This analysis forgets the difference between fixed and variable costs. Sure, the school may pay about $10K per student, but its not like one more student coming in adds $10K to the annual budget. I'm sure the vast majority of that $10K is teacher salaries and facilities. These costs are probably evenly distributed over the total number of students in the system and will not go down should a bunch of students go to private schools, unless the school sells buildings and fires teachers. What are the odds of that happening? What will really happen is that the cost per pupil will simply rise. Unless the variable portion of the cost per student is higher than the $7500 voucher, the schools will suffer financially.

Of course, I think that's all irrelevent. I totally support vouchers. Some of these public schools are a crime against children, and deserve to implode.

Aaron,

This analysis forgets the difference between fixed and variable costs.

True, but most costs are variable.

I'm sure the vast majority of that $10K is teacher salaries and facilities.

Teachers aren't a fixed cost. If school enrollment drops 30%, you can lay off 30% of teachers or transfer them to another school. It isn't anything like the heating bill, which would be, for the most part, a fixed cost.

Facilities costs are similar. Fewer students means less work for custodians, less wear and tear on the building, and less need for construction costs related to new students. This is not to say that no costs are fixed, or that all of the money is perfectly fungible. Yet most costs related to students can be cut if the school is willing, and if they aren't, then the problem is theirs.

These costs are probably evenly distributed over the total number of students in the system and will not go down should a bunch of students go to private schools, unless the school sells buildings and fires teachers.

Why shouldn't the district sell buildings or fire teachers? Again, if they're going to be stupid and selfish, that isn't the fault of vouchers. That's the fault of school administrators.

Of course, I think that's all irrelevent. I totally support vouchers. Some of these public schools are a crime against children, and deserve to implode.

Whoa! 180! I'm glad to hear that you're merely making predictions and not leaving this as an ethical argument. However, I still think you are misdefining 'fixed costs' by presenting them in terms of whatever school administrators are unwilling to cut. Fixed costs exist independently of the intransigence of school administrators.

The solution is to insist that spending on children actually go to the children. Give each child $13,500 and do away with overhead entirely. Not a voucher, actual money. Hand it to the child.

Of course nobody means _that_. Money goes to people who like money. The cover is that it's spending on children. That difference for some reason is invisible to the modern mind.

It's spending on children because we say it's spending on children. Well of course all sorts of mischief starts there. Even the voucher solution refuses to spend on children. The money goes to somebody else who likes money. They're just not unionized yet so there are hopes it will work better for a tiny while.

Excellent analysis Owen. You saved me a lot of breath. The only thing I would add is that with elastic demand, teachers (and principals, custodians, etc) would be free to migrate from schools with declining enrollment (the government schools) to schools with increasing enrollment (the private schools), which would negate most of the unemployment issues.

Owen,

I'm not saying the post is wrong, simply that it ignored an important distinction by flatly saying that every student going on a voucher will save the school $10K. Nobody knows how much of that $10K per student is fixed and how much is variable because it depends entirely on how the vouchers are implemented. I think that around the margins teacher salaries and facilities are in fact fixed to a great extent, regardless of what the administrators want. There are approximately 68K students and 167 schools in the DC system. This bill allows for 1300 students to get vouchers. That's not even an entire high school.

In order to realize any savings at all, those vouchers will have to be concentrated in a very small number of those schools, enabling entire schools to be emptied. Maybe that's the plan, and I hope it is, but what if its 15 or 20 students from each grade in 15 or 20 different schools? That's not going to equate to $10M in operating savings for the school district. The savings definitely isn't 0, but there is a very real possibility that it may not be $10M either. My point is simply that the schools are probably going to lose money on this deal, but its worth it. You know, for The Children.

The public schools have to have a budget crisis of such proportions that they fire people. That's the point. If they don't, the same rocks that are there now will stay there. Their fixed costs have to kill them.

It's like gasoline prices with respect to inelasticity. Everybody says that gasoline demand is inelastic, so raising the price doesn't reduce demand, and it amounts to a ripoff by the oil companies. No, inelastic means that screaming and bitching happens when the price goes up, accompanying reduced demand; rather than reduced demand alone. The same thing has to happen to dysfunctional schools: screaming and yelling. It's inelastic, is all.

Charles Hill of Dustbury has a post on vouchers and their hazards today. You might want to check it out.

Fuck this "fixed" and "variable" cost issue. The REAL bottom line is that students in DC schools ARE NOT LEARNING and that is the problem. I don't care how much money you pour into a Black Hole. The money will disappear and you'll be left with a Black Hole.

