I live in the LAUSD (Los Angeles) school district, which has a pretty strong charter system and has had for a long time.

In the case of LA, your assertions are just not true. They seem to be based on generalities about monopoly markets, and to be un-informed by how charters really play out.

The charter school era has been a period of great change - but there are some really bad charters, and some of them fail suddenly during the school year. Some of the for-profit charters have been notably corrupt, and oversight of small charters is hard. As a recent example, a charter near my home closed just a few days after the beginning of the school year, due to insufficient enrollment (http://www.pucschools.org/iprep/). Now those families are searching for another school. Most of them will end up at their neighborhood school after all.

To return to your "market" concept: one of the fundamentals of properly functioning markets is information. It is very hard for parents - even well-informed parents - to gather information about the real quality of instruction at a school. (The things that parents respond to don't really correlate with educational quality.) Another fundamental is liquidity - this is just not a liquid market. People like to stick with one school if possible - for good reasons.

Another problem with the "market" concept is that provision of elementary education is not really a market transaction. The teachers are not really in it mostly for the pay. The parents don't treat it as a market either. What was the last time you volunteered time at your local grocery store or lumber yard?

You and I agree that there are problems with "monopoly" elementary education - but throwing charters at it as a simple market solution has not worked out well. It seems to be a more complex problem.

Switching schools isn't hard/impossible because parents can't pay a fee. It's because you have to be within a physical distance of the school, and that space is limited. If you make schools a market with vouchers then you are going to end up with the rich getting everything and the poor being left with scraps. This already happens to some extent with parents moving to good schools districts, but it's at least somewhat mitigated by every school continuing to receive funding

It’s hard to imagine it getting much worse than today. Head on up to Hayward and check out the schools there (if you dare), then cross I580 and look at the Castro Valley schools. If you live in a poor neighborhood and also happen to care about your kid’s education, you are shit out of luck. Schools are already hopelessly class segregated, and this is not unique to the Bay Area. Tying school funding to how rich the school’s neighborhood is ranks up there among the dumbest ideas we’ve come up with as a society.

You realize California thought that different levels of funding was the problem and now almost all schools are funded by the state based on the number of students. More recently the state doubled down on this "we need more money for poor students" philosophy and now disadvantaged students get more funding. Castro Valley schools probably get less funding per student than Hayward. What people don't want to realize is that the most important component of if a school is "good" or not is the student population itself. You can't change this with funding or changes in teaching styles, or testing, etc. You can with forced busing, but that only works for a little while as parents who want a great school for their kids move to locations where busing is not in effect.

Not sure what you mean by a $44k voucher and California’s per child education cost. California spends around $11.5k per pupil for primary/secondary school[1] per year. $44k per year would cover the cost of even the most expensive private schools while $11.5k would only cover private school if it is heavily subsidized by a religion. I'd quit my job in a heartbeat and start a small school or tutor 5-10 kids directly, if you pay me $44k each.

[1] http://www.governing.com/gov-data/education-data/state-educa...

Except places using vouchers don't produce better outcomes.

Better to eliminate the reason for good and bad schools - using property taxes. Also source for 40k? That's about 4x as much as it's reported to be.

I'm doubtful about your assertion that new schools will pop up. I actually doubt that they will, especially in poorer areas. So the kids whose parents are able will leave, taking their money. Thus solidifying the problem of funding to the schools.

And, as mentioned, transportation is a big issue for many as well. School busses are nice for those parents who have to work at 7, or earlier, and can't take their kids to school. Same going home. Unless, of course, you're going to start bussing kids to all the new schools that pop up, assuming any do.

Also, how do you deal with regulations and standards? If my tax money is going to a private school, it better follow a standard and not be teaching creationism, etc.

And I, too, would like to see your source on cost of education... You also assume that the private schools won't all be owned by the same company or that they won't agree to set prices the max available from the vouchers... Or higher.

  I'm doubtful about your assertion that new
  schools will pop up.

If you can get $44k per student per year, I'm sure new schools will pop up, just like for-profit colleges. Whether that's a good thing is of course another question.

It's not $44K per year. In California, it may be around $13K per year depending somewhat on location (~ $65/day/student). See the first spreadsheet linked at: https://www.cde.ca.gov/ds/fd/ec/currentexpense.asp

(For a couple of years my kid went to a school that encouraged donation of ~$50/day/kid for voluntary absences, to make up for the lost state fees for that day of instruction.)

I'll correct myself. Apparently it's more like $13k, not $44k. At least as of now. Although it depends. Still, the point is to make schools compete and to make new schools pop up - so that the overall quality will go up.

Education is a fundamental human right, not a product.

Code my website. Having website is fundamental right, not a product.

Are you being absurd, or are you genuinely unaware that education is considered a human right?