Unintended Consequences

[Spideynw]

UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES | National Center for Policy Analysis

With a government that is regularly begged for relief -- these days, from mortgage woes, health care costs and tax burdens -- and with every presidential hopeful making daily promises to address these woes, it might be worth encouraging the winning candidate to think twice before rushing off to do good, say Stephen J. Dubner and Steven D. Levitt, authors of the book "Freakonomics."
That is because many promises, or in this case, laws, can have unintended consequences. For example:

• When the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was enacted in 1992, it led to a sharp drop in the employment of disabled workers.
• Employers, concerned that they wouldn't be able to discipline or fire disabled workers who happened to be incompetent, apparently avoided hiring them in the first place.

Also:

• Under the ADA, when a deaf patient sees a physician, for example, he can choose the mode of interpretation, at the physician's expense.
• Since receiving treatment often entails more than one doctor visit, expenses mount on physicians to the point where they will no longer take patients covered under the ADA.

The Endangered Species Act (ESA) is another example:

• Economists Dean Lueck and Jeffrey Michael wanted to gauge the ESA's effect on the red-cockaded woodpecker, a protected bird that nests in old-growth pine trees in eastern North Carolina.
• By examining timber harvest activity of privately owned forest plots, Lueck and Michael found that when a landowner felt that his property was turning into the sort of habitat that might attract a nesting pair of woodpeckers, he rushed in to cut down the trees.

Source: Stephen J. Dubner and Steven D. Levitt, "Unintended Consequences," New York Times Magazine, January 20, 2008.

More reasons why giving so much power to people who simply won a popularity contest is just plain stupid. Democracy should mean equality in liberty, not rule by majority.

[David Octavius]

Originally Posted by Spideynw

UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES | National Center for Policy Analysis



More reasons why giving so much power to people who simply won a popularity contest is just plain stupid. Democracy should mean equality in liberty, not rule by majority.

Well democracy does not mean equality or liberty - if you want that then Democracy is not for you.

There is no system that can perfectly promote equality and liberty because its impossible to do so. Everyone has their own definitions of what those things mean and how to apply it so inevitably every system is tainted before it even starts.

The only thing we hope for and bank on in a republic is that stuff like this ebbs and flows, we go too much in one direction and the pendulum swings to the other. That reform and the need for consensus to get legislation pass will inject some balance.

[WickedLou9]

Originally Posted by Spideynw

UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES | National Center for Policy Analysis



More reasons why giving so much power to people who simply won a popularity contest is just plain stupid. Democracy should mean equality in liberty, not rule by majority.

I think those are anecdotal cases and don't represent the overall effect of those pieces of legislation.

[bheld]

Pop economics is not a respected field.

[7960]

Originally Posted by WickedLou9

I think those are anecdotal cases and don't represent the overall effect of those pieces of legislation.

you're right... the ADA is much worse than those examples make it out to be.

[RMNIXON]

Originally Posted by bheld

Pop economics is not a respected field.

You mean to say the ivory tower academic crackpots don't like how the real world of market incentives work and consequences when tampering with same?

The best laid plans........

I get that!

[WickedLou9]

Originally Posted by RMNIXON

You mean to say the ivory tower academic crackpots don't like how the real world of market incentives work and consequences when tampering with same?

The best laid plans........

I get that!

Ivory tower = People who have knowledge and education and expertise in the area. Yeah what the heck do they know... those stupid PhD's. They don't know anything.

[bheld]

Originally Posted by WickedLou9

Ivory tower = People who have knowledge and education and expertise in the area. Yeah what the heck do they know... those stupid PhD's. They don't know anything.

All this time and they never knew that if a rule gets put in place people are going to try to get around it.

[tbone]

Originally Posted by WickedLou9

Ivory tower = People who have knowledge and education and expertise in the area. Yeah what the heck do they know... those stupid PhD's. They don't know anything.

Much like the people running this country,

Secretary Condoleezza Rice (PhD, Provost for 6 years at Stanford, professor since 1981)

Secretary Samual Bodman (PhD, Professor at MIT, and former director of Engineering Practice at MIT)

Secretary Michael Chertoff (Doctor of law, Harvard Law School)

Secretary Michael Mukasey (Doctor of law, Yale Law School)

Secretary James Peeake (M.D., Cornell)

Secretary Alphonso Jackson (Doctor of Law, Washington University School of Law)

Secretary Henry Paulson (MBA Harvard)

Secretary Elaine Chao (MBA Harvard)

[7960]

Originally Posted by bheld

All this time and they never knew that if a rule gets put in place people are going to try to get around it.

why don't people understand this?

