David Henderson On Thaler and Sunstein

See Henderson on Thaler's Misbehaving. Excerpt:

"But Thaler and Sunstein drastically understate the problems that arise because the people in government doing the nudging are also Humans, not Econs. And bureaucrats have generally bad incentives to nudge in the "right" direction. On this point, I laid out my criticisms in more detail in my review of Sunstein's 2013 book Simpler ("Simpler? Really?" Fall 2013.)

Thaler answers that he and Sunstein "went out of our way to say that if the government bureaucrat is the person trying to help, it must be recognized that the bureaucrat is also a Human, subject to biases." He expresses his frustration that "no matter how many times we repeat this refrain we continue to be accused of ignoring it." But the accusation is understandable, as they keep advocating government intervention.

The best way to show that they do not ignore this problem is for them to advocate taking large amounts of power out of the government's hands. As I've written elsewhere, one way to reduce government power and make people more aware of government's activities--after all, many of the problems Thaler cites are due to people's being unaware--is to get rid of tax withholding. That way, people can be more aware of their tax bill, which is one of the major costs of government. He has not yet advocated that idea.

Maybe we should nudge him."