In a post on his new blog, Neerav Kingsland writes,
Ultimately, charter school districts are simply single payer education systems.
The theme of the post is that using charter schools still leaves education less privatized than health care under Obamacare. So why is the left disturbed by charter schools? Some comments:
1. As Kingsland hints, one may ask conversely, why is the right so disturbed by Obamacare? In fact, many on the left have complained about this.
2. Many on the left are not happy with Obamacare. They prefer something like Britain’s NHS.
3. Starting points matter. We started from a health care system that was less centrally managed than Obamacare, so Obamacare represents a move to the left. We started from an education system that was more government-run than charter schools, so charter schools represent a move to the right.
4. There are many on the right who doubt the efficacy of charter schools for precisely the reason that Kingsland says that the left should like them. That is, they can be thought of as government outsourcing education, but still controlling it.
Thanks you for posting this, Professor Kling. In a single moment, this has changed my thinking. When I have discussed the possibility of the government funding but not administering education I did not realize for some reason that IS, as you say, a single payer education system.
Arnold, thanks for the thoughts.
I think your point about starting points is a good one. I should have mentioned this in my post.
-N
I should thank you, too, sir.
Thanks for the note!
Also, education is something we generally believe in providing equal provision while medicine seeks equalized outcome. Incidentally, I’m almost okay with a standard defined contribution health savings account.
I agree that the ‘starting point’ matters quite a lot. Add in a dislike of change of any sort by many people, along with tribal thinking, and you end up with many hard-to-reconcile stances.
Let me give you the Chicago Perspective on charter schools.
In Chicago the current system has a lot of different players who are looting the system – school district admins, principles, teachers unions, local school councils, the mayor, the alderman, consultants, contractors, you name it.
The mayor’s at the top but he gets the least.
Charter schools allow the mayor to disintermediate the looting of the school system by cutting all the other looters out power. That’s a good thing for him.
If you are allied to any of the (other) current looting classes, this is a bad thing.
What about the kids of Chicago? Charters of not, no matter what happens the purpose of the school system will be for political looting, not educating.