The Fight to Separate Education and State
Are corporate benefits the answer to government monopolies?
The events of 2020, notably the COVID-19 Pandemic, and the draconian government response to it, saw the largest closure of government schools many of us could have ever imagined. As irrational fears and Orwellian edicts came from on high and told us schools were not safe, that children were in danger of contracting a mild cold if they dared see their classmates and go about their lives. But all feelings of the pandemic aside, for the first time in modern history, the majority of k-12 students in the United States were forced to experience remote learning, and hundreds of thousands of parents were forced to become homeschoolers overnight.
The real crazy turn of events, was that when schools started to open back up and welcome kids back, a lot of parents decided to keep their kids home, and take responsibility for their education themselves. But not everyone is capable and available to home school their kids full time. People have jobs, bills have to be paid, and groceries need to be purchased. So innovation occurred.
Innovation in the homeschooling space is nothing new, Prenda pods, micro-schools, homeschooling co-ops, and tons of other alternative approaches to homeschooling gained immense popularity in the aftermath of the COVID-19 lockdowns. And innovation and exploration into new alternatives continue to grow every day.
Last week, The Foundation for Economic Education published an article by Kerry McDonald exploring the future of micro-schooling pods, and the potential for employers to offer educational support as a market-based benefit to attract employees who have wanted to take advantage of this new wave of school choice and education freedom.
When I saw her article my initial reaction ranged from intrigue at the idea of new alternatives to public school and an expansion of education choice, to outright fear the beneficial relationship between employers and employees any more intimate, while the state has already laid claim to employers and corporations as lifemates and bedfellows. I immediately thought of the history of health insurance, initially offered by employers as a benefit to attract employees during price and wage freezes of world war 2, but which eventually morphed into the regulatory behemoth that we know today. Health insurance is something that is very difficult to live without, and for many, the only way to attain it is through a relationship with an employer that the government requires to offer as a benefit to full-time employees. There are countless cases of people unhappy with their employment, and receiving substandard wages for their positions, but who are trapped and without a bargaining position due to their literal life and death reliance on the benefits the employer offers them. While they are not held to the whims of their employer by force, the threat of terminating their benefits is coercive at best.
I asked Kerry a simple question. First health care, now education, and what next, housing? At what point will the benefits of employment dictate where we live, where we shop, who we associate with, and how we are allowed to live our lives? Is this push a slippery slope to modern company towns? And is that truly an improvement for the economic and social freedom and liberties of Americans? She disagreed with my fears and assured me with confidence in her position that it would be an improvement over the status quo because as we could both agree, the bigger evil was the very involvement of the state. Yet still, as someone who often questions the unabashed optimism of capitalism, I wonder at what point a corporation gains so much economic power, that it translates to social and political power, and simply becomes the new government in all but name. Are the interests of our corporate masters much different from the government agents they lie with and are they remotely aligned with our own interests as free human beings?
Kerry was kind enough to join me for Episode #70 of Subversive, where we spent the hour discussing the minutia of this very debate, as well as the future of innovation in school choice and homeschooling alternatives in a post-COVID America.
I remain unconvinced entirely, but Kerry’s optimism isn’t based solely on principle and academic research, but on real-world examples taking shape before our eyes all around the country as education takes its place as a commodity in a free market.
Subversive #70: “Capitalism, or Company Towns?” feat. Kerry McDonald
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Could Employer-Based Microschooling Be The Newest Workplace Perk? Kerry McDonald explored this question in her recent article for The Foundation for Economic Education (https://tinyurl.com/microschools).
Justin raises the question of whether or not relying on corporate benefits is actually beneficial for the economic liberty of the American People. At what point are we barreling down a slippery slope to company towns, and replacing an elected government with a corporate one?
It’s not an easy question to answer, but Kerry is here to make her case, as a free market absolutist, about why putting schools and other benefits in the hands of employers is an improvement over the state monopoly.
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