If we forced rich people to send their children to public schools, they would all move to public school districts in areas with housing too expensive for poor families to afford. That’s not a hypothetical, that’s just current reality.
The problem is rich people, not what options they do or do not have.
Do you realize how many parents work two full-time jobs? A lot, especially single parents. It’s not as simple as “spend more time with your kids” when every ‘free’ moment you have is spent driving, preparing food, or doing basic chores / hygiene routines.
I’ve worked many warehouse and similar jobs. There are a lot of parents who really love their children and express that by allowing themselves to be economically exploited every single minute of their life to guarantee their children a better future.
Sure, there are also parents who just don’t give a shit and park their kids on an iPad, but that has always been the case in one form or another. The trend where even caring parents are unable to spend enough time with their children is a consequence of a society-wide failure and the shameless embrace of capitalism.
Public schools are. For high school, I went to a free online charter school. I received a substantially better education than my friends in the magnet public high school.
I get there are other problems with the whole ‘school choice’ debate, but my family was broke and I was still able to get a better education. That’s a plus imo and I’d recommend it to anyone.
Full time job, singular. I’ve known single parents who work two full-time jobs. Might be necessary for a variety of reasons. If they can financially work it out so they spend more time with their child and live below their means like you do, I 100% think that’s the smarter choice for their child’s wellbeing. But for some people it might not be feasible, for example if they have medical expenses or if they need to live near an older relative or tons of other reasons.