“The place to begin in thinking about the issue [of school vouchers] is with the difference between the state’s mandating and subsidizing a service, on the one hand, and providing the service itself, on the other hand. The government can require that children be vaccinated and pay for their vaccination without manufacturing vaccines. Similarly, it can require that children attend school and pay for their schooling without operating schools, something it doesn’t seem to be particularly good at; politics and teachers’ unions drive up costs and drive down quality. The government would have to impose minimum standards on all voucher-supported schools, as it does now on private schools, but that is different from ownership and control. The government used to regulate railroad rates, but, unlike the practice in many other countries, it did not own the railroads. A voucher system is a first step toward privatizing education. Means-tested voucher entitlements would enable parents to select a school even if they had no private means. Many rich people would continue to send their kids to fancier schools than vouchers would pay for, but that would be no different than under the current system of public and private education” –Richard Posner, responding to comments over at the Becker Posner blog