How Vouchers Harm Public Schools

Excerpt:  “Voucher programs for schools are rapidly expanding across the country. Under these programs, public budgets provide funding to parents to either send their children to private school or homeschool them. These programs’ growing popularity raises the question of whether letting public money leave the public school system and subsidize private forms of schooling is a way to improve children’s access to an excellent education. EPI’s analysis shows that vouchers harm public schools. To illustrate the damage, EPI has developed a tool that estimates fiscal externalities—the dollar costs to school districts from students leaving public schools with a voucher. An externality produces an outcome for those who aren’t responsible for the decision at hand. In this case, the fiscal externality is the negative effect that voucher programs will have on public school systems: Voucher programs redirect money away from traditional public schools.”