Scholars and pundits expend a lot of energy to tell or to hear some new thing. A lot of these new things are strange mixes of genuine insights and resurrected fallacies, and they lead to policy conclusions of dubious merit. Consider behavioral economics. It asks interesting questions and explores some interesting puzzles, but it goes off the rails when it comes to policy.
As Steven Horwitz discusses, we measure the success and failure of market outcomes and the desirability of social institutions against our idealized conceptions of how we think the world should work, or how it would work if we were in charge. The conclusions are distressingly repetitive: liberty yields, and politicians get more power. The offer–your life will be better if you give us more control over it–is suspect in light of the evidence on government intervention, and it puts the burden of proof in the wrong place. You should have to convince me to cede liberty. I shouldn’t have to convince you that I should be allowed to keep it.
The literature on behavioral economics, externalities, and “imperfect markets” offers a lot of very interesting puzzles, but enthusiasts for intervention usually assume what they need to prove. Namely, they assume that where the market can’t, the government can. As Michael Munger said at an event I attended last summer, any time someone says “the government should…”, they should replace “government” with “politicians who usually get elected.” Even if, somehow, we found a set of worthies who were able to transcend the incentive problems inherent in state action, they would still face insurmountable problems associated with identifying tradeoffs and using resources wisely. For more, here’s a great paper by Peter Boettke and Peter Leeson in which they discuss “robust political economy,” here’s Glen Whitman’s critique of the new paternalism, here’s Edward Glaeser’s critique of paternalism, and here’s Murray Rothbard’s essential “Toward a Reconstruction of Utility and Welfare Economics.”
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It might not be so deliberately statist. It could be that these folks honestly don’t realize how their personal values are impacting their economic analysis at the model design stage.
Most of “pop economics” consists of this kind of stuff. Step One, introduce an economic concept so simplistic that no one will disagree with it; Step Two, introduce some emotionally evocative concept like killing people or some other concept with which everyone disagrees; Step Three, resolve the “conflict” by updating Step One’s model to account for the new information.
Only here’s the problem: I think most academic research is conducted in more or less the same way. We deliberately leave certain factors out of our models so that we can get a better understanding of other factors. Then, someone else comes along and says, “But you left out X!” and they update the model accordingly. After a few generations, people are convinced that the most current iteration is “our best understanding of the working economy today.”
Mises might have suggested that it was a shortcoming of numerical modelling, but I’d suggest it’s a shortcoming of the scientific method. People forget what they’re talking about in the first place.
I think the problem is that if a bully comes up with a base ball bat, and demands a quarter. The cost of standing up for yourself can be orders of magnitude greater than the loss … so the typical average response is to just give in. However, when the bully starts to demand dollars, then twenties, then hundreds, then thousands, eventually it reaches a point where the victims say “the hell with it”, and battles it to the finish to get out of that situation. That’s why liberty is always lost in tiny increments as the bully pushes it harder and harder, but gained in massive swipes. Unfortunately, that’s rather unstable. The ideal and most stable situation would be a constant liberty. However, as long as people have choices, there will always be bullies. So then the question becomes how to manage it and deal with it till there is a chance for escape.
“…but enthusiasts for intervention usually assume what they need to prove.”
This. This is, what I believe, the greatest challenge when debating a layman about practically anything (be it religion, economics, etc.). Time and time again people fall into this trap, and it would behoove any serious student of Austrian Economics to study their debates and recognize when this logical fallacy arises and to point it out (its almost identical to the other problem people have, which is reversing the causality of events).
The results are twofold: (1) you allow them to recognize the faulty reasoning which they undoubtedly used towards other ideas they carry in creating a worldview for themselves, and (2) it forces them to think more logically about the topic at hand (hopefully economics!) — and that can never be a bad thing.
When a layman engages the services of a doctor, lawyer, or even a plumber, they do so because it is worth more to them to pay for the expertise and services of the professional than it is to develop the knowledge and shill necessary to perform the service for them selves. The layman looks on government in the same way — as the expert that knows the correct course to take. It is not the burden of proof that is a problem here, but the ability and desire of the layman to evaluate the premises of the “expert’s” conclusions and prescriptions. This is the principle fallacy of democratic, or any other “popular” form of government.
While the pundits and politicians should have the burden of proving that liberty should be ceded, the reality is that the masses are too easily persuaded due to their own ignorance.
This is so true. What good is logic when the opponent accepts the illogical?
Logic is still the best tool for finding correct solutions. What is needed to implement them is good salesmanship capable of overcoming the prevailing presumptions of the masses. This may still place the burden of proof in the wrong place, but recognizing the reason for it is the first step in overcoming it.
I’ve had discussions with people where I would point out that the State accomplishes its goals at the point of a gun. You can dress it up any way you want, but in the end it’s the gun that gets it done. Doesn’t matter. “But it’s the “right” thing to do!”. I then point out that the State is the worst entity to get the “right” thing done. It is wasteful force that causes more harm than good. I use all the arguments all great free market economists and philosophers have explained over the years. This point is blatantly ignored. I don’t think most people want to think. In fact, I know most people don’t want to think. I think the reasons for this are many. For one, people don’t want to be bothered thinking things through. It is too easy to go along just to get along. For another, people don’t want to seem like they don’t care. Furthermore, it has been ingrained into their brains that the only way that these problems can be solved is through State intervention. People are too lazy to think these things through. They think the only way to help people is through the force of State intervention. Free people voluntarily helping others by themselves or through voluntarily organizations isn’t possible. Do they think this through? Not hardly. It’s a given. Millennium of Sate propaganda and State control of education has everything to do with this.
Did I mention that people don’t want to think these things through?
Anytime someone says “the government should”, they should replace the statement with “I will force you at gunpoint to do what I want if I possibly can”. Let’s be honest ourselves and also not allow others to dodge responsibility. Any law is an attempt by someone to force their opinions on someone else.
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