In the context of this thought experiment: Why can’t they have equal opportunities without public money and institutions that are controlled by unions?

But I want to push this further...

The definition of opportunity: “a set of circumstances that makes it possible to do something.”

When you have offsprings of variable(1)parents coming from different variable(2)backgrounds with different variable(3) life goals, how can offering them equal chances be rational?

If there was no public funded education/support, would anyone consider having children unless they were confident that they can raise their children all on their own? Or with the help of their support system?

A child’s education doesn’t have economic value and only has the possibility of value. Society collectively invests first to benefit collectively later.

State takes over child rearing(not just education. From school lunches to vaccinations, they are happy to help everyone) so the adults can go to work to pay taxes. State takes the taxes and employs staff to educate the children in a highly conformed setting.

By providing seemingly cheap or free public school education, the children are ready to generate jobs and income for the universities. So they can go to jobs. So they can pay taxes. And when they have children, they can outsource child rearing to their public schools.

How can a public school teacher working 5.5 hours taking 5 classes with 40 children in each class be considered a good deal? Especially if they continue getting full salary as pension after they retire even though they collectively taught your child for only 12 years and you likely paid taxes for pretty much all your adult life.

Every tax payer is complicit in this communal child rearing activity where they have no collective power. The power lies with the state and it seems, the unions now. With private school education, it’s between the parent and child.

I started this thread because Los Angeles Unified School District’s teachers will go on strike. Unless they have access to a 1.8 billion dollar reserve fund..because they only got 6% raise instead of the 6.5% hike they demanded and because they had a whole list of demands. 25000 teachers will stop teaching. Is this ‘equal opportunity’ worth it?

In a free market where parents find means to educate their child according to their ability..private schools or home schooling or apprenticeship in family business or whatever fill in the blank, they still retain control over what is really their responsibility.

What one imagines is ‘equal chance for every child’ is really an equal opportunity for everyone to pay taxes and a chance to make everyone same to create a homogeneous labour class who will become future tax payers without competing too much with each other because everything from higher education to jobs is expensive, metered and decided based on how children are churned out of the public school system.

...beware of Greeks bearing gifts..

‘Free’ education and any subsidized child welfare is a way to incentivize higher birth rates. It’s not really free. Someone is paying for it. It’s like a pyramid scheme.

But my train of thought wasn’t this..

It was about exploring why it’s rational to expect every child to have equal chances handed out in life.

One might have chosen to have just one child to give him/her the best they can offer.

Another might have 5 kids because education is free and the kids can leave home when they finish school.

Another could be a trust fund baby of another trust fund baby.

Another might be the child of a beauty queen and a neurosurgeon.

Why should they all have equal opportunity and won’t it be wasted on some of them depending on what kind of chance they get..