By James J. Florio.
If there is anything good in the bad New Jersey fiscal situation, with its revenue shortfall of almost $700 million to $1.4 billion, it’s the fact that this lamentable condition should constitute the last nail in the coffin bearing a horrible educational idea: vouchers.
The financing of vouchers under pending proposals would authorize businesses to write off their state taxes, dollar for dollar, tax credits to pay for such vouchers. They would be creatively labeled “scholarships.” At a time of record deficits, each tax dollar lost to the state would make a very bad situation worse. You don’t have to be an economist to understand that tax credits are tax expenditures and, thus, revenues lost to be made up by someone else.
We should all be intellectually honest enough to label a business tax break as such and not call it an educational funding mechanism — especially when it undermines our, historically, successful universal system of public education. Fiscal irresponsibility and educational deprivation — perfect together?
Our American public school system, open to all of our children, has been responsible for the nation’s formation and development. It is the institution that harmonized our diversity, created a literate citizenry, brought us unparalleled prosperity and is the key to the upward mobility that provides us with social stability.
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