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Fraud
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Does Akrasia argue for paternalism?
The akratic might wish for laws that address their weakness of will.
Can you think of examples?
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Does Akrasia argue for paternalism?
The akratic might wish for laws that address their weakness of will.
Can you think of examples? Restrictions on drugs and alcohol Tax laws that favor savings Tax laws that favor health plans
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The Counter-arguments1. Bad Faith
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The Counter-arguments2. The state’s informational problem
The State might easily get it wrong How do we know the subject’s deep
preferences?
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The Counter-arguments2. The state’s informational problem
The State might easily get it wrong The paternalist’s biases
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The Counter-arguments2. The state’s informational problem
The State might easily get it wrong A reversal of preferences does not imply
akrasia.
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The Counter-arguments2. The state’s informational problem
The State might easily get it wrong: Is addiction per se bad? Might it ever
make sense ex ante to become an addict?
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Gary Becker: Rational and irrational addiction
Utility
0 Time
Gary Becker, Accounting for Tastes (1996)
Preferences for commodities over time
Addiction: the more you consume,The more you want
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Gary Becker: Rational and irrational addiction
Utility
0 A
B
Time
Gary Becker, Accounting for Tastes (1996)
classical music
Over time the preferencefor classical music increases—but this is a benign addiction
Subject suffers from “withdrawal”if music taken away from him
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Gary Becker: Rational and irrational addiction
Utility
0 A
B
CTime
classical music
coffee
Unlike classical music, there comes a time when the subject would like to stop drinking coffee. Though he finds he cannot do so, his ex ante decision to start drinking coffee is still rational
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Gary Becker: Rational and irrational addiction
Utility
0A
D
B
CTime
classical music
coffee
hard drugs
Ex ante, the decision to start taking hard drugs is irrational
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The Counter-arguments
Can the state distinguish between rational and irrational addiction?
Just how would you categorize the taste for the following: Tobacco Ice cream Lotteries
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The Counter-arguments3. Self-help
If we might be weak-willed, can we address the problem without the help of legal barriers? Social sanctions Self-binding
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The Counter-arguments Self-binding as a response to akrasia
Jon Elster, Ulysses and the Sirens (1984)
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Examples of self-binding
Marriage
Home purchases
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The Counter-arguments4. The value of autonomy
Even if autonomy is merely a means, things can matter as means. The abstract value of freedom
Autonomy strengthens self-control
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Paternalism and Perfectionism
Paternalism: Interfere with personal choices to make subject better off
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Paternalism and Perfectionism
Paternalism: Interfere with personal choices to make subject better off
Perfectionism: Interfere with personal choices to promote a moral goal
Note how these might overlap
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PerfectionismPaternalism
Impugning Individual Choice
The Paternalist seeks to make the subject better off, while the Perfectionist would vindicate a moral goal.
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PerfectionismPaternalism
Impugning Individual Choice
These overlap when making a person better off vindicates a moral goal
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PerfectionismPaternalism
Impugning Individual Choice
And that will happen when the subject would not choose well for himself because his preferences are immoral.
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Impugning Individual ChoiceTwo kinds of paternalism
Soft Paternalism overrules personal choices in order to satisfy subject’s deepest preferences, without advancing a moral goal E.g. Morally neutral judgment biases
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Impugning Individual ChoiceTwo kinds of paternalism
Soft Paternalism overrules personal choices in order to satisfy subject’s deepest preferences, without advancing a moral goal E.g. Morally neutral judgment biases
Hard Paternalism overrules personal choices when the subject’s deepest preferences are immoral and “he doesn’t know what’s good for him”
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PerfectionismSoft Paternalism(neutral preferences)
Impugning Individual Choice:Varieties of Paternalism
Hard Paternalism(immoral preferences)
Varieties of Perfectionism
The Social Perfectionist does not seek to make the subject better off, but only those he might influence And thus is not a paternalist
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SocialPerfectionism
Soft Paternalism
Varieties of Perfectionism
Private Perfectionism(Hard Paternalism)
The private perfectionist is a paternalist, but not the social perfectionist
