Too much power (money) is tied into the local school boards to allow learning outside their control. To them, charter schools are anathema and allowing parents choice of schools does not allow them to make the decision of where the money should go. (Usually into the pockets of all the extraneous staff necessitated by the need to fill the boxes dictated by Fed strictures.)

Instead of giving all the money to the states, let's think about giving it back to the parents, maybe by not giving it to the Feds first. They tend to skim off the top before passing it back. Then let parents decide how to spend the money rather than state politicians, just littler versions of DC politicians.

But to improve income inequality, just make people work for welfare and tie unemployment to retraining. The average unemployment is now 9 months, long enough for some adult retraining into some skills they might be able to be employed for.

As well-intentioned as Alexander and Scott's plan may be, it is highly unlikely that many states would use the money to increase charter school funding to any great extent. The teacher's lobby is just too strong in the vast majority of states.