Will Wilkinson’s post on Friday got me thinking about the public vs. private education debate, the two sides of which are essentially as follows (if anyone needs a refresher): Democrats favor more spending on public education while Republicans favor putting that money toward vouchers for use at private schools. It occurred to me that the argument for ditching public education in favor of private schools (based on the often correct notion that private schools are better and on the idea that parents should be able to choose their child’s school) makes the assumption that education is a good or service offered to the market. This assumption is dangerous though, and is representative of what’s been holding the U.S. back in education standards worldwide.

The rest after the jump...

Democrats believe that education is a right, whereas Republicans treat it like any other service available in the free market. The problem with treating education as a service is that without it, individuals have little hope of further advancement in society; on a broader scale, if every American does not have an education, the U.S. will begin to stall (in fact, has already stalled and is lagging behind even further) in math and science, the two most important fields for a green energy sector. The notion that providing an education is an option rather than an obligation implies that success can be achieved without it, a notion that has no basis in fact in this century.

And if education is a right, the government has a duty to protect that right by providing a good standard of public education to every student. Draining money from public education to pour into vouchers only further prevents us from providing that education. Vouchers are not, and can never be, a solution for every family. Treating public education as a lost cause is not a productive use of our time or tax dollars.