30 years later 2/5 Published on Jun 10, 2012 by BasicEconomics In 1980 economist and Nobel laureate Milton Friedman inspired market reform in the West and revolutions in the East with his celebrated television series “Free To Choose.” Thirty years later, in this one-hour documentary, [...]
But that’s an exception to my general feeling that we’re moving in the right direction on public policy. I’ve shared a list of reasons to be optimistic, even on issues such as Obamacare and the Laffer Curve.
Education is another area where we should be hopeful. Simply stated, it’s increasingly difficult for defenders of the status quo to rationalize pouring more money into the failed government education monopoly. To paraphrase Winston Churchill, never has so much been spent so recklessly with such meager results.
Fortunately, a growing number of people are realizing that the answer is markets and competition. That’s one of the reasons why we’re seeing progress all over the country. Policy makers have implemented varying degrees of school choice in states such as Indiana, Louisiana, Wisconsin, Colorado, Florida, Arizona, and even California.
Is this having a positive impact on educational outcomes and other key variables? The answer, not surprisingly, is yes.
Here are some of the details from a new study published by the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice.
This report surveys the empirical research on school choice. …the empirical evidence consistently shows that choice improves academic outcomes for participants and public schools, saves taxpayer money, moves students into more integrated classrooms, and strengthens the shared civic values and practices essential to American democracy.
The data on academic outcomes surely is the most important bit of information, so let’s specifically review those findings.
Twelve empirical studies have examined academic outcomes for school choice participants using random assignment, the “gold standard” of social science. Of these, 11 find that choice improves student outcomes—six that all students benefit and five that some benefit and some are not affected. One study finds no visible impact. No empirical study has found a negative impact.
And since I want to reduce the burden of government spending, let’s see whether school choice is good news for taxpayers.
Six empirical studies have examined school choice’s fiscal impact on taxpayers. All six find that school choice saves money for taxpayers. No empirical study has found a negative fiscal impact.
Here’s the breakdown of the studies for all the variables.
Some of the tax research was inconclusive, but not a single study supported the notion that higher tax rates are good for growth, much as this new research from the Friedman Foundation didn’t uncover a single study that found negative results from school choice.
So with lots of positive research and no negative research, why would anybody oppose school choice? Unfortunately, politicians like Barack Obama and groups such as the NAACP side with teacher unions, putting political power ahead of progress and opportunity for kids.
P.S. Here’s a video explaining why school choice is better than a government-run monopoly.
P.P.S. There’s also strong evidence for school choice from nations such as Sweden, Chile, and the Netherlands.
The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more [...]
John Brummett in his article, “A new civil rights struggle in Little Rock?” Arkansas News Burea, August 25, 2011, asserted the main role vouchers should have is “providing new models for regular public schools to emulate, not about replacing regular public schools.” The Heritage Foundation cares nothing about saving the public schools. If the public [...]
Milton Friedman on School Vouchers _______________ Just the facts Mam. APRIL 18, 2013 5:17PM School Choice Works By JASON BEDRICK SHARE The evidence is in: school choice works. Yesterday, the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice released their third edition of their report “A Win-Win Solution: The Empirical Evidence on School Choice.” The report provides a literature [...]
Milton Friedman – Public Schools / Voucher System Published on May 9, 2012 by BasicEconomics The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs [...]
(This letter was mailed before Oct 25, 2012.) President Obama c/o The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20500 Dear Mr. President, I know that you receive 20,000 letters a day and that you actually read 10 of them every day. I really do respect you for trying to get a pulse on [...]
The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more [...]
Everywhere school vouchers have been tried they have been met with great success. Why do you think President Obama got rid of them in Washington D.C.? It was a political disaster for him because the school unions had always opposed them and their success made Obama’s allies look bad. In 1980 when I first sat [...]
Milton Friedman – Public Schools / Voucher System (Q&A) Part 2 Published on May 7, 2012 by BasicEconomics __________ Max Brantley of the Arkansas Times Blog is always critical of the voucher system but has he taken a closer look at what has been going on in the public schools the last few decades with [...]
The evidence is in: school choice works. Yesterday, the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice released their third edition of their report “A Win-Win Solution: The Empirical Evidence on School Choice.” The report provides a literature review of dozens of high-quality studies of school choice programs around the country, including studies from scholars at Harvard University, Stanford University, Cornell University, the University of Arkansas, the Brookings Institution, and the Federal Reserve Bank. The studies examine the impact of school choice programs on the academic performance of participants and public school students, the fiscal impact on taxpayers, racial segregation, and civic values.
The report’s key findings included the following:
Twelve empirical studies have examined academic outcomes for school choice participants using random assignment, the “gold standard” of social science. Of these, 11 find that choice improves student outcomes—six that all students benefit and five that some benefit and some are not affected. One study finds no visible impact. No empirical study has found a negative impact.
Twenty-three empirical studies (including all methods) have examined school choice’s impact on academic outcomes in public schools. Of these, 22 find that choice improves public schools and one finds no visible impact. No empirical study has found that choice harms public schools.
Six empirical studies have examined school choice’s fiscal impact on taxpayers. All six find that school choice saves money for taxpayers. No empirical study has found a negative fiscal impact.
Eight empirical studies have examined school choice and racial segregation in schools. Of these, seven find that school choice moves students from more segregated schools into less segregated schools. One finds no net effect on segregation from school choice. No empirical study has found that choice increases racial segregation.
Seven empirical studies have examined school choice’s impact on civic values and practices such as respect for the rights of others and civic knowledge. Of these, five find that school choice improves civic values and practices. Two find no visible impact from school choice. No empirical study has found that school choice has a negative impact on civic values and practices.
On the same day, anew studyfrom researchers at Harvard University and the Brookings Institution found that a school choice program boosted college enrollment among African-American participants by 24 percent.
While many of the findings show only modest improvement, they consistently show that school choice programs produce the same or superior results across a gamut of measures. Moreover, not all the benefits of choice are easily measurable. Some families are looking for a school that better meets a student’s special needs, instills the parents’ values, inspires a lifelong love of learning, or where a student issafe from bullying. These outcomes are sometimes difficult if not impossible to measure in the aggregate, but parents are in the best position to tell the difference for their own children.
The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more [...]
John Brummett in his article, “A new civil rights struggle in Little Rock?” Arkansas News Burea, August 25, 2011, asserted the main role vouchers should have is “providing new models for regular public schools to emulate, not about replacing regular public schools.” The Heritage Foundation cares nothing about saving the public schools. If the public [...]
