A report examines the monetary costs and benefits of Georgia’s Qualified Education Expense Tax Credit (QEEC), a type of voucher policy that provides a public subsidy for families to pay for private school tuition. Though the report argues the QEEC provides a net fiscal benefit for the state budget, several methodological challenges limit the report’s usefulness—most notably, a lack of data about how many students per year actually switch from public to private schools because of the vouchers. If most of the vouchers are provided to students already planning to attend a private school, then the policy only subsidizes private school students with funding that could otherwise be returned to taxpayers or invested in the state’s public education system, which is open to all students. Because the report relies on unrealistic assumptions, its suggestion that program benefits outweigh costs is tenuous and risks misleading state education leaders.

Suggested Citation: Knight, D.S. (2023). NEPC review: Qualified education expense tax credit: Economic analysis. Boulder, CO: National Education Policy Center. Retrieved [date] from http://nepc.colorado.edu/review/tax-credit