The Philosophy of Liberty

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1. bildanielson says:

   5/9/2008 at 8:35 am

   Chris,
   This is really great.. and rings of what I wrote just this morning in a private note to back to Steve Edlund stating:

   “I have been called every name in the book simply because I promote a rational, market based approach to K-12 education reform in this state. Well, my underlying motivation is a moral argument and the bottom line is that parents, not the state through coercive redistribution of other peoples money, should be the fundamental directors of their children’s education. To presume otherwise is not just anti-family, it is immoral on both counts. Secondly, anyone who is legally in charge of a child ought not be financially penalized for choosing other than the government schools as the place where that child is educated – it should be simply an economically unencumbered choice, what I characterized as economic educational choice (I think I was the first to coin this concept). Thirdly, in order to keep this country free and to somehow begin to refocus on the fundamental founding vision of our forefathers, education has to become not a divisive, tax gouging, jobs program but rather a marketplace consisting of a wide diversity of options for parents and kids – regardless of financial status. For far too long the presumption that kids from poor families need the guiding hand of the state and rich kids need to have their parents pay for that guiding hand has created the pitted battles we deal with and has given rise to irrational organizations such as WEAC.

   The only way this can change is to break the monopoly. The only way that can happen, by definition, is to institute market forces. The only way market forces can reasonably be instituted is through state-wide, universal, tax credits OR the abolition of the state’s compulsory school laws. I dare say, the latter will never be repealed but the former is a real possibility and is the answer in my humble opinion.

   Tax credits induce market forces, market forces preclude a monopoly, a broken monopoly means real choice for parents.. Tax credits mean real choice.”

   Seems to me that’s the philosophy of liberty as applied to K-12…

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2. N. Onimous says:

   5/9/2008 at 8:59 pm

   Well said Dr. D. One has to wonder what the Prime Minister of Canada would say about such a free market solution to the dreaded government education mess….

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