Reply #52: It's one thing to say that will be the result

[Recursion]

It's another (and pretty ridiculous) thing to say that is the purpose. Obama and Duncan have been clear that what they want is to change where money goes so that kids who currently can only go to very bad schools can have some other option.

You (or someone else) may point out that on average charters are as good as or marginally worse than public schools. This is true in general, but the parents pushing for them are stuck sending their kids to schools that are much worse than most public schools, which is part of why this is so popular among a lot of parents (the same or marginally worse is better than much worse).

You (or someone else) may suggest that we simply need to fund "bad" schools more. I have seen no national numbers, but DC spends twice as much per student as Montgomery county and half again as much per student as Fairfax county (yes, yes, there are a million ways that index can be manipulated). And they've been getting more and more every year. This is why people think throwing more money at the schools isn't going to help. Maybe we're wrong. But it's just not true that the purpose here is to destroy public schools.