Should the Federal Government Subsidize Private School Tuition?

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April 20, 2026 by Sophia Olivia

The historic passage of the “One Big Beautiful Bill” in July 2025 brought about numerous new tax and spending policies. The Education Choice for Children Act passed within the text of the bill, representing the first federal, voucher-style, school choice program set to begin in January 2027. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon has described it as “the largest federal expansion of school choice in history.”¹

School Choice Vouchers

The history of school choice stems from free-market ideologist and Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman, who emerged in the 1950s, suggesting that schools should receive funding through competition as opposed to the government-funded, public, state-run schools.² Early programs emerged from, on one end, the Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education (1954), which put an end to racial segregation in public schooling. In response, many white families enrolled their children in private schools, which were not required to be integrated. On the other end, liberals and Black nationalists saw vouchers as an opportunity to better educate poor children and children of color, opening private schools like the Mississippi Freedom Schools.³

Modern school choice vouchers, which began implementation in the 1990s, take various forms. The three most common are:

Scholarship Programs: These are the most common kind of voucher program. The state sets aside a specific amount of money, typically based on a per-pupil amount, for families to attend private schools.
Education Savings Accounts (ESAs): These are private savings accounts funded by state governments and managed by the parents themselves.
Tax Credit Programs: These allow parents to receive a tax credit when they donate to nonprofit-managed ESAs or to nonprofits that provide public school scholarships.⁴

The Education Choice for Children Act

The Education Choice for Children Act will operate as a tax credit program, allowing individuals to receive up to $1,700 in credits for donating to nonprofit scholarship-granting organizations.⁵ The scholarships will be distributed for private school tuition. The legislation places a great deal of power into the hands of state governments, giving states the ability to choose to opt into or out of the tax-credit program. To be eligible to receive a voucher, one’s income cannot exceed 300% of the area’s median gross income (the median, or average, annual income for the households in a specific geographic area).

Arguments in Favor

Proponents of the legislation, and of similar school choice voucher programs, argue that vouchers honor the sanctity of a parent’s right to choose what is best for their child. Parents know what is best for their child; therefore, the decisions they make will result in the best possible outcome for their child.

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), the lead Senate sponsor of the Educational Choice for Children Act, has framed the bill in equity terms. “A parent shouldn’t have to be rich to choose their child’s school,” said Sen. Cassidy as the bill moved toward becoming law. “My Educational Choice for Children Act helps make this choice available to everyone, not just the wealthy.”⁶

Rep. Burgess Owens (R-Utah), a co-sponsor of the legislation in the House of Representatives, emphasized a similar argument. “In America, a child’s race, income, or zip code should never determine the quality of their education,” he said when introducing the bill. “School choice works because it puts students over systems and empowers parents to choose the academic options that best fit their child’s unique needs.”⁷

That argument is echoed by parent advocates whose work helped lay the groundwork for federal school choice. Virginia Walden Ford, whose grassroots organizing in Washington, D.C., helped create the federally funded D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program in 2004, has long described vouchers as a question of access. “Everybody else seems to have those kinds of options—people with money, people that live in different parts of town,” she said. “But our kids didn’t.”⁸

EdChoice, a nonprofit whose goal is to “advance educational freedom and choice,” advocates for parental choice in schooling. It points to a disconnect between parents’ schooling preferences and enrollment patterns. According to EdChoice research, more than half of American parents would choose a school type other than a public district one.⁹ The advancement of school choice vouchers allows parents to make choices that align with their preferences.

EdChoice also points to the economic gains of voucher programs. For each dollar the state spends on school choice, the nonprofit estimates a benefit between $1.07 and $2.64.¹⁰ The issue is gaining momentum, and advocates believe states should implement such programs to provide safer learning environments for children and realize the economic gains.

Arguments Against

Opponents of voucher programs suggest that they offer a simple, incomplete solution to problems like unequal access to high-quality schools, segregation, and school safety. Although such initiatives can work in small doses, critics believe that large-scale voucher programs like the recently passed federal legislation hinder overall academic growth.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the ranking member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and a longtime critic of federal voucher proposals, has argued that the cost falls on students who never see a scholarship. “Vouchers would weaken public schools by diverting already scarce funds needed for smaller classes, after-school programs, better facilities, and teacher training to pay private school tuition for a few, select children,” said Sen. Murray in a Senate floor speech opposing voucher amendments.¹¹

Critics argue that voucher programs divert funding from public schools, many of which are already underfunded. Public schools in states that have implemented large-scale voucher programs, like Ohio, Indiana, and Louisiana, present lower test scores than states without the programs.¹² That research is the basis for one of the most prominent academic critiques of vouchers. Josh Cowen, a professor of education policy at Michigan State University who spent years as an evaluator of state and local voucher programs before turning against them, argues that the empirical record is now overwhelming. “Decades of careful empirical studies have converged to expose school vouchers as the drivers of the worst academic declines ever recorded,” Cowen wrote in his 2024 book, The Privateers: How Billionaires Created a Culture War and Sold School Vouchers.¹³

Opponents also point to data that shows programs excluding students who present the greatest needs while benefiting wealthy families who are already enrolled in private schools. In Arkansas, 95% of students using vouchers didn’t come from public schools.¹⁴ Unequal access occurs for numerous reasons. Private school costs often exceed the voucher value, leaving families who cannot fill the gap unable to enroll. Private schools are also not required to admit everyone with a voucher. Students from low-income communities may not have the necessary test scores or may have a disciplinary record that disqualifies their admission. Private schools may also not serve students with disabilities or religious schools may limit admission of LGBTQ+ students. For opponents, large-scale voucher programs only worsen issues of quality schooling and school safety.

Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, made a similar case in sharper terms. “Voucher schemes are transparent attempts to diminish parental choice by syphoning money away from public schools to pay for tax cuts for billionaires,” said Weingarten. “The research shows that vouchers hurt student achievement, go 70% to families with kids already in private school, and that private schools then increase tuition in response.”¹⁵ In Weingarten’s framing, the program is less a vehicle for expanding student opportunity than a public subsidy for private schools.

Discussion Questions

What are the benefits and drawbacks of school voucher programs?
What are the strongest arguments for large-scale school voucher programs? What are the strongest arguments against them?
What are some reasons that may encourage parents to choose private or home schools over public schools?
How might school choice voucher programs change public education in the United States?
Do you think school choice voucher programs increase or decrease educational equality across the United States?
If you were a member of Congress, how would you have voted on the Educational Choice for Children Act? What factors would have guided your decision?

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As always, we encourage you to join the discussion with your comments or questions below.

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Sources

Image Credit: Shutterstock/artemegorovv

[1] Sen. Ashley Moody: https://www.moody.senate.gov/press-releases/video-release-senator-moody-and-education-secretary-mcmahon-highlight-educational-wins-in-the-one-big-beautiful-bill-expansion-of-school-choice-for-students-nationwide/

[2] Harvard Graduate School of Education: https://www.gse.harvard.edu/ideas/edcast/25/10/school-vouchers-explained-what-new-federal-program-means

[3] Education Writers Association: https://ewa.org/news-explainers/school-choice-movement-how-we-got-here

[4] Ibid.

[5] Harvard Graduate School of Education: https://www.gse.harvard.edu/ideas/edcast/25/10/school-vouchers-explained-what-new-federal-program-means

[6] Sen. Bill Cassidy: https://www.cassidy.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/cassidy-school-choice-legislation-heads-to-president-trumps-desk-as-part-of-one-big-beautiful-bill/

[7] Rep. Burgess Owens: https://owens.house.gov/posts/owens-helps-introduce-the-educational-choice-for-children-act

[8] Pioneer Institute: https://pioneerinstitute.org/civil-rights-education/parent-advocate-virginia-walden-ford-on-civil-rights-school-choice-the-d-c-voucher-program/

[9] EdChoice: https://www.edchoice.org/

[10] EdChoice: https://www.edchoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/2024-Annual-Review.pdf

[11] Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2015/07/08/the-case-against-school-vouchers-sen-patty-murray-takes-a-stand-on-senate-floor/

[12] Hechinger Report: https://hechingerreport.org/opinion-after-two-decades-of-studying-voucher-programs-im-now-firmly-opposed-to-them/

[13] Josh Cowen, The Privateers: How Billionaires Created a Culture War and Sold School Vouchers (Harvard Education Press, 2024); Shanker Institute: https://www.shankerinstitute.org/blog/school-vouchers-there-no-upside

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