ProPublica falsely calls vouchers the sole culprit in Arizona’s budget woes
July 17, 2024
ProPublica wants to blame school vouchers for Arizona’s budget problems. They try really hard to do so, too. But they can’t quite get there – as their own article shows.
That it’s necessary to strain to read it properly is the very proof of ProPublica’s bias. For they say:
School Vouchers Were Supposed to Save Taxpayer Money. Instead They Blew a Massive Hole in Arizona’s Budget.
Clearly, given that’s the headline, we’re supposed to believe that school vouchers are a really bad idea. Backed up with this:
Arizona, the model for voucher programs across the country, has spent so much money paying private schoolers’ tuition that it’s now facing hundreds of millions in budget cuts to critical state programs and projects.
So, Arizona was the first place to really go for vouchers for all, they’re costing a fortune, therefore no other state should adopt vouchers. The logic being put forward is obvious. And yet:
The state this year faced a $1.4 billion budget shortfall, much of which was a result of the new voucher spending,
Well, yes, that’s the claim. But reality? Much?
Last fiscal year alone, the price tag of universal vouchers in Arizona skyrocketed from an original official estimate of just under $65 million to roughly $332 million,
OK, so vouchers move money across state budgets. From the public school system to the vouchers, obviously.
Overall enrollment in Arizona public schools has been slightly down — ever since many parents withdrew their kids during the pandemic — creating some savings in the education budget that could be seen as offsetting the new voucher spending.
ProPublica’s estimates of the costs of the voucher system do not include these savings on the public school system budget.
In an email, Beienburg maintained that Arizona’s current budget mess wasn’t caused by vouchers; he blamed, among other issues, state revenue recently being lower than anticipated. (The Goldwater Institute in 2021 collaborated with Ducey to write and pass a tax cut that reduced income taxes on the wealthiest Arizonans to 2.5%, the same rate that the poorest people in the state pay, which is the leading cause of the decline in revenue.)
Lower revenue often is a reason for a deficit in a state budget, yes.
Vouchers are a larger line item as a result of the expansion of the voucher system, obviously so. We’ve also some savings – at least potential savings – as a result of fewer students in the public school system. We’ve also a change in the state income tax – whether we think that’s a good idea or not is another question entirely – which has blown out the state budget deficit.
But ProPublica tells us all, in headline and subhead, that it’s vouchers and vouchers alone causing the budget problems. This is obvious bias. The reason for it? If you’re roughly progressive, as ProPublica is, then school vouchers are a bad idea. They take power away from the bureaucracy. Therefore any investigation, any article, is going to be against vouchers. As this is.
Well, that’s just how the progressive media works. Pity, but there we are that’s just how it works. A $270 million increase in one line item (vouchers) without subtracting the public school savings, ignoring the state tax changes, is “much” of the explanation for a $1.4 billion deficit. Put that way it’s laughable. Which is why the article has to be read hard to grasp why the headline isn’t right.