[WickedLou9]

Originally Posted by tbone

Much like the people running this country,

Secretary Condoleezza Rice (PhD, Provost for 6 years at Stanford, professor since 1981)

Secretary Samual Bodman (PhD, Professor at MIT, and former director of Engineering Practice at MIT)

Secretary Michael Chertoff (Doctor of law, Harvard Law School)

Secretary Michael Mukasey (Doctor of law, Yale Law School)

Secretary James Peeake (M.D., Cornell)

Secretary Alphonso Jackson (Doctor of Law, Washington University School of Law)

Secretary Henry Paulson (MBA Harvard)

Secretary Elaine Chao (MBA Harvard)

Those are some smart people.

[David Octavius]

Originally Posted by WickedLou9

Ivory tower = People who have knowledge and education and expertise in the area. Yeah what the heck do they know... those stupid PhD's. They don't know anything.

Its interesting how some of the smartest people make the worst leaders because all they know is these ridged rules and process so when a variable in introduced as it always is in the real world, they fall apart.

For better or worse, great leadership and great success in the real world (for many things like politics) requires more than just smarts, you need to inspire leadership, to adapt to changes and unite different factions.

[bheld]

Originally Posted by 7960

why don't people understand this?

[bheld]

The funny thing about that picture is that Levitt would probably argue that it was a stupid idea to put that gate there in the first place and that it needed to be taken down. Never mind the fact that you could put a few posts and a rope up and be done with it.

[RMNIXON]

Originally Posted by WickedLou9

Ivory tower = People who have knowledge and education and expertise in the area. Yeah what the heck do they know... those stupid PhD's. They don't know anything.

The Soviet Union had plenty of respected economists involved in writing papers on Central Planning. I am not sure where they are now?

You really need to get over the idea that these University "professors" need prove much of anything outside of hard science related fields of study.

Because they don't!

[RMNIXON]

Originally Posted by bheld

You mean people who plan economics through government incentives and punishments don't understand it?

Because the free market always finds a way around the gate. But it does often get hurt by the unfair handouts. And the people on the giving end can do less to produce good products and services with that extra help.

[RMNIXON]

Originally Posted by WickedLou9

Those are some smart people.

If they learned that the best thing they can do is leave the economy the hell alone I would say yes they are.

I never posted that I did not value higher education.

When I speak of Ivory towers I am talking about some people who never leave them, but have no problem telling the rest of us how to live by their ideals. I thought that was easy enough to understand. But I was very wrong.

[David Octavius]

Originally Posted by RMNIXON

If they learned that the best thing they can do is leave the economy the hell alone I would say yes they are.

I never posted that I did not value higher education.

When I speak of Ivory towers I am talking about some people who never leave them, but have no problem telling the rest of us how to live by their ideals. I thought that was easy enough to understand. But I was very wrong.

While I agree 100% that the "ivory tower" intellectuals are overrated (both the left and the right), there is no such thing as an economy left alone. Something beyond the control of consumers and rational producers will always affect them - war, strength of currency, greedy people who try to tilt the marketplace etc.

This kind of stuff leads to the type of economic disparity that I think you agree should not happen. It's one thing to earn your money, its entirely different to get it through nefarious means and its because of that we need a referee (regulations). The definition of what is nefarious and how much regulation we need should be the debate and everyone and their mama has a "solution".

But sometimes the question of the economy gets too muddled with "economic justice" instead of defining what is unscrupulous market practices that is actually making the economic chasm wider than it should be.

[RMNIXON]

The free market has problems. For example people have good judgement on the quality of most products, and the labor market is based on rewards for skills and productivity. When you get into areas like environmental polution for example, then the market is not working. You need a broader public interest. But it does not need to be anti-capitalist and act like industry is an enemy. The best environmental science we now have is done in the private sector. You can hire people to make your company compliant with government regulation. We do not need all the "evil corporation" class warfare bullshit.

[Ironduke]

Originally Posted by tbone

Much like the people running this country,
[...]

Secretary Henry Paulson (MBA Harvard)

Secretary Elaine Chao (MBA Ha