This text examines both the specifics of school finance policy and the impact of evolving economic and political forces on school finance.

School Finance: Achieving High Standards with Equity and Efficiency explores traditional economic and political models and contemporary issues within the current social, political, and economic context. It enables students to see the political and judicial forces at work in shaping school finance policy. It also provides students with tools drawn from economics to analyze the impacts of those policies in terms of equity, adequacy, efficiency, and liberty.

Readers examine the financial implications of systemic reform, including centralized goal setting and accountability via standards, curricula, and testing; decentralized reforms via school-site decision making; and family choice of schooling through charter schools and vouchers for low-income families.