Choice, Schools, & Taking Democracy Seriously
Deborah Meier continues her conversation with Michael J. Petrilli today.
Dear Mike,
Maybe you are right that we share a kind of cynicism. Or maybe a close cousin—healthy skepticism. Especially about politics.
Dilemma: One can have politics without democracy, but one can't have democracy without politics. Ditto for self-interest—if power is fairly equally distributed. Democracy and equality are inextricably connected! Furthermore, unions, equality, and democracy are closely linked.
The idea, you suggest, that the 5 to 10 percent of the public that belong to unions could outweigh the 5 to 10 percent at the top of the wealth ladder seems ... unlikely. Mike, quit worrying about the power of unions—alas. Especially since the unions that remain (predominantly public employee unions) are constrained in their ability to use the most powerful tool they might have—collectively refusing to go to work. It's much easier for private corporations to close their shops (and move elsewhere, for example) than for working people to create a union that can "close the shop." Public employee unions that dare strike can (in liberal New York, for example) pay a heavy price.
Yet I still hold on to the naïve belief that my bogeyman—the very rich—won't always win. But having nearly half the wealth of the nation in its hands is formidable. And indeed, ideology closely relates to one's wealth, power, and social status. Yes, a scoundrel worth millions is a lot more dangerous than one earning $42,000 (the average income of the other 90 percent).
How do you explain why children were, as you put it, "chained" to failing schools long before there were teachers' unions with contracts of any sort, or in those states today without
