> That's true in the ideal, and I 100% agree. But not in the actual real world, because, very tritely put, nobody is an island.
No, it's true in the real world. That's the issue. Nobody is smarter than everybody. The consequence is that you should never prohibit someone from making a choice "for their own good" because the chances are better that they understand and act in their own best interest than you do.
Where you need some kind of government action is for externalities. Dumping industrial waste in the river might be rational from the perspective of the factory, because they don't live down river, so you need a law to protect the people who do from the factory acting in their own self-interest. You can't convince them to stop doing it with argument because safely handling the waste is more expensive for them in actual fact. You have to change the math by prohibiting the bad act.
That's still subject to the same problem. You can enact highly inefficient and ineffective environmental regulations by being lazy or uninformed or corrupt. But for that we don't have any alternative than to do the best we can.
For getting people to make better choices or hold better ideas, we do. We try to convince them. If we fail, it's more likely to be because we're wrong than they are. Forcing them should not even be attempted.
>The consequence is that you should never prohibit someone from making a choice "for their own good" because the chances are better that they understand and act in their own best interest than you do
Say that to all the OSHA regulations that were written in blood with a straight face
OSHA regulations punish employers for the actions of employees. That has its own set of problems but it's a kind of externality. The law isn't punishing the employee for refusing to wear safety equipment, it's punishing the employer for refusing to provide it.
No, it's true in the real world. That's the issue. Nobody is smarter than everybody. The consequence is that you should never prohibit someone from making a choice "for their own good" because the chances are better that they understand and act in their own best interest than you do.
Where you need some kind of government action is for externalities. Dumping industrial waste in the river might be rational from the perspective of the factory, because they don't live down river, so you need a law to protect the people who do from the factory acting in their own self-interest. You can't convince them to stop doing it with argument because safely handling the waste is more expensive for them in actual fact. You have to change the math by prohibiting the bad act.
That's still subject to the same problem. You can enact highly inefficient and ineffective environmental regulations by being lazy or uninformed or corrupt. But for that we don't have any alternative than to do the best we can.
For getting people to make better choices or hold better ideas, we do. We try to convince them. If we fail, it's more likely to be because we're wrong than they are. Forcing them should not even be attempted.