Milton Friedman – Public Schools / Voucher System Published on May 9, 2012 by BasicEconomics The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs [...]
(This letter was mailed before Oct 25, 2012.) President Obama c/o The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20500 Dear Mr. President, I know that you receive 20,000 letters a day and that you actually read 10 of them every day. I really do respect you for trying to get a pulse on [...]
The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions Published on Sep 4, 2012 by ReasonTV America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children. That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more [...]
Everywhere school vouchers have been tried they have been met with great success. Why do you think President Obama got rid of them in Washington D.C.? It was a political disaster for him because the school unions had always opposed them and their success made Obama’s allies look bad. In 1980 when I first sat [...]
Milton Friedman – Public Schools / Voucher System (Q&A) Part 2 Published on May 7, 2012 by BasicEconomics __________ Max Brantley of the Arkansas Times Blog is always critical of the voucher system but has he taken a closer look at what has been going on in the public schools the last few decades with [...]
Everywhere school vouchers have been tried they have been met with great success. Why do you think President Obama got rid of them in Washington D.C.? It was a political disaster for him because the school unions had always opposed them and their success made Obama’s allies look bad. In 1980 when I first sat [...]
You would think $30,000 a year would get you a decent education. For just a few thousand more, you could cover the cost of Harvard’s yearly undergraduate tuition or send your child to the prestigious Sidwell Friends School, which the Obama daughters attend.
But spending $30,000 to cover the cost of a child’s education in a district that has one of the lowest graduation rates in the nation and produces some of the country’s lowest achievement scores? Seems a bit steep. But this is the hefty per-pupil bill taxpayers are made to foot for D.C. public schools every year.
Andrew Coulson of the Cato Institute, who calculated D.C.’s per-pupil cost, explains that the first time he revealed D.C.’s high per-pupil spending a few years ago, he received considerable pushback. Critics claimed his estimate was too high and was inconsistent with the Census Bureau’s numbers.
“Indeed, the Census Bureau figures for DC’s total K-12 expenditures were substantially lower than mine,” he explains.
Why the inconsistency?
“It turns out, [Census] got [D.C. spending data] from a DCPS [D.C. Public Schools] official,” notes Coulson. “We presented evidence to the Bureau that that DCPS official had missed a few line items when completing the Census Bureau’s forms—to the tune of about $400 million.” Census agreed, and their “data now show DC spent a total of $29,409 per pupil.”
On the other hand, the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program (DCOSP), which provides scholarships to low-income students in the nation’s capital to attend private schools of their choice, not only produces significantly higher graduation rates than D.C. public schools but costs significantly less. A DCOSP scholarship stands at just $8,000 for a K-8 student or $12,000 for a 9-12 grade student.
Children in D.C. and around the nation deserve the best opportunity for academic success, and taxpayers deserve that their dollars be used effectively. Rather than investing more in the same failed approaches, policymakers and local leaders should look to innovative reforms, including school choice, to improve education and give students the brightest hope for a promising future.
________________
Thank you so much for your time. I know how valuable it is. I also appreciate the fine family that you have and your commitment as a father and a husband.
Sincerely,
Everette Hatcher III, 13900 Cottontail Lane, Alexander, AR 72002, ph 501-920-5733, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com
In that post, I noted that Chile was a pioneer in the shift from unsustainable tax-and-transfer entitlement schemes to savings-based personal retirement accounts. And with good reason. That system, which has been in place for more than three decades, is hugely successful.
But Chile’s success is driven by more than just pension reform. And I want to mention something remarkable about what’s happening with school choice in that country.
Jose Pinera – Freedom Fighter
First, some background. I’m currently at a Cato Institute donor retreat, where I had the chance to talk to Jose Pinera, who is now the Co-chairman of Cato’s Project on Social Security Choice, but who also was the person who implemented the pension reforms in his home country of Chile.
Jose thinks that it is just a matter of time before more than 80 percent of Chilean kids are in private schools. Why? Because people like freedom and choice.
He often brags – and rightly so – that more than 95 percent of workers chose personal retirement accounts when given the option of staying with the old government-run pension system. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that parents also choose wisely when deciding how to get the best possible education option for their kids.
Thank you so much for your time. I know how valuable it is. I also appreciate the fine family that you have and your commitment as a father and a husband.
Sincerely,
Everette Hatcher III, 13900 Cottontail Lane, Alexander, AR 72002, ph 501-920-5733, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com
America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children.
That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more money for unions and more donations for politicians.
For decades, teachers’ unions have been among our nation’s largest political donors. As Reason Foundation’s Lisa Snell has noted, the National Education Association (NEA) alone spent $40 million on the 2010 election cycle (source: http://reason.org/news/printer/big-education-and-big-labor-electio). As the country’s largest teachers union, the NEA is only one cog in the infernal machine that robs parents of their tax dollars and students of their futures.
Students, teachers, parents, and hardworking Americans are all victims of this political machine–a system that takes money out of taxpayers’ wallets and gives it to union bosses, who put it in the pockets of politicians.
No one did more to advance the cause of school vouchers than Milton and Rose Friedman. Friedman made it clear in his film series “Free to Choose” how sad he was that young people who live in the inner cities did not have good education opportunities available to them.
President Obama c/o The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
I have posted often about the voucher system and how it would solve our education problems. What we are doing now is not working. Milton Friedman’s idea of implementing school vouchers was hatched about 50 years ago.
Poor families are most affected by this lack of choice. As Friedman noted, “There is no respect in which inhabitants of a low-income neighborhood are so disadvantaged as in the kind of schooling they can get for their children.” It is a sad statement quantified by data on low levels of academic achievement and attainment. Take a look at this article below.
Reading scores on the SAT for the high school class of 2012 reached a four-decade low, putting a punctuation mark on a gradual decline in the ability of college-bound teens to read passages and answer questions about sentence structure, vocabulary and meaning on the college entrance exam.
The decline over the decades has been significant. The average reading (verbal) score is down 34 points since 1972. Sadly, the historically low SAT scores are only the latest marker of decline. Graduation rates have been stagnant since the 1970s, reading and math achievement has been virtually flat over the same time period, and American students still rank in the middle of the pack compared to their international peers.
On the heels of the news about the SAT score decline, President Obama filmed a segment with NBC’s Education Nation earlier today. The President notably praised the concept of charter schools and pay for performance for teachers.
But those grains of reform were dwarfed by his support of the status quo. During the course of the interview, President Obama suggested hiring 100,000 new math and science teachers and spending more money on preschool. He also stated that No Child Left Behind had good intentions but was “under-resourced.”
