Is Privatization through Education Vouchers Really the Answer?
Author InfoCarnoy, Martin Abstract Government-financed school vouchers promise to improve consumer choice while still providing the public funding needed for families to invest adequately in their children’s education. But politically and in practice, the choice that vouchers offer can mean many things, from eliminating neighborhood residency as a condition for attending a public school to allowing groups of parents and teachers to form their own public schools (charter schools in the United States, for example). And it can mean an educational system that is in part publicly funded but that is privately owned and operated with no public regulation. Choice through vouchers can also produce undesirable side effects that more than offset their optimistic promises. In this context, E. G. West presents a particular version of the case for vouchers. Although he allows for a range of possibilities, he puts primary emphasis on the privatization of education. This version of choice has to be di
