A Republican Michigan state legislator has proposedexempting people without children in public schools from paying school-related property taxes. In a news release, Steve Carra, who has served in office since 2021, says it’s “fundamentally unjust to force people—including seniors, empty-nesters, those who pay for private school, and those without children—to subsidize a government education system they do not use.” It’s especially unfair, he continues “because our broken system spends a record amount of money yet results continue to plummet.”
At first glance, the idea has intuitive appeal: Why should people pay for a service they do not use? But while the proposal may sound fiscally tidy (or like a blunt-force accountability measure aimed at discrediting low-performing district schools), it rests on a deeply un-conservative misunderstanding of what public education is—and why a free society has long treated its costs as a shared obligation.
Public education is not a consumer good, like a gym membership or a streaming service. It is a civic institution. Conservatives have always recognized that some goods must be funded collectively because everyone benefits from their existence, not merely from direct use. You hope that you will never need the fire department, but you still pay for it because you benefit from living in a community where houses don’t burn down. The same logic applies to educating children.