Most public schools suck, all over the country. Bush is not about to change the status quo (the cowardly bastard) and there isn't a politician in the country with the balls to challenge the Teacher's Unions. We can accept what we have (which is shit) or rebel.

We did the same thing in 1776. We can do it again. Vouchers are a good first step.

Getting Washington DC OUT of education, abolishing teacher's unions and requiring teacher competence can come later.

Ron,

Everybody says that gasoline demand is inelastic, so raising the price doesn't reduce demand, and it amounts to a ripoff by the oil companies.

1) Gasoline demand isn't inelastic. It isn't as elastic as some other commodities, but as prices go up, people do drive less.

2) The oil companies aren't 'ripping off' anybody. They compete with each other on price, which is why a gallon of refined gasoline doesn't cost a great deal relative to other commodities.

Aaron,

I think that around the margins teacher salaries and facilities are in fact fixed to a great extent, regardless of what the administrators want.

How so? I shouldn't need to repeat myself -- fewer students means less wear and tear on buildings, fewer teachers, fewer school supplies, etc, etc. Unless administrators are willing to adjust to the changing student population, they should be able to save substantial amounts of money.

In order to realize any savings at all, those vouchers will have to be concentrated in a very small number of those schools, enabling entire schools to be emptied.

This is completely false. You would not need to empty out an entire school to experience savings from school vouchers, unless you proceed from the ridiculous assumption that individual students cost the school absolutely nothing -- that they have no relation to the number of employees needed, the amount of supplies needed, and so forth.

Granted, allowing for some schools to be closed down would be a major savings, because you could then sell the land, which is an asset, and vouchers would actually make a net profit for the district. However, in serving fewer students, schools will need less money. It's as simple as that.

While there is a portion of per pupil spending attributed to fixed costs, it is likely quite small.

I would be willing to bet that government officials will always make sure that two things are certain:
1. Vouchers will always be less than per pupil spending.
2. The difference will always be more than enough to cover any fixed costs.

You guys are off the mark with your "financial analysis" -- most school costs are fixed, not variable especially when it comes to teachers' salaries. A school is not a factory where you can simply "cut staff by 30%". Reason? Because kids are split up into different grades. Put it this way -- you have an elementary school with 100 kids. 25 in first grade, 25 in second grade, 25 in third grade and 25 in fourth grade. Each class has one teacher. If say, 25% of the students in the school leave to go to federally funded private school it's not like all 25 kids in the third grade are going to leave, so you can just sack the third grade teacher. You'll have 5 kids leave from first grade, 5 kids from second grade, etc. Please explain to me how you can lay off a teacher under this scenario and save compensation cost? Combine grades?

At the end of the day, I don't think that anyone would argue that many school districts and schools are broken and need reform and assistance. Taking away money from them is just not the way to do it. And can't you libertarians see that this won't take government out of the schools at ALL?

"Taking away money from them is just not the way to do it."

How is giving parents the choice to use their tax dollars for private schools rather than government schools "taking away money" from government schools?

By that logic, if a college kid chooses to go to State instead of Tech, he's taking money away from Tech by not continuing to pay them tuition.

I thought lefties liked choice? I guess when it comes to picking schools, you think choice is bad.

Ravenwood: You are the master of the bait and switch / change the topic when you can't answer the question. I go and question your side's math and typical of most conservatives, you just resort to idiotic and assinine assuptions that are driven off of your own interpretation of what you think I think. It's seriously incredible.

I'll do you the favor of directly answering your question even though you didn't bother to answer mine. "How is giving parents the choice to use their tax dollars for private schools rather than government schools "taking away money" from government schools? " Well, let's see here. Let's take my example above -- 100 kid elementary school spending 10k per kid. 25% leave the school. You have now removed $187,500 from the school budget (25 * $7500). By your flawed logic this means that the school is getting $2500 per kid even though they aren't there. The problem is that when you remove the 25 kids from the school, the per student spending goes up, because fixed costs are well . . . fixed. They don't change. So even with 75 kids, you're still spending $1m per year (okay, fine, you cut out some variable costs like school lunches and um, well, that's the ONLY school-related variable cost I can think of). So let's say you can even cut out $100k from the budget based on 25 kids leaving. $1m - $187.5k + $100k is still an $87.5k budget shortfall. Where is that money going to come from?

