The Network for Public Education asks you to join us in protesting the voucher scam.
https://networkforpubliceducation.org/2018/09/stop-voucher-tax-scam/
There is no nice way to say it–it’s a tax scam to promote vouchers.
Twelve states have designed ingenious ways to use the U.S. tax code so that businesses and the wealthy can make money when they “contribute” to voucher programs.
Here is how it works. A business or taxpayer makes a donation to a state voucher “scholarship.” Then the state gives all or most of the “donation” back as a tax credit. The donor then deducts the donation as a charitable deduction on federal taxes, even though they got the money back.
And right now it is perfectly legal.
The profiteering resulting from these tax credit voucher schemes has been marketed by tax accountants, private schools, and voucher proponents. And all of this means less money for public schools in state and federal coffers.
The good news is that the IRS is now trying to stop this.
The bad news is that Betsy DeVos’s American Federation for Children and EdChoice are mobilizing thousands to pressure the IRS to keep the scam going.
Please file your comment today with the IRS and tell them “close the loophole.”
This is all you have to do.
Go to https://www.regulations.gov/comment?D=IRS-2018-0025-0001
In the ‘Comment” box, type the phrase “I submit the attached comment in response to the IRS proposed regulations on Contributions in Exchange for State and Local Tax Credits.” Then continue with your comment. We give you a model comment to paste in below.
Enter your first and last name.
Follow the directions to submit.
Below is a comment you can use:
—————————————————-
I submit the attached comment in response to the IRS proposed regulations on Contributions in Exchange for State and Local Tax Credits. I am writing to thank the IRS for proposing the ending of a tax shelter that allows taxpayers to turn a profit when they fund private schools through state tuition tax credit programs. This comes at the expense of state and federal budgets. Meanwhile, people line their pockets while the rest of us pay our fair share of taxes.
Please stay the course and make sure that tax accountants, private schools, and others can no longer exploit the federal charitable deduction to promote voucher tax credits. Thank you.
It is extremely important that you do this. Please add your comment here today.
Then post this link on your Facebook page. https://networkforpubliceducation.org/2018/09/stop-voucher-tax-scam/
Open the link to read other links.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Sent.
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For bureaucratic reasons we settled on one issue, weapons of mass destruction, because it was the one reason everyone could agree on — Paul Woefulwits, about the rationale for invading Iraq
In one regard, vouchers are like war.
They are supported by many different parties for very different reasons.
But as with war, for practical reasons, the different parties came up with a rationale they could all agree on (whether they actually believed it or not)
For bureaucratic reasons we settled on one issue, improved schools, because it was the one reason everyone could agree on — Betsy Woefulwits (No relation to Paul)
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This is one more way to move public money into private pockets and weaken the quality of education in public schools. Some wealthy people can even make money by taking the federal tax deduction on top of the state tax credit. Moreover, regular working people should realize that the more loopholes and tax avoidance strategies are exploited by billionaires and their tax attorneys, the more the wealthy can shift the tax burden onto the rest of us. The net result for us is to pay more or have services including earned benefits cut.
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According to the Internal Revenue Service, the top one percent, is paying 39% of all federal taxes. See
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldurkheimer/2018/03/01/0-001-percent-one-percent/#6d4275382cf2
Why do you think that wealthy people are trying to “shift” their tax burden to others?
If wealthy people, with all of their political influence, and all of their tax lawyers, and tax shelters in the Cayman Islands, were able to shift their tax burden to others, I would submit that they are not doing a very good job!
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You love inequality.
Read “The Spirit Level.”
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I am very glad that there are people who are wealthier than I am. I have never received a private sector job from a poor person.
I have lived under socialism ,where everyone is equal. I much prefer inequality.
“A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both.”
― Milton Friedman
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You’d go crazy trying to close down the individual loopholes.
The simplest and most effective approach by far is simply to close down the voucher program.
Problem solved.
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In that case you would have to go state by state to try to shut the vouchers down. Chances are some of the conservative judges in conservative states would decide to keep the vouchers.
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My guess is most people are not even aware that their state taxes are helping fund vouchers that are largely benefitting the wealthy and helping fund schools that teach creationism and other stuff that public schools are not allowed to teach.
Perhaps it’s simply a matter of educating people about what is happening to their tax dollars, something which up until now has been hidden behind a cloud of obfuscation.
