Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-89wxm Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-07T12:17:04.663Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

6 - Deficient Foundations for Behavioral Policymaking

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2019

Mario J. Rizzo
Affiliation:
New York University
Glen Whitman
Affiliation:
California State University, Northridge
Get access

Summary

The policies recommended by behavioral paternalists rest on certain posited empirical facts or regularities about human behavior. Some of these supposed facts have not been established with much confidence. Specifically, psychological findings are highly context-specific, and thus lack the generality required for policymaking; generalizing quantitative results from the laboratory to the real world is unreliable; most existing research does not account adequately for incentives and learning; most existing research does not consider small-group debiasing; and most existing research does not adequately assess self-regulation and self-debiasing. Establishing reliable answers to these questions is a prerequisite for crafting and calibrating paternalistic policies with a reasonable expectation of improving welfare.

Type
Chapter
Information
Escaping Paternalism
Rationality, Behavioral Economics, and Public Policy
, pp. 190 - 234
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×