I certainly do think that people should be able to choose schools -- my mom teaches at a private school. I just don't think that we should take away tax dollars from public schools to do it. If parents want private schools, let them pay for it. Your argument of parents having the choice of where their tax dollars are spent is a fantastic red herring. My tax dollars are spent on lots of things I don't necessarily agree with (#1 is the billions we're spending on Gulf Two). But at the end of the day, it's called living in a SOCIETY. Seriously, dude -- are you completely unable to form a logical argument?

lazywhiner,

A school is not a factory where you can simply "cut staff by 30%".

You can always cut staff, even if tasks are specialized. Factories have highly specialized workers, but you can bet if demand drops for their product, they lay off the appropriate workers to keep output matching demand. Schools should be able to do the same. It doesn't matter what grade they're teaching; they can do it.

Reason? Because kids are split up into different grades. Put it this way -- you have an elementary school with 100 kids. 25 in first grade, 25 in second grade, 25 in third grade and 25 in fourth grade. Each class has one teacher

You don't have any public schools in D.C. with around 100 kids. Let's add another zero just be accurate, hmmm? From now on it's 1,000 with 250 in each grade.

If say, 25% of the students in the school leave to go to federally funded private school it's not like all 25 kids in the third grade are going to leave, so you can just sack the third grade teacher. You'll have 5 kids leave from first grade, 5 kids from second grade, etc. Please explain to me how you can lay off a teacher under this scenario and save compensation cost?

Well, since I'm adding zeros, this works out fine. Instead of five kids leaving each grade, we have 50 leaving each grade. That's enough to lay off a teacher in each grade with.

(And BTW - A teacher in one grade can actually teach a class in another).

And that comment about school lunches being the only variable cost with regards to schools? That was stupid. First of all, there are school supplies (books, classroom materials, etc)... And whether you like it or not, maintainence and teaching costs go down when you have fewer students. These are facts.

Most costs are variable. They can change if the administration is willing to adjust in response to a changing student population.

Oh goody, I have a raving looney liberal on my side. Never thought that would happen. I must have gone wrong somewhere.

Owen and Ravenwood, I think we're all agreeing here in principle. All I'm trying to say is that that some portion of the cost per pupil is fixed for the numbers of student we're talking about in THIS PARTICULAR PROGRAM. The variable portion may or may not be greater than the voucher value, depending on how many students use the vouchers and how the student reductions are distributed. I simply don't know enough of the particulars to say one way or another.

As a general concept, I wholeheartedly agree that costs trend linearly to 0 as students are removed from the system. If you cut half the students, I'm sure you do cut half the costs. If you cut all the students, you definitely cut all the costs (obviously). But if you only cut 10% of the students, or in the case of this voucher program, less than 2% of the students, I'm not convinced that many of those costs could be cut by the same proportion. The cuts would come in big chunks. I do staffing efficiency and reorganization studies at work all the time and that's how it usually turns out. You can't fire half an employee.

That being said, it really doesn't matter. I'm not at all arguing that vouchers are a bad idea. If anything, I'm arguing that the program should be expanded significantly so that these savings can if fact be realized. Parents definitely should have the option to put their kids wherever they want. I would never expect a parent to put their child in some hell-hole school just to serve some abstact concept of collective effort in public education. When did we turn into a country where our children are expected to be sacrificial lambs on the altar of government programs? If "living in a SOCIETY", as it was so condescendingly put, requires me to forfeit my kid's hope of a real opportunity at a good future, then that SOCIETY can (and will, eventually) go to hell as far as I'm concerned.

Ravenwood makes a good point that this was probably all taken into account when the voucher value was set. The math that "lazywhinerkid" worked through gets to the heart of the point I was trying to make, but seriously dude, you need to chill out. We're all grownups here, right? If Ravenwood is such an idiot, then why the hell are you reading his stuff? Just so you can work yourself into a lather all over his website? Don't you have a "Bush=Hitler" sign to make?

Damn, I'm sorry I started this whole discussion in the first place. I'll save my bitching for something important next time. Ravenwood, keep up the good work.

Lazywhinerkid,

I am not ignoring your question, I was simplifying it. You delved into specific mathematics that basically rely on the assumption that voucher value is more than the value of variable costs. That assumption is essential to the argument that kids being removed from the schools will increase the school's costs per pupil. No matter how you spin the numbers, your assumption is still there.

I figured rather than cite specific mathematics that illustrate my assumption that voucher value is probably less than the value of variable costs, I'd just take the easy (ie: "lazy") way out and simply state the assumption.

