Putting a Price Tag on Universal School Voucher Programs

Over the past few years, Governors and Legislatures in states around the country have sought to implement universal private school voucher programs that mean every resident child, regardless of family income or prior enrollment in public school, is eligible to receive public funding for private education expenses. These universal voucher programs have already led to the transfer of billions of taxpayer dollars to the largely unaccountable and unregulated private sector.

The price tag of universal voucher programs is often underestimated significantly, resulting in programs that are many times more expensive than what voucher proponents and lawmakers initially promise.

To help public education supporters push back against these distortions and prevent further expansion of these harmful voucher programs, Education Law Center has created an advocacy tool that makes it possible to estimate the potential price tag of a universal voucher program in any state. In three simple steps, users can project the amount of taxpayer funds that would be diverted to pay for private education.

Users will select a particular state, an amount for the universal voucher, and the percentage of public school and nonpublic students that will seek a voucher. With that information, the tool calculates the total price tag. The tool also shows how much of the total price would fund vouchers for students already receiving private education.

For example, a bill recently passed by the Texas Senate would create a universal voucher program providing families with $10,000 per pupil. If just half of all currently enrolled private school students and only 5% of public school students receive a voucher, the price tag would be $5 billion, five times the funding allocated in the bill. Nearly half of that $5 billion in taxpayer funds would pay for students already participating in private education. (No Texas voucher bill has been enacted.)

“Advocates can use this tool to project future costs of enacted voucher programs as they expand or to estimate the price tag of newly proposed voucher programs in state legislatures around the country,” said Danielle Farrie, ELC Research Director. “Our hope is this information can help public school supporters make clear the enormously high price of these vouchers.”

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