As someone who lives in one of the richest counties in a red state, they’ve already gutted the education system so there is no longer a difference between counties.
That state is Texas.
The state claimed all our school funding would be solved by introducing a state lottery. It didn’t do a damned thing. Funding is worse than ever. Oh, but lobbyists have started running commercials for casino gambling with the same promise.
The state confiscates and redistributes school taxes.
Austin takes in a huge amount of tax revenue, but can’t afford to pay its teachers because the taxes are confiscated and sent to the state.
The state gives Austin’s tax money to other school districts so they can build water parks and sports stadiums.
What doesn’t get redistributed gets confiscated and held by the state in a “rainy day” fund that never gets spent.
Not satisfied with this, the state wants to create a voucher program where tax money will be spent on private schools instead. Those vouchers won’t be spent on teachers or students though. It goes to administrators, and the pockets of investors.
And they consistently mislead voters about the effect of vouchers. If attendance in a public school drops, so does their funding. Period. End of story. Maybe the public school budget will stay the same or even increase but public school funding won’t go anywhere but down.
The math is bullshit. Even if they said, “Schools keep 20% of the original funding,” that’s something like an $8000 loss. Do they save $8000 in transportation, building maintenance, lunches, books, materials, salaries, and extracurriculars because ONE student left?
As someone who lives in one of the richest counties in a red state, they’ve already gutted the education system so there is no longer a difference between counties.
That state is Texas.
https://www.texastribune.org/2023/03/13/texas-budget-surplus/
https://abc13.com/texas-water-park-school-la-joya-isd-funding/4162905/
https://www.texastribune.org/2025/03/06/valere-public-schools-superintendent-salary-texas
And they consistently mislead voters about the effect of vouchers. If attendance in a public school drops, so does their funding. Period. End of story. Maybe the public school budget will stay the same or even increase but public school funding won’t go anywhere but down.
The math is bullshit. Even if they said, “Schools keep 20% of the original funding,” that’s something like an $8000 loss. Do they save $8000 in transportation, building maintenance, lunches, books, materials, salaries, and extracurriculars because ONE student left?
The one positive thing I have to say about my state is that it hasn’t gone full Texas… Yet.