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I agree with Wendy Wagenheim's assessment of school vouchers ("Why Public Money Shouldn't Go to Private Schools," fall 1998), but for different reasons.
Government should not be in the business of educating our youth. My hard-earned money is taken from me in the form of sales, federal, state, and property taxes in order to subsidize the education of people I don't even know. It doesn't matter if vouchers are used for public or private school tuition.
If my property and sales taxes were lowered, I would voluntarily donate money to a private school that expounded my beliefsto paraphrase Thomas Jefferson- that government which governs best governs least.
Tom Funke
Battle Creek
Wendy Wagenheim decries vouchers as forcing taxpayers to pay to support religious institutions and someone else's choice of religious education. The key is that vouchers and tax credits do not support any one religion, or a government-established religion. I am forced to pay a lot of taxes toward causes I disagree with, such as foreign aid, the IMF, unemployment "insurance," and the list goes on and on. She talks about "laundering public funds by passing them through parent's pockets," which is the most heinous falsehood perpetrated in America today, that the public has any funds it has not first taken from individuals who have no choice but to pay. Her argument that anyone who can will abandon public schools only reinforces that they are doing a poor job and no one should be forced to support them.
Pamela Boyd
President
Workforce, Inc.
Clarkston
