Ok, can someone tell me again why some (heck, it may be most, but it is at least some) people are so dead set against vouchers for education and so dead set against having tax funds make their way to private schools for the education of their children or the education of other parent's children?
Actually, I'm sure that jealousy and envy have a lot to do with the part of not wanting tax funds to pay for the private school educations of 'other people's kids,' but I don't believe that would be a reason for not wanting to get tax money to help pay for a better education for your own children.
Why do I bring this up? { Rod Serling voice activated } { or perhaps you'd prefer James Earl Jones in a Darth Vader-ish tone } Submitted for your consideration.... { end celebrity voice }
Anyway, friends of mine recently bought a new house and are now what I would consider somewhat house poor. Actually, one of the friends is the now former co-worker I recently posted some thoughts on. (Thoughts that started the water works for her, but that's a different story). Anyway, they bought a very nice home, one of the McMansion types. Upper end of same. Brick front, nice deck, nice den, large open areas inside the house, finished basement, the works. Reached a bit to buy it, and in turn led my now former co-worker to seek other opportunities to make more money to help pay the bills, and importantly enough to her and her family, to help be able to continue to pay the tuition to send their children to private schools. (Actually only one of them is school age, the other still pre-school).
When my former co-worker initially started talking to me about the costs of sending her child to private school and how tight she and her husband were stretching their budget I suggested that perhaps she might consider public school. I knew that wasn't likely to happen though, as they live in Prince Georges County Maryland. Not the best place to send children to public school. At least not in the mind of my former co-worker and her husband. (And not in the mind of many others as well).
The public school system in Prince Georges County is not the best. It is debatable whether or not D.C. or Prince Georges are the worst, but they're probably ranked in the top 10, not far from each other, when you look at rankings of the worst public shool systems. I won't get into why they would both rank so high on such a list, but suffice it to say that performance among the students in those schools would not be at the high end of the test ranges.
Anyway, my former co-worker is headed off to a new job where she'll make considerably more moulah, but in reality she hasn't really improved her situation much since she'll be paying for more gasoline to travel to the new job, and oh yeah, by the way, she'll continue to pay the private tuition costs.
So back to the main point here. In talking to my former co-worker, know she is one of those middle of the road political types. Typically she's voting Democratic because she buys into the typical political pandering and promises of the left, and she also typically buys into the smear campaigns of the left that promise no more abortions (though she herself is, I believe, opposed to abortion), no more Social Security, etc., that will all come to fruition if the GOP controls things.
And yet this same person (and her husband) stand to benefit the most if they are able to enjoy the use of vouchers to help pay for the education of their child(ren). As is they are already wasting thousands in tax payments for schools that they get absolutely no benefit out of. Property taxes, state and local income taxes, and sales taxes that help to fund schools that they fear sending their school aged child to.
So, please, someone tell me again, why aren't more people in favor of real competition amongst schools? Competition paid in part by giving parents choices for where to send their children by giving them back some of the very same tax money they have already paid so much of.
