By William Haupt III [Tennessee Watchdog Journalist, Columnist, Author, and Citizen Legislator via The Center Square]
Image Credit: The
Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice / Public Domain
It’s a disgrace that there is more illiteracy
today than there was 100 years ago.” – Milton Friedman
For decades after the American Revolution, our parents
were the drivers of how and where their children were educated. Parents chose
from home schools and private schools to educate their children. The first
state public-funded schools appeared in the 1840s. But it was not until the
1900s during the Progressive Era that government gained control of funding and
regulating education.
As government took more control of education, parents
became subordinate to central education manipulation. Government dictated
everything in every classroom. When Jimmy Carter married the National Teachers
Union with the Department of Education in 1979, government and unions took
ownership of education. If parents did not like local education, they had to
pay for private schools.
Milton Friedman was an economist that rejected
Keynesianism, the theory that government could control the economy better than
free markets. Friedman’s view was based on the concept of free markets and
“rational expectations.” Friedman theorized that free market competition is the
most powerful tool in our nation to surpass any and all expectations we can
expect from government.
Following the second Great War in the 1950s, Communists
in Eastern Europe proved what a dangerous tool education was in the hands of
government. A young economist, Milton Friedman did not want to see that in
America and penned his thesis, defining “The Role of Government in Education.”
“A student’s education should not be
determined by government but their parents.” – Milton Friedman
Friedman felt it was necessary for government to fund
education, but it had no right to administer it. He believed monopolized
government control of public education empowered the government to indoctrinate
young minds into thinking the way politicians want students to think, not their
parents. He blamed federal and union control of education for stagnant and
declining student test scores.
Pointing to the economic success of market consumer
choice and competition, Friedman blamed the lack of consumer choice on our
inferior education system.
“It is unjustified for any government to have
absolute monopolistic control over any commodity in the free markets.” – Milton
Friedman
Milton Friedman said lack of competition in a nation
built and dependent on free market principles produces inferior products. If we
apply these economic principles to a non-responsive government-administered
education program, competition for education dollars would vastly improve
education.
According to Friedman, to improve education we must find better methods to administer it and to finance it. He insisted, instead of government making the decisions how and where children are educated, they should provide education vouchers to parents to use for schools of their choice.
Friedman believed giving parents education vouchers would
empower them to “improve education” though free market competition, which in
turn would force the government’s inferior public school system to improve. As
more and more parents choose private and chartered schools over failing public
schools, the public-school systems would be responsive to parental concerns and
improve.
“Most arguments against the free market is a
lack of belief in freedom itself.” – Milton Friedman
Six decades later, we have living proof that Friedman’s
“The Role of Government in Education” is the logical foundation of the modern
American school-choice movement. People isolated from the academic world are
seldom exposed to innovative ideas and concepts. So Friedman’s article went
largely unnoticed in the public. But once those seeds were planted, over time
they have blossomed.
In 1989, Wisconsin put Friedman’s ideas into practice
when it approved the first voucher program allowing students to use vouchers to
pay tuition at private schools. Shortly after, 18 states passed similar voucher
programs. Vouchers remain the most attractive private school choice programs.
“Do-it-yourself education beats factory
production education anytime anyplace.” – Milton Friedman
In 2003 during an education symposium, Friedman suggested
there are many alternatives to public education. He cited education savings
accounts would allow parents to use taxpayer funds to pay for tuition and other
education expenses. In 2011, Arizona implemented the nation’s first education
savings account option. Florida, Tennessee, Mississippi and North Carolina soon
followed them.
A charter school is a tuition-free contract school,
publicly funded, but independent from the public system. Friedman believed
parents would support such a system. And this has come to fruition in over 40
states. According to the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, many of
the best-known charter school networks are run by nonprofit charter management
organizations, or CMOs.
Private religious school choice was ruled constitutional
when the Supreme Court ruled it was legal for Ohio’s Pilot Project Scholarship
Program to provide vouchers for students to attend nonreligious and religious
schools. The court held that the program neither advances nor inhibits religion
at any school and that publicly funded school vouchers go to the parents rather
than the private schools.
Milton Friedman and wife Rose founded the Friedman
Foundation for Educational Choice in 1996 to promote freedom of choice in
education. Today, it is simply called EdChoice. Although the name has changed,
the mission lives on. There were only five education choice programs when it
opened. Twenty years later, more than 400,000 students participate in 61
programs in 30 states.
Milton Friedman said, “Our mistake is to judge programs
by their intentions not their results.” Our founders promised a quality
education for every youth in the nation. But by the time this system was in
place it was run by politicians, not parents. A century later the system was in
such disrepair Milton Friedman realized that the only way to repair it was to
make it competitive in the free market.
The discussion of school choice stimulated by Friedman’s
“The Role of Government in Education” has grown and has penetrated the broad
public. Most parents and citizens now believe that more choice is needed and
less government and union control. Giving parents the information about the
deficiencies in public education and other education choices will result in
better educated students.
The greatest flaw in public education is union run
government schools. Proposed federal education reforms are the same as those
that failed. They propose doing more of what we’ve already done: More money,
smaller classes, increased teacher pay and benefits, more schools and expanded
central control. “To the public union school system, school choice is a threat,
not an improvement.”
“If we are really concerned that our children
receive a quality education, we must empower parents and their children to have
equal access to appropriate educational opportunities.” – Milton Friedman
________________
About the Author: William Haupt III is a retired professional journalist, author, and citizen legislator in California for over 40 years. He got his start working to approve California Proposition 13.
His work also appears in The
Center Square, The
Western Journal, Neighbor Newspapers, KPXJ 21
(Shreveport, LA), Killeen Daily Herald, Aberdeen
American News, InsideNova, Kankakee
Daily Journal, Monterey
County Weekly, Olean
Times Herald, The
Greeneville Sun and more. Follow William
on Twitter @iii_haupt.
https://tennesseeconservativenews.com/milton-friedmans-role-of-government-in-education/
