Inequality.org recently took an in-depth look at the Right-wing’s increasingly successful effort to destroy public education. In an article titled “Private Fortunes Vs. Public Education,” the article began
The United States essentially invented public education. Back in the 1780s, notes the Center on Education Policy, federal legislation “granted federal lands to new states and set aside a portion of those lands to be used to fund public schools.” By the 18th century’s close, most Americans had embraced the notion of “using public funds to support public schooling for the common good.”
In the mid-20th century, amid growing levels of economic equality, that public financial support for public schools would expand mightily. The results would be impressive. By 1970, graduation rates from American high schools — institutions, notes historian Claudia Goldin, themselves “rooted in egalitarianism” — had quadrupled over 1920 levels.
But that era of growing equality and expanding public education would start fading in the 1970s. Over recent years, a new U.S. Senate report makes clear, that fade has only intensified.
The article went on to report that, during the last decade, funding for the nation’s public schools has “barely increased,” while “state spending on tax breaks and subsidies for private schools has skyrocketed by 408 percent.”
A report from the Brookings Institution found that universal voucher programs “are unwinding two centuries of tradition in U.S. public education” and that the programs “violate basic traditions of church-state separation, anti-discrimination, and public accountability.” As the researcher concluded, even if the courts -ignoring over fifty years of precedents–rule that these voucher programs are constitutionally permissible, “we should assess them against our principles as a nation.”
Indiana is a prime example. For severa years, the Hoosier state has had the nation’s largest voucher program. It was originally justified as a way to allow poor children to escape “failing public schools,” there were income limits for families taking advantage of the program, and vouchers use was limited to children who had first attended a public school. Those restrictions were steadily eased, and a few days ago, the Indianapolis Star confirmed what I have repeatedly pointed out on this blog: costs have exploded and Indiana’s voucher program has become a subsidy for parochial schools and the well-to-do.
The Star article began with the story of a father who had been paying his daughter’s tuition at a private religious school in Mishawaka, Indiana. The school informed him that Hoosier taxpayers stood ready to assume most of the nearly $10,000 annual cost.
Garcia applied and his daughter joined more than 600 other students ― or about 90% of Marian’s enrollment ― utilizing the state grants to pay for their schooling 2023-24. The tax-funded payments generated $4.3 million for the private school…
A three-month investigation by University of Notre Dame students in the Gallivan Program for Journalism, Ethics, and Democracy found that a majority of the families in the Indiana voucher program today were previously paying for private school on their own, just like Garcia. Yet the state stepped in to offer a financial subsidy to parents who didn’t need it ― a costly decision critics say is hurting public schools, which educate more than 90% of the approximately one million K-12 students in Indiana.
Started in 2011 under former Gov. Mitch Daniels as an avenue to help low-income students escape failing public schools, the voucher program has changed dramatically in the last decade. While it has helped thousands of families choose their preferred school, the cost is projected to grow 263 percent in just five years. This expansion is predicted to force public school districts to either make severe cuts or ask taxpayers for more money through public referendums.
The Indiana legislature has turned the program into “a subsidy for predominantly wealthy, white suburban families”. The Star found that–far from helping poor minority children– the program’s “average recipient is a white female who has never attended public school, from a family earning more than $99,000 a year.”
That cushy subsidy for the well-to-do has cost Indiana’s public schools an estimated $600 million this year.
In 2011, in order for a family of four to qualify for a voucher, the family could make up to $40,000 a year. Today, the same family can qualify while making $222,000 a year. A program that initially cost Indiana taxpayers $15.5 million per year cost more than $300 million last year, and is projected to top $600 million this year.
Meanwhile, a mountain of research confirms that educational outcomes have not improved–and in some places and some subjects, have declined.
Researchers have also identified the “dark money” behind the attack on public education, and Project 2025 acknowledges that the goal is to replace public schools with private and parochial ones.
In Indiana, where gerrymandering has given the GOP carte blanche to do their worst, they’re already working on it.
The voucher system in Indiana and many other states is founded on the basic lie that the money goes to the parents of the student when in fact it goes to the school and it stays with the school even if the student leaves for any reason. This increases the loss to public education where the money is most needed. The term education now means higher education for the well-to-do and above that level of income because schools at lower levels is not only founded on that basic voucher lie but brings fear for the lives of K through 12 children as the school shootings continue.
CNN reported this morning that they believe this 2024 General Election will be based on the economy; a fact that has taken hold as prices escalate and quality of foods, merchandise and services lowers. People have totally forgotten that this past almost four years, which will be known as the “Biden era”, is in actuality the coming out years of surviving the Covid-19 Pandemic; aided and abetted to the death tolls in the millions by Trump and his MAGA Republicans.
We have much to fear as November 5th quickly approaches and we see no improvement in the economy; Kroger admitted that they are price gouging, that will escalate if they merge with Albertson’s. FOOD is the staple of life and is there any food value in the poor quality of, not only produce, but now escalated to canned and frozen foods as our source of life.
The state level government “down ballot” is as vital as the presidential and vice presidential and all federal level candidacies. Our once protective Supreme Court is now our enemy. Be afraid, be very afraid!
I’ve been saying for years, until I’m blue in the face, that the whole underlying goal of the voucher system was to destroy the public schools. The very fact that it began under Mitch “privatize everything” Daniels sent my hackles up from the get-go. Uneducated (and undereducated) people, especially if they’re ignorant in history and civics, are much easier to manipulate.
Hopefully, come November, the MAGAts will get their comeuppance. TFG is increasingly losing his grip, and the slide is becoming increasingly obvious. And the Twitterverse is now having a field day with the news that you have to be a truly horrible republican candidate when someone as loathsome as Dick Cheney crosses the party line and votes for your opponent.
JoAnn is, once again, spot on. The down ballot races are more closely related to how our lives will be lived. Your state senators and representatives may have the biggest influence on your life. Think about that when you’re filling out your ballot, especially if you’ve just ignored them and voted only for the top of the ticket in the past.
And in Florida, infected by the same disease, last year’s tab for vouchers, aka “scholarships” was 4 billion.
Mitch Daniels is the Hoosier gift that keeps on giving. The Gannett newspapers in Indiana gave Mitch a pass to do anything, even offer funds to the worst CAFO operators in the country who were being kicked out of North Carolina. Now, all our waterways are polluted. One of the biggest operators of private schools in Indiana was the Gulen movement. I could write a book about that operation and how the Hoosier Republicans abused it.
Vouchers were never meant to help people experiencing poverty. That was the con for the media, and it worked. Click through to the dark money networks behind the destruction of public education. All the names are mentioned, including the Publix heiress, Fancell, who gave millions to the Stop the Steal crowd along with Charles Koch, and neither one was pulled in front of the Democratic insurrection committee in Washington. Why is that?
Funding an insurrection is being an accomplice to the insurrection. The law is very clear here. Yet, the Democrats, even for appearance purposes, didn’t send a subpoena to the billionaire funders.
If you click through and read the dark money article, it tells you all you need to know about the who, why, and what, etc. They are the who’s who of the dark money ATM, and it’s why the IRS has seen its budget decimated over the past decade. These churches and nonprofits are not supposed to participate in political activities, but they do, but the IRS is so incredibly backlogged they can’t catch them. And, once they do, the 501c3 is just closed and reopened under a different name. The billionaire donors mentioned in the cited article are the ones behind Project 2025. They will not stop if Trump loses.
Every day we hear about more ex-Republicans who are supporting Harris. I haven’t heard of ANY ex-Democrats supporting Trump. Draw your own conclusions.
I cannot think of anything more critical to the country’s future than public education. Its present conception is barely adequate for future needs. Weakening it is selling our seed corn. In other words, we are mortgaging the country’s future.
Reds would say that stealing money from public education allows them to teach only what is necessary to produce duplicates of themselves with all the dysfunction they currently own instead of preparation for the future.
Their culture is one of the past being good enough for the future.
They are wrong about that.
Indiana was late in the game and did not approve free public education until the 1850s. I am proud that my great, great grandfather was part of the group that fought for that right. It was not an easy fight. It is sad that Indiana today to destroying that system so that white kids don’t have to go to school with black and brown kids. 19th Century Whig/Republicans built the system and 21st Century Republicans are destroying it.
Yup, Marian High School is a private school and those vouchers are causing all kinds of problems. Nobody complaining about their property taxes seems to put two and two together. sigh.
This isn’t just one side or the other situation, in Illinois, everything is a Democratic super majority. And the voucher programs have decimated public education, and put a huge and inordinate amount of pressure on the average taxpayer. Definitely not a panacea!
I’m all for paying taxes, Romans the 13th chapter discusses the tax issue. That being said, the abuse by the superior authorities in government is way out of bounds. The use of property taxes to pay the lion’s share of monies earmarked for public schools, is inequitable. The burden falls upon those that can least afford it. The large corporations, and the wealthy, have complete access to government tax abatement programs, and use them to the fullest extent. The average taxpayer cannot. Somehow, wealthy property owners can claim depreciation on their properties. Wear and tear can save them billions, large businesses use the abatement programs to not pay any tax at all for decades. But the struggling middle class taxpayer, cannot deduct depreciation on their homes, they cannot get breaks on their taxes by using an open lands exemption. In other words allowing folks to come on your property once a year to birdwatch or paint. The Phillips family that invented the Phillips screwdriver has a mansion in lake Forest, they pay $700 a year in taxes. They use the exemptions. My taxes were just assessed an extras 18%. Putting me over $10,000 a year. Well over!
The poorest or those who can least afford tax increases get hammered year after year. The disabled and the elderly get no breaks. Basically, the taxing authorities tell you if you can’t pay the taxes you need to sell your property or risk it being confiscated and sold for back taxes.
So where is the equity, in red Tennessee, they don’t even come close to the shenanigans that are going on in Illinois. Their taxes are pennies on the dollar compared to here. The teachers union in Illinois fight against any sort of tax abatement bill that comes up, because they want a larger portion of the money for the public pension fund and to make up for the school vouchers that are going out.
If one party or the other were to lead by example, that would be something novel, but in the end, in the grand scheme, they all do the same thing, and it portends to a major shift in society as a whole.
Equity, or equality, should not be snuffed out. And when you have those who use clever terminology and programs to fleece the average public civilian, who do you have to set it right? There is no one! In Illinois, politicians have spent like lottery winners, but now paying the piper is due. And they have no clue how to do it. So they continue on, careening towards self-destruction and both parties sitting on that rudderless ship heading for the falls, drinking and eating while kicking the can down the road. The crash is going to be so deafening, so enormous, there won’t be anything left. There will be no one to pick up the pieces, because for the most part, stupidity is the most tangible commodity embraced by politicians and their acolytes.
Is the landing strip unencumbered? Is the Sea calm, and the tacking wind friendly? Is every road a boulevard?
The obvious is approaching and is plain as the nose on everyone’s face, and yet, it’s like the band playing on the Titanic! Let’s put it this way, it ain’t good.
I’m kind of a broken record on this point, but the goals have always been: subsidize religious education; weaken teacher’s unions; and redirect public money to private interests.
well said Doug, we would t want pure white Sally to be seated next to
those public school ruffians…she might actully grow up to be tollerant of
others less fortunate