Source: American Institute for Economic Research
by Michael Munger
“Public Choice originated as a heterodox corrective to a misguided focus on ‘market failure,’ a central concept in the welfare economics literature of the 1950s. The orthodox work compared real-world markets with the ‘ideal’ allocation of resources that would be selected by an omniscient, benevolent despot. Opponents argued that government also faces the ‘knowledge problem,’ and state employees are not immune to incentives. Real governments are neither omniscient nor benevolent, and so state action is not always better than markets. Sometimes, relying on government may make things much worse. In fact, it has been estimated that the total ‘killing by the state,’ or total death toll from democide, exceeds 250 million since 1800. Still, unless you are an anarchist, you accept that some government is necessary. But how much? Doing what?” (06/11/24)
https://www.aier.org/article/government-failure-in-one-lesson/