Or, perhaps, anti-fraud & conspiracy, or TANSTAAFL

Bryan Caplan makes a compelling argument that Mises and Bastiat were right: contrary to popular belief, government policy very closely mirrors public opinion and not the views of lobbyists, corporations and political insiders:

Start with spending. Over 80% of respondents in 1996 either "favored" or "strongly favored" cuts in government spending, a clear strike against Bastiat and Mises.2 But making the question slightly more specific reveals that the majority opposes spending cuts on all of the biggest components of the budget, from Social Security and health care to national defense.3 A majority does intermittently favor cuts in space exploration and welfare.4 But opposition even to the latter is tenuous; government-funded job training is more than twice as popular as dropping recipients from the rolls and expecting them to find low-skill jobs.5 The only category of spending that the public invariably wants to cut is foreign aid6-which amounts to about 1% of the federal budget! Thus, if you carried out all of the cuts the public is willing to tolerate, the size of government would barely change...The most plausible reading of this data is that the public wants a free lunch. They hope to spend less on government without touching any of its main functions.

More

Caplan continues:

Public opinion on regulation looks much the same. At the most abstract level, the median American favors the status quo, but those who want less regulation consistently outnumber those who want more. During the 1983-7 period, advocates of deregulation had an absolute majority. But even this moderate skepticism about regulation is superficial. Americans who believe that it is "government's responsibility to keep prices under control" predominate more than 2:1. About 80% of Americans think that government should "require businesses to provide consumers with the information they need to make informed choices." Industrial policy for both high-tech and declining industries enjoys majority support. The median American persistently favors "government financing of projects to create new jobs," and at least does not oppose French-style "work sharing," though he does balk at the idea that government ought to "provide a job for everyone who wants one.

See parts one and two.

(via Mises econoblog)

posted by rafuzo | 06:04 PM