Government Paternalism
purepedantry | August 1, 2008There is an interesting discussion going on at the Becker-Posner blog about obesity abatement. Richard Posner talks about the NY ordinance requiring that calorie counts of food be prominently labeled fast food restaurants:
The significance of the New York City ordinance lies in its requiring that calorie numbers be printed next to the food items on menus and menu boards and in large type. The purpose is less to inform than to frighten. Psychologists have shown (what is anyway pretty obvious) that people respond more to information that is presented to them in a dramatic, memorable form than…
purepedantry | June 6, 2007I wrote about my skepticism about libertarian paternalism before.
Here is some more skepticism. Glen Whitman writes about one type of policy advocated by libertarian paternalists -- the opt-out program. In opt-out programs, you are enrolled in what the government says you should do -- such as a savings account -- unless you specifically say that you don't want to do it. The problem as Whitman points out is in how difficult it is to get out. If you make it a bureaucratic maze to extricate yourself from a program, you have essentially made that program mandatory. (He discusses the slippery…
purepedantry | May 29, 2007Ilya Somin from the Volokh Conspiracy has this post on a resurgent paternalism -- using as its justification new findings from behavioral economics:
"Libertarian Paternalism" is all the rage in law and economics circles these days. To slightly oversimplify, libertarian paternalists claim that people systematically make mistakes as a result of cognitive errors and biases. Afterwards, they end up with outcomes that they themselves consider inferior to at least some of the alternatives they could have gotten by making a different decision in the first place. As a result, third party intervention…
purepedantry | February 13, 2007I am not really that into online poker; I lack the patience to be truly great at poker.
However, I have several friends that swear by it, and we were all quite annoyed when Congress decided to attach a ban on transfers to online gambling companies in a rider to a port security bill last year. That was annoying government paternalism about something that is really none of their business. (Furthermore, the only reason online gambling was banned was because they don't have as good lobbyists as the brick-and-mortar gambling companies. Inadequately organized lobbyists shouldn't be a reason to…
purepedantry | February 7, 2007This will never end. Ever. There will always be some yo-yo who feels it necessary to protect me from reality:
First it was cell phones in cars, then trans fats. Now, a new plan is on the table to ban gadget use while crossing city streets.
We all seem to have one -- an iPod, a BlackBerry, a cell phone -- taking up more and more of our time, but can they make us too distracted to walk safely? Some people think so.
If you use them in the crosswalk, your favorite electronic devices could be in the crosshairs.
Legislation will be introduced in Albany on Wednesday to lay a $100 fine on…