Efforts by the federal government to intervene in preschool, most notably through Head Start, have failed—despite a $160 billion in spending on the program since 1965. And No Child Left Behind is far from “under-resourced.” The $25 billion, 600-page law has been on the receiving end of significant new spending every decade since the original law was first passed nearly half a century ago.
President Obama was also pressed on the issue of education unions by host Savannah Guthrie:
Some people think, President Obama gets so much support from the teachers’ unions, he can’t possibly have an honest conversation about what they’re doing right or wrong. Can you really say that teachers’ unions aren’t slowing the pace of reform?
President Obama responded: “You know, I just really get frustrated when I hear teacher-bashing as evidence of reform.”
Criticizing education unions for standing in the way of reform should not be conflated with criticizing teachers, as the President does in the interview. The unions have blocked reforms such as performance pay and charter schools (which the President supports), have opposed alternative teacher certification that would help mid-career professionals enter the classroom, and have consistently fought the implementation of school choice options for children.
If we ever hope to move the needle on student achievement—or see SAT scores turn in the right direction again—we’ll need to implement many of those exact reforms, particularly school choice.
And as he has in the past, President Obama stated that his Administration wants to “use evidenced-based approaches and find out what works.” We know what works: giving families choices when it comes to finding schools that best meet their children’s needs. Instead of continuing to call for more spending and more Washington intervention in education, let’s try something new: choice and freedom.
_________
Thank you so much for your time. I know how valuable it is. I also appreciate the fine family that you have and your commitment as a father and a husband.
Sincerely,
Everette Hatcher III, 13900 Cottontail Lane, Alexander, AR 72002, ph 501-920-5733, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com
I ran across this very interesting article about Milton Friedman from 2002: Friedman: Market offers poor better learningBy Tamara Henry, USA TODAY By Doug Mills, AP President Bush honors influential economist Milton Friedman for his 90th birthday earlier this month. About an economist Name:Milton FriedmanAge: 90Background: Winner of the 1976 Nobel Prize for economic science; [...]
Milton Friedman videos and transcripts Part 11 On my blog http://www.thedailyhatch.org I have an extensive list of posts that have both videos and transcripts of MiltonFriedman’s interviews and speeches. Here below is just small list of those and more can be accessed by clicking on “Milton Friedman” on the side of this page or searching [...]
Milton Friedman videos and transcripts Part 10 On my blog http://www.thedailyhatch.org I have an extensive list of posts that have both videos and transcripts of MiltonFriedman’s interviews and speeches. Here below is just small list of those and more can be accessed by clicking on “Milton Friedman” on the side of this page or searching [...]
Milton Friedman videos and transcripts Part 9 On my blog http://www.thedailyhatch.org I have an extensive list of posts that have both videos and transcripts of MiltonFriedman’s interviews and speeches. Here below is just small list of those and more can be accessed by clicking on “Milton Friedman” on the side of this page or searching [...]
Biography Part 2 In 1977, when I reached the age of 65, I retired from teaching at the University of Chicago. At the invitation of Glenn Campbell, Director of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, I shifted my scholarly work to Hoover where I remain a Senior Research Fellow. We moved to San Francisco, purchasing [...]
Milton Friedman at Hillsdale College 2006 July 2006 Free to Choose: A Conversation with Milton Friedman Milton Friedman Economist Milton Friedman is a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and a professor emeritus of economics at the University of Chicago, where he taught from 1946-1976. Dr. Friedman received the Nobel Memorial [...]
Milton Friedman videos and transcripts Part 8 On my blog http://www.thedailyhatch.org I have an extensive list of posts that have both videos and transcripts of MiltonFriedman’s interviews and speeches. Here below is just small list of those and more can be accessed by clicking on “Milton Friedman” on the side of this page or searching [...]
Testing Milton Friedman – Preview Uploaded by FreeToChooseNetwork on Feb 21, 2012 2012 is the 100th anniversary of Milton Friedman’s birth. His work and ideas continue to make the world a better place. As part of Milton Friedman’s Century, a revival of the ideas featured in the landmark television series Free To Choose are being [...]
Charlie Rose interview of Milton Friedman My favorite economist: Milton Friedman : A Great Champion of Liberty by V. Sundaram Milton Friedman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist who advocated an unfettered free market and had the ear of three US Presidents – Nixon, Ford and Reagan – died last Thursday (16 November, 2006 ) in San Francisco [...]
Free or Equal?: Johan Norberg Updates Milton & Rose Friedman’s Free to Choose I got this below from Reason Magazine: Swedish economist Johan Norberg is the host of the new documentary Free or Equal, which retraces and updates the 1980 classic Free to Choose, featuring Milton and Rose Friedman. Like the Friedmans, Norberg travels the globe [...]
I must say that I have lots of respect for Reason Magazine and for their admiration of Milton Friedman. However, I do disagree with one phrase below. At the end of this post I will tell you what sentence it is. Uploaded by ReasonTV on Jul 28, 2011 There’s no way to appreciate fully the [...]
Milton Friedman on Hayek’s “Road to Serfdom” 1994 Interview 1 of 2 Uploaded by PenguinProseMedia on Oct 25, 2011 Says Federal Reserve should be abolished, criticizes Keynes. One of Friedman’s best interviews, discussion spans Friedman’s career and his view of numerous political figures and public policy issues. ___________________ Two Lucky People by Milton and Rose Friedman [...]
What a great man Milton Friedman was. The Legacy of Milton Friedman November 18, 2006 Alexander Tabarrok Great economist by day and crusading public intellectual by night, Milton Friedman was my hero. Friedman’s contributions to economics are profound, the permanent income hypothesis, the resurrection of the quantity theory of money, and his magnum opus with [...]
Milton Friedman videos and transcripts Part 7 On my blog http://www.thedailyhatch.org I have an extensive list of posts that have both videos and transcripts of MiltonFriedman’s interviews and speeches. Here below is just small list of those and more can be accessed by clicking on “Milton Friedman” on the side of this page or searching [...]
Below is a discussion from Milton Friedman on Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan. February 10, 1999 | Recorded on February 10, 1999 audio, video, and blogs » uncommon knowledge PRESIDENTIAL REPORT CARD: Milton Friedman on the State of the Union with guest Milton Friedman Milton Friedman, Senior Research Fellow, Hoover Institution and Nobel Laureate in [...]
