A recent
New York Times piece heralding the arrival of the
libertarian moment has triggered a backlash—well documented by
Reason writers
here and
here—from some noted anti-libertarians determined to rain on
our freedom-loving parade. The most predictably awful response came
from Paul Krugman, who went full Krugman and declared that
libertarianism is an answer to “problems we don’t have.”
Nobody paying even cursory attention to the news could actually
believe that, but in case you’ve been living under a rock, Reason’s
J.D. Tuccille recently listed
five policy areas where libertarianism is making people’s lives
better.
I’d like to suggest another: education. School choice—a concept
popularized by libertarians like Milton Friedman—is
liberating students from the oppressive failures of traditional
public schools by empowering parents to get their kids into
classrooms with teachers who actually care. To create innovative
learning environments, entrepreneurs need room to breathe, and
school choice gives them just that. Some charter schools may fail,
but taken as a whole, the U.S.’s limited experiment in unshackling
its classrooms is a success
worthy of celebration.
Want evidence that the libertarian movement is here? The
libertarian approach to education is more popular than ever. Even
Democrats—once ironclad allies of notoriously freedom-hostile
teachers unions—are increasingly on board with liberty-friendly
reforms. (Union bosses, having embraced some of the
angriest and
ugliest rhetoric imaginable, have no one to blame but
themselves.) In the recent Vergara v.
California decision, for instance, the Supreme Court
agreed with the plaintiffs that California’s unconstitutionally
broad protections for teachers were “handcuffing”
schools. Arne Duncan, President Obama’s Education Secretary,
released a statement in support of the ruling.
Libertarian-leaning Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky), a likely
presidential contender, has made school choice a paramount
issue—and one he uses to
chart new territory among minority communities that have been
skeptical of the limited government message in the past but are
nevertheless excited about school choice. Those who take the
opposite view, that inner city students should be condemned to
languish in failing public schools, are increasingly outside the
mainstream.
The horizon isn’t entirely bright for libertarian education
reformers, given the threats of increased centralization and
nationalization posed by the Common Core curriculum. But even on
that front, a weird mix of people with almost nothing in common
other than a basically libertarian skepticism of standardization
seem to be winning the fight.
Take that, Krugman.
More from Reason on education reform here.
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