The greatest obstacle to sound economic policy is not entrenched
special interests or rampant lobbying, but the popular misconceptions,
irrational beliefs, and personal biases held by ordinary voters. This
is economist Bryan Caplan's sobering assessment in this provocative
and eye-opening book. Caplan argues that voters continually elect
politicians who either share their biases or else pretend to,
resulting in bad policies winning again and again by popular demand.
Boldly calling into question our most basic assumptions about American
politics, Caplan contends that democracy fails precisely because it
does what voters want. Through an analysis of Americans' voting
behavior and opinions on a range of economic issues, he makes the
convincing case that noneconomists suffer from four prevailing biases:
they underestimate the wisdom of the market mechanism, distrust
foreigners, undervalue the benefits of conserving labor, and
pessimistically believe the economy is going from bad to worse. Caplan
lays out several bold ways to make democratic government work
better--for example, urging economic educators to focus on correcting
popular misconceptions and recommending that democracies do less and
let markets take up the slack. The Myth of the Rational Voter takes an
unflinching look at how people who vote under the influence of false
beliefs ultimately end up with government that delivers lousy results.
With the upcoming presidential election season drawing nearer, this
thought-provoking book is sure to spark a long-overdue reappraisal of
our elective system.
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Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9781400828821
Publisert
2013
Utgiver
Vendor
Princeton University Press
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter