From: mwilson@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM (Mark Wilson)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: Questions about the TEN POINT PARTY PROGRAM.
Date: 30 Sep 92 17:54:42 GMT
Organization: NCR Engineering and Manufacturing Atlanta -- Atlanta, GA

In <ISBELL.92Sep30094920@panther.ai.mit.edu> isbell@ai.mit.edu (Charles L Isbell) writes:

>|Micky Dee's has a level of customer satisfaction that most businesses
>|envy.

>So?  Most cocaine users are pretty happy as well.  Shall we feed our
>kids crack instead of educate them?

Are you claiming the McDonalds is addicting?  And strenuously reject your
claim that most cocaine users are happy.  McDonalds makes a product that
a lot of people like, at a cost that most people can afford.  If you
do not like it, then don't go.  That's the beauty of choice.
BTW, how are we supposed to take it when you denigrate people whose
choices you disagree with.

>|It does.  What incentive does the school have to change, now?

>I didn't say they did.  I'm just trying to get an idea of from where
>the market incentive to improve really comes.

That's easy, those schools that don't improve will cease to exist.
That's plenty of motivation for most people.

>|Currently the teacher's union is an extremely powerful political
>|force, with enormous goodwill among the people in general (naturally).

>But if that's the case, then we can be happy (as we are with
>McDonald's)--the customers are satisfied (or else no good will).

I don't believe that the NEA has a lot of good will.  They have a lot
of clout and a lot of politicians are scared of them.  But that is
not the same as having good will.  The NEA has also effectively
used PR to get people to believe that they are actually interested
in the children's welfare.

>Beyond that, is your assertion that privatizing or vouchering
>education will eliminate the teacher's union (as it has the GM
>worker's union, presumbably)?

By creating more than one employer you make it more difficult for
one union to dominate the field.  How many private school teachers are
unionized.

>|>Perhaps the McDonald's analogy has merit:  with the taste of our
>|>citizens, I'm not so sure that giving them "choice" (which I think
>|>they already have for many of the important things in schools) will
>|>improve our system (that is the goal?).

>|The old state-knows-best argument.  

>I find that most annoying.  I don't think the "state knows best."

But you did imply that the average parent can't be trusted to make these
decisions for themselves.  If not the parent then who?

>You do have a choice.  Go build your own private school.  Get together
>with like minded individuals and start another.

How do you pay for this school.  With vouchers, the funding is automatic.

>Move.

Only works if you can afford a house in the appropriate neighborhood.
Houses in good school districts usually carry a price premium.
This also seems like a drastic solution for a problem that good be solved
simply by allowing the students to choose their school.  Finally,
what do you do if you feel that the best high school and the best grade
school are in different districts, and you have both high school and
grade school aged children.

>Lie about your
>home address.

Do you really believe that breaking the law is the best way around a
beaurocratic bottle neck.

>In practice what's the difference between that and the case (quite
>possible in, say, rural America) where you have vouchers and there's
>only one school in a ten mile radius (and you can't manage the drive)?

Any parent who won't get up a few minutes early to drive their kids to a
good school probably don't care enough to get the kids to the best
school anyway.

>Where's you choice then?  Build another?  Get together with like
>minded individuals and start another?  Move?

A perfectly adequate schooling can be achieved in schools with only a few
students.  Wasn't too long ago that tutoring was normal.  With vouchers
if you don't like the current school you can start your own.

>|They won't.  But interested students could choose to go schools that
>|cater to them, thereby concentrating themselves.  Teachers might try
>|to interest uninterested students in unorthodox ways that would not
>|currently be allowed.

>Sure.  But--within the public school context--we actually have that
>happening now (in Atlanta).  With Magnet schools and all that, there

A good start, but it doesn't go far enough.

>is already quite a bit of choice.  You can even go to schools outside
>of your entire school system if you are willing to pay a yearly fee.

Why should the students have to pay a fee.  Their parents have already
paid the school taxes to support the local schools.  The school should
pass the money that would have been spent on that student to the
school that the student chooses to go to.  (Sounds a lot like the
voucher system doesn't it.)

>I disagree.  The public just doesn't care enough.  It's like the
>incumbent problem:  90% think Congress sucks, but almost as many
>thinks their reps are doing a good job.

