IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/now/jnlrbe/105.00000144.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Libertarian Paternalism: Making Rational Fools

Author

Listed:
  • D. Wade Hands

Abstract

This paper examines criticisms of libertarian paternalism, focusing in particular on so-called knowledge problems: the set of problems associated with the question of whether a choice architect would, or even could, have sufficient information to implement a successful libertarian paternalist policy. The paper builds on arguments presented in Mario Rizzo and Glen Whitman’s book Escaping Paternalism: Rationality, Behavioral Economics and Public Policy (2020). Although the paper supports Rizzo and Whitman’s arguments about knowledge problems, it moves in a different, more social, direction when it comes to the implications of these criticisms for microeconomic-based governmental policy more generally.

Suggested Citation

  • D. Wade Hands, 2021. "Libertarian Paternalism: Making Rational Fools," Review of Behavioral Economics, now publishers, vol. 8(3-4), pages 305-326, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:now:jnlrbe:105.00000144
    DOI: 10.1561/105.00000144
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1561/105.00000144
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1561/105.00000144?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Carlsson, Fredrik & Johansson-Stenman, Olof & Kataria, Mitesh, 2024. "How Much Liberty Should We Have? Citizens versus Experts on Regulating Externalities and Internalities," Working Papers in Economics 841, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    2. Luca Congiu & Ivan Moscati, 2022. "A review of nudges: Definitions, justifications, effectiveness," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(1), pages 188-213, February.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Behavioral economics; nudging; paternalism; rational choice; welfare;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • B4 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Economic Methodology
    • D6 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics
    • D9 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:now:jnlrbe:105.00000144. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Lucy Wiseman (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nowpublishers.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.