[ziddoap]

>"There's no such thing as a fixed pool of teachers that everyone is competing against."

Maybe the definition of zero-sum, in the economic sense, is the wrong phrase. But there's still only so many people who can be (or are willing to be, qualified to be, whatever) teaching class in a public school tomorrow.

>I certainly know personally a lot of people who I'd gladly hire to teach my kids, but who do not fulfill the requirements the public schools set upon teachers.

Cool. If that was the case for all of the private teaching pods, my opinion would probably be different.

>Second, there's no such thing as "shortage" in absolute terms. There is only shortage at a given price point. [...]

Yeah, I agree, and I have no idea why the rest of the paragraph is written as if I wouldn't agree. Teachers should get paid more (and/or reduced workload) given their importance. Whatever lets to largest amount of kids grow up with a good education.

I don't think going private with 5 kid pods is going to give the largest amount of kids a good education, and I think that's unfortunate, because that seems to be the best route for teacher's who are trying to live a decent life.

[xyzzyz]

As I said, I think the government should outsource the entire business. Just give parents education vouchers, and let them choose the education they want for their kids. I think every parent should be able to hire a private teacher, not only the wealthy ones.

Where I am, the good private schools charge about 30% less tuition than the public school district spends per student. This means that providing good schooling is very much possible at what government spends. Food stamps do not have to be spent on government-produced food in government stores. Section 8 vouchers do not have to be spent on government-owned housing. Why not just do the same with education?