Once again you indicate a belief that the average person cannot
be trusted to make judgements for themselves.
(Actually this opinion of Congress is quite rational, unfortunate, but still
rational.)  People like the crook who steals from others to support
them, but the do not like the crook who steals from them to support
others.

>A worthy target, but I think the system is much more flexible than you
>give it credit for.

I have yet to see any evidence of flexibility.  Oh that reminds me, the
magnet schools you mentioned above.  They were but in place to satisfy
the courts desegregation requirements.  It was an attempt to avoid having
to bus students to achieve integration.  Without the impetus of the
desegregation lawsuits, these magnet schools would never have been started.
IE, on their own they never would have done it.

>But, (to steal an earlier sarcastic analogy) given what I will call
>the SUPERMARKET EFFECT(tm), wherein the poor pay more for less quality
>& service, why would we expect it to help the poor?

The SUPERMARKET EFFECT(tm) is a very bad analogy.  Stores in poor areas
tend to be small and hence less efficient.  They also suffer from higher
crime rates and have to pay more in insurance.  This means that they
have to charge more to cover the overhead.

>And I still want to know how we phase the program in.  Who gets
>priority for a school the first 10 years?

If we do it first come first serve, then we will prolong the phase in
period.
If we do it by price then more people will enter the market as suppliers
and that will shorten the phase in period.
BTW, do you honestly feel that if we can't help everybody, we shouldn't
help anybody?

Do we honestly think we can
>package this so as not to scare off the suburbian voters who are more
>likely to be satisfied with their educational environment?  Will they resist
>the "busing" (one could easily couch vouchers in those terms) of
>dangerous gang members into their schools or the "socialist
>redistribution" of taxes?

Why should parents worry about who attends these voluntary schools.  If a
student causes trouble, he should be expelled.
BTW, I believe that public schools do have a role.  They serve as the
school of last resort.  The public school will be required to take any
student that applies.

Why do you consider the voucher system to be more redistributionist then
the system we already have.  The school taxes are already being collected.

>You make my point for me!  There will be little incentive to improve
>the Inner City schools (or the rural schools).

You don't get it do you.  There is a lot of incentive.  If the schools
do not shape up, they will lose all of their students.  It takes very little
to start a school.  All you really need is a place to meet and some textbooks.
These can be found in the Inner City and in rural areas.  (BTW, why are we
capitalizing Inner City?)

>|>|The point of vouchers is really choice,
>|>|and that can be done without vouchers.  We could choose to pay our
>|>|teachers more.  [We could choose ...]+

The amount that we as a society pay for education has risen dramatically
over the last two decades.  Yet scores are still going down.
The education establishments position seems to be,  If you give us more money
this time we promise not to waste it.

>I'm all for small empirical test cases.  One should not get me wrong
>on this.  But I want to hear that there's been more thought on how we
>get from here to there and a realistic view of who's going to reall be
>helped the most.

Apparently I do not see the change over problems that you do.  In fact
I really don't see any.  If you do, please state what they are and we
can debate them.

>For example, are the vouchers paid for by state, local or federal
>taxes?

How are schools paid for now?  The same source funds the vouchers.

Do we regulate the schools?  How do we inspect them?  Do we
>require teacher certification?  School certification?  Will we have to
>create new govt. structures (is there a net loss or gain)?

We could, but I do not see any reason to.  I forsee various rating
agencies springing up, probably supported by the schools themselves.
A lot like UL works now.  The agencies will have to stay honest because
what school will pay good money to be rated by an agency that no one
uses because no one trusts it.  This beats the government rating system
where a little political pressure can get you any rating you want.
Nobody trusts the government rating systems, but we don't have any
choice but to use them.

Will we
>allow anti-discrimination laws to apply to the schools?

I notice you use the word allow, I would have chosen the word force.
In the interim we will probably have to.  In the long run I hope to get
rid of all laws that promote discrimination.

>I prefer to test the waters first.  There may be sharks.

The only sharks I see are the ones who are trying to preserve the current
mess.
-- 
Mark
My opinions are mine, all mine.  Unless someone else claims them first.
Mark.Wilson@AtlantaGA.NCR.com
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian