Ending Free Public Education

by Kerry Thomas

June 9, 2002

As another school year draws to a close we are witnessing an obviously coordinated effort to repeal the laws our legislature enacted a few years ago, in response to the demand from Wisconsin taxpayers to control the then out of control annual tax hikes by local school districts.

Those controls have worked. They have served to limit the blank check mentality responsible for our property tax increases, making all of us more cognizant of the role of taxpayers to the educational system we now have.

Now we are hearing the pleadings from school administrators that they cannot live within the fiscal limits placed upon them. Whether by design or by coincidence, school boards, administrators, and teachers unions are all crying for a repeal of these limits.

The legislature put in place a simple mechanism for raising taxes by these groups. It is called a referendum. Assemble your budgets, make hard choices, and, if you cannot limit your spending, you must get the approval of the taxpayers before you raise their taxes. If your expenditures are in line with the wishes of the local taxpayers, they will approve your referendum. If not, they will reject your wishes.

The referendum process is the only real way local taxpayers can control the spending of the local school districts. And it is working just fine in Wisconsin. When increased expenditures are justified, referendums pass.

When the economy slows, we all should expect less take-home pay, even the teachers and other public employees. The people who work in the private sector to pay your salaries don't get an automatic pay raise every year. They have to earn it by increasing their productivity for their employers. They don't get a pay raise just because they have higher expenses.

Those who work harder, get bigger paychecks. But not so when you're part of a union. No matter how hard you work, you get paid just as little as the worst employee. Is there any better reason to question your union membership?

Perhaps the time has come to re-examine the entire concept of a free compulsory public education all together. Every year, more and more parents are choosing to find alternative means of education for their children, even though they still pay the local school taxes. How in the world did America ever come into existence before compulsory public education? Were our Founders uneducated men? No, they were educated at home, privately. Maybe it's time to think about that approach once again. With the information available on the Internet these days, an entire world is now open to learn from. And it's a lot more cost-effective, too.