If you didn’t know better, you might think Gov. Kevin Stitt was related to Mother Teresa. He is so concerned about poor children “trapped” in low-performing public schools without options that he plans to use state funds (whether vouchers or tax credits) to pay for private school tuition. Finally, he preaches, we will offer a “way out” for poor single mothers on the south side of OKC or the north side of Tulsa (aka Black and brown mothers) and their children who are lost to gangs, drugs, and violence. Thank you, Jesus.
Who does Stitt think he is kidding? After going on and on about how rich folks already have school choice, which is true, he pretends to be pushing school choice legislation that is both unconstitutional and violates the separation of church and state so that he can save the “last and the least of these.” You could almost hear the angels singing, except they were too busy gagging.
How will Stitt save these poor kids? The governor and his party (who once called public school teachers “slugs”), will try to make it possible for everyone, including those rich people who already have school choice, to also get vouchers or tax credits. That is, his plan to subsidize private education with our tax dollars will be based on a new and revolutionary concept of need. You get it whether you need it or not.
So let me see if I understand exactly how this will benefit poor kids. If you can afford private education for your kids you are truly fortunate. But you are also expected to pay the taxes that help to educate other, less fortunate kids. This is not double taxation from which you need relief. This is that quaint but disappearing concept known as the Common Good. It is the very heart and soul of the American Experiment.
So, let’s assume that the bill passes, either for vouchers or for tax credits. Who really wins and who really loses? When other states have tried this, most recently Arizona, the data spoke louder (and more truthfully) than the politicians. Rich people gained the most from the plan, when those applying turned out to be the top 25 percent of the wealthiest households, and four out of five students were already in private schools or being home-schooled. Arizona Governor Doug Ducey sounded just like Stitt when he said it was all about the poor kids “locked in underperforming schools.”
To help mitigate this deception and improve the odds that we pass some version of what should be called the Lying About Kids Act, some lawmakers have proposed an income cap of $250,000. Stitt would have nothing to do with it, reminding us that he believes in the free market, and income caps are unnecessary government meddling. Of course. This makes perfect sense from someone who is proposing that the government get involved in subsidizing those who can already afford to buy something, or have already purchased it, by helping them to pay for it with other people’s money. Adam Smith is turning over in his grave.
House Speaker Charles McCall said that an income gap is a form of “class warfare.” Yes it is. We can’t allow poor people to resent rich people for using public funds to buy what they can already afford, now can we? What’s more, how are rich people supposed to feel if they are left out of the educational welfare they say no one should get—unless of course they can get it too! We never think the government is wasting money when it is wasted on us. As for Speaker McCall’s concern about class warfare, news flash: we’ve been at war for a long time, and the rich won.
Besides, let’s face it. We all know that most poor kids won’t be able to cash in their vouchers or tax credits for private school tuition. Many rural districts don’t even have those options to begin with, and there are transportation issues, as well as no guarantee that those students in south OKC or north Tulsa would even be admitted to private schools. Diversity and inclusion are not the hallmarks of private education—lack of diversity and exclusion are, and that’s why they attract those who can afford them. What’s more, every time a student good enough to be admitted to a private school leaves a failing public school, the failure of the school she left behind is accelerated.
The truth is often painful and difficult to hear. We are in a downward spiral when it comes to the most important single collective social obligation we have in America: a good public education for every child. Every move that Republicans make to accommodate the rich while pretending to help the poor drains resources from what should be our priority—helping the kids who truly need help.
Before somebody turns out the lights on common education, we need to support the few brave voices left at the Capitol, like that of Julia Kirt (D-Oklahoma City), whose recent analogy was simple and effective, like the truth-telling boy in the story of The Emperor’s New Clothes. “We joke that this is like a person saying they want to take their tax dollars from a local park and use it for a country club membership they are already paying for.” I would also add, while at the same time expecting others to pay more to keep the park up to their neighborhood standards.
Who knows, maybe the dirty little secret is that Republicans know that we can’t attract high-tech businesses to a state whose public schools they have helped to destroy unless we also include individual educational tax incentives for the kids of the employees who move here.
Sounds like corporate welfare to me.
This is not “soaking the rich.” It’s subsidizing them at the expense of the poor.
Shame on us.
The Rev. Dr. Robin Meyers is pastor of First Congregational Church UCC in Norman and retired senior minister of Mayflower Congregational UCC in Oklahoma City. He is currently Professor of Public Speaking, and Distinguished Professor of Social Justice Emeritus in the Philosophy Department at Oklahoma City University, and the author of eight books on religion and American culture, the most recent of which is, Saving God from Religion: A Minister’s Search for Faith in a Skeptical Age.
Visit robinmeyers.com
