Preach It

Megan McArdle answers pretty much every criticism made of school voucher plans. She finds them wanting.

My instinct tells me that opponents of school vouchers are primarily motivated by a few biases:

1. Anti-market bias - voucher opponents are nearly always left-of-center, and agreeing to a voucher plan is a tacit admission of failure of a large-scale government operation (similar arguments were made in opposition of welfare reform in 1990s). Admitting that the government can't operate the education system efficiently makes one wonder if it could operate the health care system (or anything else) efficiently either, doesn't it?

2. The "It's My Money" Reactionary Bias - Call this the "I don't want my tax dollars supporting religious lessons in schools" syndrome. McArdle mentions this one, and has a good point: religious fundamentalists don't want their tax dollars supporting evolution lessons, or sex ed, or secularism, etc. Others are opposed to multi-cultural lessons, or biased history books, or whatever. The point is, nobody gets exactly what they want. If the point is to educate children, then the primary concern should be to educate children and not to bitch about where your tax dollars eventually end up. Additionally, under a voucher system parents would actually have choices over what their children are taught. So, those who don't want religious instruction for their kids will have secular options; those who don't want secularism taught to their kids will have religious options. Opposing vouchers is opposing choice.

McArdle has much, much more. It's worth reading the whole thing.