Milton Friedman and Chile – The Power of Choice Uploaded by FreeToChooseNetwork on May 13, 2011 In this excerpt from Free To Choose Network’s “The Power of Choice (2006)”, we set the record straight on Milton Friedman’s dealings with Chile — including training the Chicago Boys and his meeting with Augusto Pinochet. Was the tremendous [...]
Why don’t you support the voucher system for the poor people that live in the same town that your town daughters live in? Is that fair that they attend a top quality private school while at the same time you shut down the voucher system that was in place for poor kids in D.C.?
In his latest weekly radio address, President Obama featured what will no doubt be a mainstay of his reelection campaign: the “Buffett Rule,” which says that rich people should pay at least the same tax rate as middle-class folks. It’s named after mega-investor Warren Buffett, who famously declared that he pays a lower tax rate than his secretary. President Obama and his supporters have run with that, and are employing it to convince the public that such is the norm for the despised “rich.”
Of course that’s not the norm: Buffett is the rare taxpayer who makes almost all his income through investments, and top earners have much higher tax rates than people earning $200,000 and below. So this is clearly not about fairness — it’s about politics.
Two, though, can play at this game. If the President can engage in class warfare he’s also a fair target of it. So why not implement something called the “Obama Rule,” which demands that lower-income people get at least the same educational options as the President? That only seems fair, right, like the Buffett Rule? Indeed, the President himself noted in his weekly address that “ we…have to pay for investments that will help our economy grow and keep our country safe [such as] education.” So why, then, does the President’s 2013 budget zero-out funding for the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program while his daughters go to Sidwell Friends? Shouldn’t other kids in Washington have access to the same excellent private schools as the President’s daughters?
Class envy is hardly the right reason to demand school choice — the right reasons are freedom, competition, innovation, and specialization – but of course all kids should have the same options as President Obama’s daughters! As the President concluded in his weekly address (though, obviously, he wasn’t talking about school choice): “That’s how we’ll make this country a little fairer, a little more just, and a whole lot stronger.” So let’s invoke the Obama Rule, and give lower-income families the same educational choices as the President! It’s simply the fair thing to do.
Here is the video clip and transcript of the film series FREE TO CHOOSE episode “What is wrong with our schools?” Part 1 of 6.
Volume 6 - What’s Wrong with our Schools
Transcript:
Friedman: These youngsters are beginning another day at one of America’s public schools, Hyde Park High School in Boston. What happens when they pass through those doors is a vivid illustration of some of the problems facing America’s schools.
They have to pass through metal detectors. They are faced by security guards looking for hidden weapons. They are watched over by armed police. Isn’t that awful. What a way for kids to have to go to school, through metal detectors and to be searched. What can they conceivably learn under such circumstances. Nobody is happy with this kind of education. The taxpayers surely aren’t. This isn’t cheap education. After all, those uniformed policemen, those metal detectors have to be paid for.
What about the broken windows, the torn school books, and the smashed school equipment. The teachers who teach here don’t like this kind of situation. The students don’t like to come here to go to school, and most of all, the parents __ they are the ones who get the worst deal __ they pay taxes like the rest of us and they are just as concerned about the kind of education that their kids get as the rest of us are. They know their kids are getting a bad education but they feel trapped. Many of them can see no alternative but to continue sending their kids to schools like this.
To go back to the beginning, it all started with the fine idea that every child should have a chance to learn his three R’s. Sometimes in June when it gets hot, the kids come out in the yard to do their lessons, all 15 of them, ages 5 to 13, along with their teacher. This is the last one-room schoolhouse still operating in the state of Vermont. That is the way it used to be. Parental control, parents choosing the teacher, parents monitoring the schooling, parents even getting together and chipping in to paint the schoolhouse as they did here just a few weeks ago. Parental concern is still here as much in the slums of the big cities as in Bucolic, Vermont. But control by parents over the schooling of their children is today the exception, not the rule.
Increasingly, schools have come under the control of centralized administration, professional educators deciding what shall be taught, who shall do the teaching, and even what children shall go to what school. The people who lose most from this system are the poor and the disadvantaged in the large cities. They are simply stuck. They have no alternative.
Of course, if you are well off you do have a choice. You can send your child to a private school or you can move to an area where the public schools are excellent, as the parents of many of these students have done. These students are graduating from Weston High School in one of Boston’s wealthier suburbs. Their parents pay taxes instead of tuition and they certainly get better value for their money than do the parents in Hyde Park. That is partly because they have kept a good deal of control over the local schools, and in the process, they have managed to retain many of the virtues of the one-room schoolhouse.
Students here, like Barbara King, get the equivalent of a private education. They have excellent recreational facilities. They have a teaching staff that is dedicated and responsive to parents and students. There is an atmosphere which encourages learning, yet the cost per pupil here is no higher than in many of our inner city schools. The difference is that at Weston, it all goes for education that the parents still retain a good deal of control.
Unfortunately, most parents have lost control over how their tax money in spent. Avabelle goes to Hyde Park High. Her parents too want her to have a good education, but many of the students here are not interested in schooling, and the teachers, however dedicated, soon lose heart in an atmosphere like this. Avabelle’s parents are certainly not getting value for their tax money.
Caroline Bell, Parent: I think it is a shame, really, that parents are being ripped off like we are. I am talking about parents like me that work every day, scuffle to try to make ends meet. We send our kids to school hoping that they will receive something that will benefit them in the future for when they go out here and compete in the job market. Unfortunately, none of that is taking place at Hyde Park.
Friedman: Children like Ava are being shortchanged by a system that was designed to help. But there are ways to help give parents more say over their children’s schooling.
This is a fundraising evening for a school supported by a voluntary organization, New York’s Inner City Scholarship Fund. The prints that have brought people here have been loaned by wealthy Japanese industrialist. Events like this have helped raise two million dollars to finance Catholic parochial schools in New York. The people here are part of a long American tradition. The results of their private voluntary activities have been remarkable.
This is one of the poorest neighborhoods in New York City: the Bronx. Yet this parochial school, supported by the fund, is a joy to visit. The youngsters here from poor families are at Saint John Christians because their parents have picked this school and their parents are paying some of the costs from their own pockets. The children are well behaved, eager to learn, the teachers are dedicated. The cost per pupil here is far less than in the public schools, yet on the average the children are two grades ahead. That is because teachers and parents are free to choose how the children shall be taught. Private money has replaced the tax money and so control has been taken away from the bureaucrats and put back where it belongs.
This doesn’t work just for younger children. In the 60′s, Harlem was devastated by riots. It was a hot bed of trouble. Many teenagers dropped out of school.
_______
You need to take 45 minutes and watch the remainder of this program by Milton Friedman on the voucher system.
Thank you so much for your time. I know how valuable it is. I also appreciate the fine family that you have and your commitment as a father and a husband.
Sincerely,
Everette Hatcher III, 13900 Cottontail Lane, Alexander, AR 72002, ph 501-920-5733, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com
Here is the video clip and transcript of the film series FREE TO CHOOSE episode “What is wrong with our schools?” Part 1 of 6. Volume 6 - What’s Wrong with our Schools Transcript: Friedman: These youngsters are beginning another day at one of America’s public schools, Hyde Park High School in Boston. What happens when [...]
Free to Choose by Milton Friedman: Episode “What is wrong with our schools?” (Part 4 of transcript and video) Here is the video clip and transcript of the film series FREE TO CHOOSE episode “What is wrong with our schools?” Part 4 of 6. Volume 6 - What’s Wrong with our Schools Transcript: It seems to me [...]
Free to Choose by Milton Friedman: Episode “What is wrong with our schools?” (Part 3 of transcript and video) Here is the video clip and transcript of the film series FREE TO CHOOSE episode “What is wrong with our schools?” Part 3 of 6. Volume 6 - What’s Wrong with our Schools Transcript: If it doesn’t, they [...]
Free to Choose by Milton Friedman: Episode “What is wrong with our schools?” (Part 2 of transcript and video) Here is the video clip and transcript of the film series FREE TO CHOOSE episode “What is wrong with our schools?” Part 2 of 6. Volume 6 - What’s Wrong with our Schools Transcript: Groups of concerned parents [...]
Here is the video clip and transcript of the film series FREE TO CHOOSE episode “What is wrong with our schools?” Part 6 of 6. Volume 6 - What’s Wrong with our Schools Transcript: FRIEDMAN: But I personally think it’s a good thing. But I don’t see that any reason whatsoever why I shouldn’t have been required [...]
Here is the video clip and transcript of the film series FREE TO CHOOSE episode “What is wrong with our schools?” Part 5 of 6. Volume 6 - What’s Wrong with our Schools Transcript: Are your voucher schools going to accept these tough children? COONS: You bet they are. (Several talking at once.) COONS: May I answer [...]
America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children.
That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more money for unions and more donations for politicians.
For decades, teachers’ unions have been among our nation’s largest political donors. As Reason Foundation’s Lisa Snell has noted, the National Education Association (NEA) alone spent $40 million on the 2010 election cycle (source: http://reason.org/news/printer/big-education-and-big-labor-electio). As the country’s largest teachers union, the NEA is only one cog in the infernal machine that robs parents of their tax dollars and students of their futures.
Students, teachers, parents, and hardworking Americans are all victims of this political machine–a system that takes money out of taxpayers’ wallets and gives it to union bosses, who put it in the pockets of politicians.
If you want to change this nation in a big way then you will at the fact that in the last 40 years we have increased our educational spending every year and our test scores have dropped. The problem is not money but education competition. We don’t need to spend over $29,000 per kid in the Washington D.C. district when we could give vouchers out (under $9000 per kid) and have better results. Take a look at this article from Milton Friedman.
Michelle: you are the grandfather of school vouchers do you feel victorious?
Mr. Friedman: Far from victorious, but very optimistic and hopeful. We are at the beginning of the task because as of the moment vouchers are available to only a very small amount of children. Our goal is to have a system in which every family in the U.S. will be able to choose for itself the school to which its children go we are far from that ultimate result. If we had that a system of free choice we would also have a system of competition, innovation which would change the character of education. You know our educational system is one of the most backwards things in our society in the may we teach people they did 200 years ago there is a person in the front of the room there are children sitting down at the bottom and they are being talked to can you name any other industry in the U.S. which is as technologically backward I can name one and only one..the legislature for the same reason. Both are monopolies the elementary and secondary school system is the single most Socialist industry in the U.S. leaving aside the military, but aside from the military its a major socialist industry, it is centralized and the control comes from the center and the difficulty of having a monopoly in which people cannot choose has been exacerbated by the fact that it has been largely taken over by teachers unions, the national education association and the american federation of teachers and the unions. Understandably I do not blame them but they are interested in the welfare of their members not the welfare of the children and the result is they have introduced a degree of rigidity which makes it impossible to reform the public school system from within. Reform has to come through competition from the outside and the only way you can get competition is by making it possible for parents to have the ability to choose.
Michelle: Give to me a model, an example of how it would work
Mr. Friedman: Very simple, take the extreme the government says we are willing to finance schooling for every child. The government compels children. If you look at the role of government in education there are 3 different levels there is a level of compulsory the government says every child must go to school until such and such and age. That is the equivalent of saying if you are going to drive a car you must have a license. The second stage is funding not only do we require you to have an education but the government is willing to pay for that schooling. That would be equivalent to saying the government is willing to pay for your car that you drive. The third level is running the educational industry that would be the equivalent of the government manufacturing the automobile or to put it in a different image consider food stamps today. Food stamps are funds provided by the government but if that were to be runned like the schools they would say everybody has to use these food stamps at a government grocery and each person with food stamps is assigned to a particular government grocers so the only way you can get your food stamps is by going to that grocer do you think those groceries would be very good? We know what the situation is in schooling people say why now and not 50-75 years ago? Well, when I went to high school t hat was a long time ago in the 1920s there were a 150,000 school districts in the U.S and the population was half what it is now. Today, there are fewer than 15,000 school districts. So it used to be that you really did have competition cause you had small school districts and parents had a good deal of control over those school districts, but increasingly we have shifted to very large school districts, to centralized control, to a system in which the governmental officials in which the educational professionals control it and like every socialist industry it produces a product that is very expensive and of very low quality. Of course it is not uniform there are some very good schools do not misunderstand me, but there are also some very bad ones.
Michelle: I interviewed some folks who are against school vouchers and they say that if you really want to help out a school what you should do is provide high quality early childhood education, small classes, small schools, summer school available to children who want it. Put money to those items which they claim would work.
Mr. Friedman: They don’t, we have been doing that. The amount of money spent per child adjusted for inflation has something like doubled or tripled over the last 20 years. Twenty years ago we had this report A Nation at Risk that pointed out all of the difficulties I just referred to and which pointed out this was a first generation that was going to be less schooled then its parents. We are now in the next generation and will be even less well schooled. We have had every possible effort you could have from reform from within. It is not just in schools it is in any area reform has to come from outside it has to come from competition. Let me illustrate that from within the school system. the united states from all accounts ranks #1 in higher education people from all over the world regard the United States colleges and universities the best and most varied. On the other hand in every other international comparison we rank near the bottom in elementary and secondary education why the difference?…one word..choice. The elementary and secondary education the school picks the child it picks its customer. In higher education the customer picks its school, you have choice that makes all the difference in the world. It means competition forces product. Look over the rest of the economy is there any area in the u.s. in which progress has not required progress from the outside. Look at the telephone industry when it was broken down into the little bells and opened up the competition it started a period of rapid innovation and development the key word is competition and the question is how can you get competition. only by having the customer choosing.
Michelle: There is concern that money is going to religious schools. That the majority of the students in voucher programs that exist use them to attend schools with religious affiliation?
Mr. Friedman: Why? Because the vouchers are so small in some cases. It is true that of the private schools in the u.s the great bulk of them are religious. that is for one simple reason here is someone selling something for nothing somebody down the street is giving away chocolate and you want to get into the business of selling chocolate that is kind of tough isn’t it here at schools children can attend them they are not free they are paying for it in the form of taxes but there is no specific charge for going to that school somebody else is going to offer it. The churches, the religious organizations have had a real advantage in that they were the only ones around who were in a position to subsidize the education and keep the fees down low. If you open it wide the most recent case was Ohio, cleveland case. The voucher that they had had a max value of $2,500 now it is not easy to provide a decent education at $2,500 and make money at it make it pay at the same time the state of Ohio was spending something like over $7,000 per child on schooling if that voucher had been $7,000 instead of $2,500 I have no doubt that there would have been a whole raft of new private, non-profit both profit and non-profit schools. That is what has happened in Milwaukee. Milwaukee has a voucher system and today the fraction of the voucher users in Milwaukee going to religious schools is less than the fraction going to religious schools was before this system started because there have been new schools developed and some of them have been religious but many of them are not. In any event, the Supreme Court has settled that issue they have said that if it is the choice of the parent if there are alternatives available there are government schools, charter schools, private non-denominational schools, private denominational schools so long as the choice is in the hands of the parent that is not a violation of the 1st amendment.
Michelle: You have a friend and an ally in the White House when it comes to vouchers
Mr. Friedman: I should say. Mr. Bush has always been in favor. He is in favor of free choice. Remember vouchers are a means not an end the purpose of vouchers is to enable parents to have free choice and the purpose of having free choice is to provide competition and allow the educational industry to get out of the 17th century and get into the 21st century and have more innovation and more evolvement. There is no reason why you cannot have the same kind of change in the provision of education as you have had in industries like the computer industry, the television industry and other things.
Michelle: Is it refreshing to have a President that, Bill Clinton was firmly against vouchers.
Mr. Friedman: No, it is a case of circumstances when he was Governor of Arkansas he was not against vouchers. He was in favor, but when he became President he came out against vouchers. I should say he did not oppose vouchers as Governor and he did as President and that was for political reasons. People don’t recognize how powerful politically the teachers unions are. Something like a quarter of all the delegates at the democratic national convention are from the teachers union. They are probably the most powerful pressure group in the U.S… very large funds, very large number of people and very active politically.
Michelle: We talk in the office about how President Bush has some very Friedmanesq ideas.
Mr. Friedman: They are not freidmanesq they are just good ideas. I hope that is true anyway. I think very highly of President Bush and I think in these areas don’t misunderstand me that is not a blanket statement there are some things he has done that I disagree with, but taken as a whole he has been moving in the right direction of trying to move toward a smaller more limited government trying to provide more freedom and more initiative in all areas. His philosophy on Medicare is the same as his philosophy in schools.
Michelle: Is that refreshing?
Mr. Friedman: It is an interesting thing, if you look at the facts the one area the area in which the low income people of this country, the blacks and the minority are most disadvantaged is with respect with the kinds of schools they can send their children to. The people who live in Harlem or the slums or the corresponding areas in LA or San Francisco they can go to the same stores, shop in the same stores everybody else can, they can buy the same automobiles, they can go to supermarket but they have very limited choice of schools everybody agrees that the schools in those areas are the worst they are poor. Yet, here you have a Democrat who allege their interest is to help the poor and the low income people here you have to take a different point every poll has shown that the strongest supporters of vouchers are the low income blacks and yet hardly a single black leader has been willing to come out for vouchers there were some exceptions Paul Williams in Milwaukee who was responsible for that…and a few others
Michelle: Why do you think that is?
Mr. Friedman: For obvious reasons, political. It has been to the self interest to the leaders the school system as long as its governmental its a source of power and jobs to hand around and funds to dispose of. If it is privatized that disappears and the other aspect of it is the power of the teachers unions. Right now those of us that are in the upper income classes have freedom of choice for our children in various ways we can decide where to live and we can choose places to live that have good schools or we can afford to pay twice for schooling once by taxes and once by paying tuition at a private school. It seems to me utterly unfair that those opportunities should not be open to everybody at all levels of income. If you had a system the kind I would like to see the government would say we require every child to get a certain number of years of schooling and in order to make that possible we are going to provide for every parent a voucher equal to a certain number of dollars which they can use only for schooling can’t use it for anything else. They can add to it, but they cannot subtract from it. Those will be those can be used in government schools let the government run the school but force them to be in competition so that all government schools charge tuition, but can be paid for by that voucher but that same voucher can also be used in private schools of all kinds and then you would have an open the teachers union complained and they insist they are doing a good job. if they are doing a good job then why are they so afraid of some competition?
No one did more to advance the cause of school vouchers than Milton and Rose Friedman. Friedman made it clear in his film series “Free to Choose” how sad he was that young people who live in the inner cities did not have good education opportunities available to them. Remembering Milton Friedman’s School Choice Legacy [...]
Everywhere school vouchers have been tried they have been met with great success. Why do you think President Obama got rid of them in Washington D.C.? It was a political disaster for him because the school unions had always opposed them and their success made Obama’s allies look bad. In 1980 when I first sat [...]
I ran across this very interesting article about Milton Friedman from 2002: Friedman: Market offers poor better learningBy Tamara Henry, USA TODAY By Doug Mills, AP President Bush honors influential economist Milton Friedman for his 90th birthday earlier this month. About an economist Name:Milton FriedmanAge: 90Background: Winner of the 1976 Nobel Prize for economic science; [...]
Milton Friedman and Chile – The Power of Choice Uploaded by FreeToChooseNetwork on May 13, 2011 In this excerpt from Free To Choose Network’s “The Power of Choice (2006)”, we set the record straight on Milton Friedman’s dealings with Chile — including training the Chicago Boys and his meeting with Augusto Pinochet. Was the tremendous [...]
The True Cost of Public Education Uploaded by catoinstitutevideo on Mar 5, 2010 What is the true cost of public education? According to a new study by the Cato Institute, some of the nation’s largest public school districts are underreporting the true cost of government-run education programs. http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=11432 Cato Education Analyst Adam B. Schaeffer explains [...]
Max Brantley of the Arkansas Times Blog reports today that Mitt Romney is for school vouchers. I am glad to hear that. Over and over we hear that the reason private schools are better is because they don’t have to keep the troubling making kids. It reminds me of this short film that I saw many [...]
John Brummett (10-26-11, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette online edition) does not want charter schools to put public schools out of business but he wants them to show public schools how to do it. (Paywall) I seek in these matters a kind of Clintonian third-way finesse: I support charter schools only to the extent that they should be [...]
America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children.
That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more money for unions and more donations for politicians.
For decades, teachers’ unions have been among our nation’s largest political donors. As Reason Foundation’s Lisa Snell has noted, the National Education Association (NEA) alone spent $40 million on the 2010 election cycle (source: http://reason.org/news/printer/big-education-and-big-labor-electio). As the country’s largest teachers union, the NEA is only one cog in the infernal machine that robs parents of their tax dollars and students of their futures.
Students, teachers, parents, and hardworking Americans are all victims of this political machine–a system that takes money out of taxpayers’ wallets and gives it to union bosses, who put it in the pockets of politicians.
If you want to change this nation in a big way then you will at the fact that in the last 40 years we have increased our educational spending every year and our test scores have dropped. The problem is not money but education competition. We don’t need to spend over $29,000 per kid in the Washington D.C. district when we could give vouchers out (under $9000 per kid) and have better results. Take a look at this article from Milton Friedman.
Michelle: you are the grandfather of school vouchers do you feel victorious?
Mr. Friedman: Far from victorious, but very optimistic and hopeful. We are at the beginning of the task because as of the moment vouchers are available to only a very small amount of children. Our goal is to have a system in which every family in the U.S. will be able to choose for itself the school to which its children go we are far from that ultimate result. If we had that a system of free choice we would also have a system of competition, innovation which would change the character of education. You know our educational system is one of the most backwards things in our society in the may we teach people they did 200 years ago there is a person in the front of the room there are children sitting down at the bottom and they are being talked to can you name any other industry in the U.S. which is as technologically backward I can name one and only one..the legislature for the same reason. Both are monopolies the elementary and secondary school system is the single most Socialist industry in the U.S. leaving aside the military, but aside from the military its a major socialist industry, it is centralized and the control comes from the center and the difficulty of having a monopoly in which people cannot choose has been exacerbated by the fact that it has been largely taken over by teachers unions, the national education association and the american federation of teachers and the unions. Understandably I do not blame them but they are interested in the welfare of their members not the welfare of the children and the result is they have introduced a degree of rigidity which makes it impossible to reform the public school system from within. Reform has to come through competition from the outside and the only way you can get competition is by making it possible for parents to have the ability to choose.
Michelle: Give to me a model, an example of how it would work
Mr. Friedman: Very simple, take the extreme the government says we are willing to finance schooling for every child. The government compels children. If you look at the role of government in education there are 3 different levels there is a level of compulsory the government says every child must go to school until such and such and age. That is the equivalent of saying if you are going to drive a car you must have a license. The second stage is funding not only do we require you to have an education but the government is willing to pay for that schooling. That would be equivalent to saying the government is willing to pay for your car that you drive. The third level is running the educational industry that would be the equivalent of the government manufacturing the automobile or to put it in a different image consider food stamps today. Food stamps are funds provided by the government but if that were to be runned like the schools they would say everybody has to use these food stamps at a government grocery and each person with food stamps is assigned to a particular government grocers so the only way you can get your food stamps is by going to that grocer do you think those groceries would be very good? We know what the situation is in schooling people say why now and not 50-75 years ago? Well, when I went to high school t hat was a long time ago in the 1920s there were a 150,000 school districts in the U.S and the population was half what it is now. Today, there are fewer than 15,000 school districts. So it used to be that you really did have competition cause you had small school districts and parents had a good deal of control over those school districts, but increasingly we have shifted to very large school districts, to centralized control, to a system in which the governmental officials in which the educational professionals control it and like every socialist industry it produces a product that is very expensive and of very low quality. Of course it is not uniform there are some very good schools do not misunderstand me, but there are also some very bad ones.
Michelle: I interviewed some folks who are against school vouchers and they say that if you really want to help out a school what you should do is provide high quality early childhood education, small classes, small schools, summer school available to children who want it. Put money to those items which they claim would work.
Mr. Friedman: They don’t, we have been doing that. The amount of money spent per child adjusted for inflation has something like doubled or tripled over the last 20 years. Twenty years ago we had this report A Nation at Risk that pointed out all of the difficulties I just referred to and which pointed out this was a first generation that was going to be less schooled then its parents. We are now in the next generation and will be even less well schooled. We have had every possible effort you could have from reform from within. It is not just in schools it is in any area reform has to come from outside it has to come from competition. Let me illustrate that from within the school system. the united states from all accounts ranks #1 in higher education people from all over the world regard the United States colleges and universities the best and most varied. On the other hand in every other international comparison we rank near the bottom in elementary and secondary education why the difference?…one word..choice. The elementary and secondary education the school picks the child it picks its customer. In higher education the customer picks its school, you have choice that makes all the difference in the world. It means competition forces product. Look over the rest of the economy is there any area in the u.s. in which progress has not required progress from the outside. Look at the telephone industry when it was broken down into the little bells and opened up the competition it started a period of rapid innovation and development the key word is competition and the question is how can you get competition. only by having the customer choosing.
Michelle: There is concern that money is going to religious schools. That the majority of the students in voucher programs that exist use them to attend schools with religious affiliation?
Mr. Friedman: Why? Because the vouchers are so small in some cases. It is true that of the private schools in the u.s the great bulk of them are religious. that is for one simple reason here is someone selling something for nothing somebody down the street is giving away chocolate and you want to get into the business of selling chocolate that is kind of tough isn’t it here at schools children can attend them they are not free they are paying for it in the form of taxes but there is no specific charge for going to that school somebody else is going to offer it. The churches, the religious organizations have had a real advantage in that they were the only ones around who were in a position to subsidize the education and keep the fees down low. If you open it wide the most recent case was Ohio, cleveland case. The voucher that they had had a max value of $2,500 now it is not easy to provide a decent education at $2,500 and make money at it make it pay at the same time the state of Ohio was spending something like over $7,000 per child on schooling if that voucher had been $7,000 instead of $2,500 I have no doubt that there would have been a whole raft of new private, non-profit both profit and non-profit schools. That is what has happened in Milwaukee. Milwaukee has a voucher system and today the fraction of the voucher users in Milwaukee going to religious schools is less than the fraction going to religious schools was before this system started because there have been new schools developed and some of them have been religious but many of them are not. In any event, the Supreme Court has settled that issue they have said that if it is the choice of the parent if there are alternatives available there are government schools, charter schools, private non-denominational schools, private denominational schools so long as the choice is in the hands of the parent that is not a violation of the 1st amendment.
Michelle: You have a friend and an ally in the White House when it comes to vouchers
Mr. Friedman: I should say. Mr. Bush has always been in favor. He is in favor of free choice. Remember vouchers are a means not an end the purpose of vouchers is to enable parents to have free choice and the purpose of having free choice is to provide competition and allow the educational industry to get out of the 17th century and get into the 21st century and have more innovation and more evolvement. There is no reason why you cannot have the same kind of change in the provision of education as you have had in industries like the computer industry, the television industry and other things.
Michelle: Is it refreshing to have a President that, Bill Clinton was firmly against vouchers.
Mr. Friedman: No, it is a case of circumstances when he was Governor of Arkansas he was not against vouchers. He was in favor, but when he became President he came out against vouchers. I should say he did not oppose vouchers as Governor and he did as President and that was for political reasons. People don’t recognize how powerful politically the teachers unions are. Something like a quarter of all the delegates at the democratic national convention are from the teachers union. They are probably the most powerful pressure group in the U.S… very large funds, very large number of people and very active politically.
Michelle: We talk in the office about how President Bush has some very Friedmanesq ideas.
Mr. Friedman: They are not freidmanesq they are just good ideas. I hope that is true anyway. I think very highly of President Bush and I think in these areas don’t misunderstand me that is not a blanket statement there are some things he has done that I disagree with, but taken as a whole he has been moving in the right direction of trying to move toward a smaller more limited government trying to provide more freedom and more initiative in all areas. His philosophy on Medicare is the same as his philosophy in schools.
Michelle: Is that refreshing?
Mr. Friedman: It is an interesting thing, if you look at the facts the one area the area in which the low income people of this country, the blacks and the minority are most disadvantaged is with respect with the kinds of schools they can send their children to. The people who live in Harlem or the slums or the corresponding areas in LA or San Francisco they can go to the same stores, shop in the same stores everybody else can, they can buy the same automobiles, they can go to supermarket but they have very limited choice of schools everybody agrees that the schools in those areas are the worst they are poor. Yet, here you have a Democrat who allege their interest is to help the poor and the low income people here you have to take a different point every poll has shown that the strongest supporters of vouchers are the low income blacks and yet hardly a single black leader has been willing to come out for vouchers there were some exceptions Paul Williams in Milwaukee who was responsible for that…and a few others
Michelle: Why do you think that is?
Mr. Friedman: For obvious reasons, political. It has been to the self interest to the leaders the school system as long as its governmental its a source of power and jobs to hand around and funds to dispose of. If it is privatized that disappears and the other aspect of it is the power of the teachers unions. Right now those of us that are in the upper income classes have freedom of choice for our children in various ways we can decide where to live and we can choose places to live that have good schools or we can afford to pay twice for schooling once by taxes and once by paying tuition at a private school. It seems to me utterly unfair that those opportunities should not be open to everybody at all levels of income. If you had a system the kind I would like to see the government would say we require every child to get a certain number of years of schooling and in order to make that possible we are going to provide for every parent a voucher equal to a certain number of dollars which they can use only for schooling can’t use it for anything else. They can add to it, but they cannot subtract from it. Those will be those can be used in government schools let the government run the school but force them to be in competition so that all government schools charge tuition, but can be paid for by that voucher but that same voucher can also be used in private schools of all kinds and then you would have an open the teachers union complained and they insist they are doing a good job. if they are doing a good job then why are they so afraid of some competition?
Thank you so much for your time. I know how valuable it is. I also appreciate the fine family that you have and your commitment as a father and a husband.
Sincerely,
Everette Hatcher III, 13900 Cottontail Lane, Alexander, AR 72002, ph 501-920-5733, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com
No one did more to advance the cause of school vouchers than Milton and Rose Friedman. Friedman made it clear in his film series “Free to Choose” how sad he was that young people who live in the inner cities did not have good education opportunities available to them. Remembering Milton Friedman’s School Choice Legacy [...]
Everywhere school vouchers have been tried they have been met with great success. Why do you think President Obama got rid of them in Washington D.C.? It was a political disaster for him because the school unions had always opposed them and their success made Obama’s allies look bad. In 1980 when I first sat [...]
I ran across this very interesting article about Milton Friedman from 2002: Friedman: Market offers poor better learningBy Tamara Henry, USA TODAY By Doug Mills, AP President Bush honors influential economist Milton Friedman for his 90th birthday earlier this month. About an economist Name:Milton FriedmanAge: 90Background: Winner of the 1976 Nobel Prize for economic science; [...]
Milton Friedman and Chile – The Power of Choice Uploaded by FreeToChooseNetwork on May 13, 2011 In this excerpt from Free To Choose Network’s “The Power of Choice (2006)”, we set the record straight on Milton Friedman’s dealings with Chile — including training the Chicago Boys and his meeting with Augusto Pinochet. Was the tremendous [...]
The True Cost of Public Education Uploaded by catoinstitutevideo on Mar 5, 2010 What is the true cost of public education? According to a new study by the Cato Institute, some of the nation’s largest public school districts are underreporting the true cost of government-run education programs. http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=11432 Cato Education Analyst Adam B. Schaeffer explains [...]
Max Brantley of the Arkansas Times Blog reports today that Mitt Romney is for school vouchers. I am glad to hear that. Over and over we hear that the reason private schools are better is because they don’t have to keep the troubling making kids. It reminds me of this short film that I saw many [...]
John Brummett (10-26-11, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette online edition) does not want charter schools to put public schools out of business but he wants them to show public schools how to do it. (Paywall) I seek in these matters a kind of Clintonian third-way finesse: I support charter schools only to the extent that they should be [...]
