What If Public Schools Were Abolished?

What If Public Schools Were Abolished?
by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
lewrockwell@mac.com

In American culture, public schools are praised in public and
criticized in private, which is roughly the opposite of how we tend to treat
large-scale enterprises like Wal-Mart. In public, everyone says that
Wal-Mart is awful, filled with shoddy foreign products and exploiting
workers. But in private, we buy the well-priced, quality goods, and long
lines of people hope to be hired.

Why is this? It has something to do with the fact that public
schools are part of our civic religion, the primary evidence that people
cite to show that local government serves us. And there is a psychological
element. Most of us turn our kids over to them, so surely they must have our
best interest at heart!

But do they? Murray N. Rothbard's Education: Free and Compulsory
explains that the true origin and purpose of public education is not so much
education as we think of it, but indoctrination in the civic religion. This
explains why the civic elite is so suspicious of homeschooling and private
schooling: it's not fear of low test scores that is driving this, but the
worry that these kids aren't learning the values that the state considers
important.

But to blast public schools is not the purpose of this article.
There are decent public schools and terrible ones, so there is no use
generalizing. Nor is there a need to trot out data on test scores. Let me
just deal with economics. All studies have shown that average cost per pupil
for public schools is twice that of private schools (here is a sample
study).

This runs contrary to intuition, since people think of public
schools as free and private schools as expensive. But once you consider the
source of funding (tax dollars vs. market tuition or donation), the private
alternative is much cheaper. In fact, the public schools cost as much as the
most expensive and elite private schools in the country. The difference is
that the cost of public schooling is spread out over the entire population,
whereas the private school cost is borne only by the families with students
who attend them.

In short, if we could abolish public schools and compulsory
schooling laws, and replace it all with market-provided education, we would
have better schools at half the price, and be freer too. We would also be a
more just society, with only the customers of education bearing the costs.

What's not to like? Well, there is the problem of the
transition. There are obvious and grave political difficulties. We might say
that public education enjoys a political advantage here due to network
effects. A significant number of "subscriptions, " etc. have been piled up in
the status quo, and it is very difficult to change those.

But let's pretend. Let's say that a single town decided that the
costs of public schooling are too vast relative to private schooling, and
the city council decided to abolish public schools outright. The first thing
to notice is that this would be illegal, since every state requires
localities to provide education on a public basis. I don't know what would
happen to the city council. Would they be jailed? Who knows? Certainly they
would be sued.

But let's say we somehow get past that problem, thanks to, say,
a special amendment in the state constitution, that exempts certain
localities if the city council approves. Then there is the problem of
federal legislation and regulation. I am purely speculating since I don't
know the relevant laws, but we can guess that the Department of Education
would take notice, and a national hysteria of some sort would follow. But
let's say we miraculously get past that problem too, and the federal
government lets this locality go its own way.

There will be two stages to the transition. In the first stage,
many seemingly bad things will happen. How are the physical buildings
handled in our example? They are sold to the highest bidder, whether that be
to new school owners, businesses, or housing developers. And the teachers
and administrators? All let go. You can imagine the outcry.

With property taxes abolished, people with kids in public
schools might move away. There will be no premium for houses in school
districts that are considered good. There will be anger about this. For the
parents that remain, there is a major problem of what to do with the kids
during the day.

With property taxes gone, there is extra money to pay for
schools, but their assets have just fallen in market value (even without the
Fed), which is a serious problem when it comes to shelling out for school
tuition. There will, of course, be widespread hysteria about the poor too,
who will find themselves without any schooling choices other than
homeschool.

Now, all that sounds pretty catastrophic, doesn't it? Indeed.
But it is only phase one. If we can somehow make it to phase two, something
completely different will emerge. The existing private schools will be
filled to capacity and there will be a crying need for new ones.
Entrepreneurs will quickly flood into the area to provide schools on a
competitive basis. Churches and other civic institutions will gather the
money to provide education.

At first, the new schools will be modeled on the public school
idea. Kids will be there from 8 to 4 or 5, and all classes will be covered.
But in short order, new alternatives will appear. There will be schools for
half-day classes. There will be large, medium, and small schools. Some will
have 40 kids per class, and others 4 or 1. Private tutoring will boom.
Sectarian schools of all kinds will appear. Micro-schools will open to serve
niche interests: science, classics, music, theater, computers, agriculture,
etc. There will be single sex schools. Whether sports would be part of
school or something completely independent is for the market to decide.

And no longer will the "elementary, middle school, high school"
model be the only one. Classes will not necessarily be grouped by age alone.
Some will be based on ability and level of advancement too. Tuition would
range from free to super expensive. The key thing is that the customer would
be in charge.

Transportation services would spring up to replace the old
school-bus system. People would be able to make money by buying vans and
providing transportation. In all areas related to education, profit
opportunities would abound.

In short, the market for education would operate the same as any
other market. Groceries, for example. Where there is a demand, and obviously
people demand education for their kids, there is supply. There are large
grocery stores, small ones, discount ones, premium ones, and stores for
groceries on the run. It is the same for other goods, and it would be the
same for education. Again, the customer would rule. In the end, what would
emerge is not entirely predictable - the market never is - but whatever
happened would be in accord with the wishes of the public.

After this phase two, this town would emerge as one of the most
desirable in the country. Educational alternatives would be unlimited. It
would be the source of enormous progress, and a model for the nation. It
could cause the entire country to rethink education. And then those who
moved away would move back to enjoy the best schools in the country at half
the price of the public schools, and those without children in the house
wouldn't have to pay a dime for education. Talk about attractive!

So which town will be the first to try it and show us all the
way?

Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. is founder and president
of the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, editor of
LewRockwell. com, and author of Speaking of Liberty.

© 2008 LewRockwell. com



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