# Public Schools: Make Them Private 

June 23, 1995 • Briefing Paper No. 23 

By Milton Friedman 

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Our elementary and secondary educational system needs to be radically restructured. Such a reconstruction can be achieved only by privatizing a major segment of the educational system–i.e., by enabling a private, for-profit industry to develop that will provide a wide variety of learning opportunities and offer effective competition to public schools. The most feasible way to bring about such a transfer from government to private enterprise is to enact in each state a voucher system that enables parents to choose freely the schools their children attend. The voucher must be universal, available to all parents, and large enough to cover the costs of a high-quality education. No conditions should be attached to vouchers that interfere with the freedom of private enterprises to experiment, to explore, and to innovate.

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##### Public Schools: Make Them Private 

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##### About the Author 

Milton Friedman, a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution, won the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1976. This article appeared in the *Washington Post *on February 19, 1995. Reprinted by permission of the author and the* Washington Post.* 

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