I can use numbers to illustrate my point, but why should I, if it is not necessary? I would rather simplify the argument than make it more complex than is necessary. Either way you look at it, your argument relies on one assumption and mine relies on the opposite assumption.

I used figures in my original post simply to illustrate my point, and ground it in logic. That is why I reduced them to a simple factor of 10. Conversely, you are using more complex numbers in an attempt to cloud the issue. Your figures are based on an assumption that vouchers are more than variable costs, yet you are asking me to show how they could illustrate that vouchers are less than variable costs, as if your numbers were grounded in fact. That is impossible to illustrate given your numbers, and for me to even try would be "idiotic and assinine (sic)".

I'm sorry that I didn't fall for your ruse, but daring me and calling me names isn't going to work.

Whether or not I have made an "idiotic and assinine (sic) assuption (sic)" as you claim, is a matter of opinion, and you offer no evidence that your assumption is any better than mine. Instead, you resort to childish name calling and superfluous numbers to make your point, and make it sound as if you have a better argument.

I'm not buying it, and to do so would truly be asinine.

Touché, maybe I did go off the deep end a bit, but firstly, I never called Ravenwood any names, I attacked his arguments and assertions. Secondly, I don't mean to get pedantic here, but read my first post which was more than polite, then read Ravenwood's post which is totally snarky and combative (not to mention pretty weak "I thought lefties liked choice? I guess when it comes to picking schools, you think choice is bad"). So basically, it really does come down to my main point -- Ravenwood makes a point, someone challenges him and he snarks. In my experience, this is very typical with conservatives. And then I'm the "raving looney liberal", I mean, really, can't you guys come up with anything else? And then to pick on my spelling . . . hehe, unreal. I bow down to your spelling skillz.

Thank you, Owen for actually responding. I dispute your "facts" though. While schools are certainly economies of scale, not all or most costs are variable. Sure, you can cut down on books and teaching supplies (touché), but at the end of the day the largest costs factored into cost / spending per pupil are building costs (including "rent" / paying bonds on construction projects which are far from variable) and teacher salaries, which could be variable under the circumstances you describe. Numbers never work out in reality as they do on paper. So what then? Overstressed teachers? Higher student-teacher ratios? Again, it's an economy of scale -- the more students at the school, the more programmes, afterschool activities, sports, etc. a school can afford. Once you decrease the number of students, you decrease the variety and quality of services, especially (and this is from experience in talking about this stuff with my mom, a private school teacher) when it comes to special needs programmes. She freely admits that they do not have the resources to deal properly with special needs kids. (Before anyone screams "Why aren't the biggest schools in the nation the best?" Look where they're located and get back to me. Inncer-city school receive proportionately less money and that's a fact.)

The one HUGE fact that hasn't been brought up yet is that the single #1 key to children receiving a good education is parental involvement. That's a whole 'nother debate, but at the end of the day, when parents get involved with their kids' education, be it private or public, kids do better and that's a fact.

lazywhiner,

it's an economy of scale -- the more students at the school, the more programmes, afterschool activities, sports, etc. a school can afford.

I went to big public schools in the suburbs for my first two years of junior high. They stank; I hated them. Then I left and when to a small private school for high school (graduating class: 34 students). It was a great deal better than what I'd experienced in a large public school.

Now this is just anecdotal, but I do disagree that bigger is better when it comes to public schools. You might have fewer programs, but the sheer number of programs has little to do with the overall quality of education.

Once you decrease the number of students, you decrease the variety and quality of services, especially (and this is from experience in talking about this stuff with my mom, a private school teacher) when it comes to special needs programmes.

Special needs programs can be sub-contracted out to private schools, with no reduction in the quality of education. The Supreme Court has held that this is constitutional even if the private school in question is religious. Moreover, special needs programs are only at issue when a large number of special needs kids take vouchers.

Before anyone screams "Why aren't the biggest schools in the nation the best?" Look where they're located and get back to me. Inncer-city school receive proportionately less money and that's a fact.

Suburban schools are also often quite large. I doubt there's a substantial different between inner-city schools and the behemouths that make up the suburbs. The major distinction is rural/urban, not inner-city/suburban.

Besides, the city we are now discussing -- that of Washington D.C. -- has one of the highest spending per child rates in the entire country. That blows the thesis that funding is the major issue at stake with inner-city schools or large schools in general. I would also cite that spending per student in New York public schools is far higher than in private Catholic schools, and yet private Catholic schools in New York garner far better results. I'd wager most of the Catholic schools are smaller as well.