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@someDAMpoet: Where did you get the idea that most people are not aware that their state taxes are funding voucher programs (in states which have such programs)? I would submit the reverse. In states which have voucher programs, the state is required to publish the information about the program. Why keep it a secret?
Furthermore, the opponents of such programs generally get a lot of publicity, and express their support of the public-school monopoly with a great deal of enthusiasm and vigor.
And where did you arrive at the idea, that vouchers primarily benefit the wealthy? Intuitively, you should see that wealthy people already have the choice to send their children to non-public schools, regardless of any voucher program. The first modern voucher programs were brought in in the inner-cities of Milwaukee and Cleveland. Voucher programs are moot in Beverly Hills, and Grosse Point.
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Sent, and thanks for the opportunity.
Here is another. It bears on the importance of influencing the mass media’s narratives about public education. I think that the 74Million and friends will try to control the narratives about education within this new joint initiative from USA TODAY and CBS Morning…unless there are efforts to communicate important reports from sources such as NPE, the National Education Policy Center, and major bloggers on behalf of public education.
This is an announcement of the USA TODAY and CBS Morning initiative. https://www.pressreader.com/usa/usa-today-us-edition/20180917/textview It has some of the names of reporters.
One of the first reports (today) is about the dismal conditions in Detroit Public Schools, the legal appeal for some remedy, and with telling comments from students who see the difference between their own schools and those in the nearby suburb Grosse Point. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2018/09/18/detroit-students-lawsuit-water-michigan-school/1326060002/
I looked over a roster of Opinion Writers for USA TODAY. Many list “education” as a topic, but only one has deep experience in schooling: Patrick Welsh, a longtime high school English teacher at T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria, Va. Here is a bit more. “The school’s struggles with integration in 1971, Welsh’s second year there, were portrayed in the Denzel Washington film Remember the Titans. Currently, T.C. Williams has 2,100 students of every racial, ethnic and socioeconomic group imaginable, including students from more than 100 countries, many of them refugees. His writing on education and the youth culture has appeared in The Washington Post, The New York Times, Newsweek and other publications. He is a graduate of Canisius College and the George Washington University Law School, and is a member of the Virginia State Bar.
The lead person for the USA TODAY and CBS Morning initiative appears to be Manny Garcia
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In Ohio they use the word “scholarship” as marketing, too. It’s mean to imply scarcity and exclusivity. Public schools let in everybody while a scholarship is something special, offered only to a few.
Ed reform is 90% marketing and 10% education. It’s why so many of them have no actual training or experience in education. They literally don’t need it. It’s not a big part of the job.
I do think ed reformers believe private schools are inherently better than public schools, but a lot of people believe that. It isn’t true but it doesn’t matter. In this worldview “private” is always superior to “public”. DeVos absolutely believes this. Read the stories she tells when she travels the country (on our dime) bashing our schools. Every single story involves a student “escaping” a horrible public school and going to a private or charter school. Mostly they leave because public school students are violent thugs who are not very bright. This is the US Department of Education. We’re paying for this propaganda.
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Hey, if charters get to call themselves public schools, why can’t public schools call themselves private? After all, they do restrict visitors to to those who have been approved. That’s private, right?
If private has such a good connotation, maybe public shools should start tacking private onto their name
So, for example, the LA Public School System would be called The LA Private Public School System
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but to keep up with the reformer scam where long fancy names do the work of bringing in new students while effectively hiding profit scams, they might have to rename themselves as THE L.A. ELITE PRIVATE PRESIDENTIAL SCHOLARSHIP PUBLIC AWARDS SCHOOLS
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I truly believe that public schools are better than charter fake schools. However, the only reason I do not want to send my kid to a public school is not that the teachers are bad or not good but its the other kids in the school who will be the problem. Bad kids are in the public schools, bad kids are in the charter schools however we have more in the public schols
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Public schools serve all students including those that may be troubled or very poor. That is one of the reasons public schools should be adequately funded to serve the diverse needs of students. One of the problems in many urban public schools is a real estate funding system and politicians that seriously under fund public schools that have many challenging students. One of the best ways to help troubled students is to give them smaller classes. What often happens is due to poor funding these students are in large classes with fewer resources. Charter and voucher drain make a difficult situation worse.
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This one is really easy and safe. It’s cut and paste, and don’t have to give any further information than your name. It’s a .gov website. Please send a message to the IRS.
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Thank you for flagging this and making it easy to do! I’ve sent my comment and will post this on Facebook as well.
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