fabio guillermo rojas wrote:
>
> > "screwed-up institution." The outcome of democracy depends on the
> > overall rationality of public opinion, but whatever outcome you get can
> > be equally enjoyed by the rational and irrational alike.
>
> My question isn't about the quality of policy, but the difference
> between what the institution produces and what the median voter
> wants. It's easy for me to believe that voters are irrational,
> but it's harder for me to believe that every policy closely
> matches the MV.
Why? What are the biggest unpopular policies that persist?
> Let me elaborate my question: isn't is possible than when voters
> put faith in some set of rules for generating policy that the
> outputs may be far from the MV? Fabio
If I understand you, my paper talked about this too. If voters put an
irrationally high level of trust in their leaders, this might give their
leaders the slack to pursue their own agenda. The doctrine of papal
infallibility is the extreme case - if your clientele considers you
infallible, you obviously have a lot of slack! But it is plausible to
see this as a special case of the MV. The only twist is that the median
voter implicitly says "My preference is whatever his preference is,
within some limits."
--
Prof. Bryan Caplan
Department of Economics George Mason University
http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED]
"He wrote a letter, but did not post it because he felt that no one
would have understood what he wanted to say, and besides it was not
necessary that anyone but himself should understand it."
Leo Tolstoy, *The Cossacks*
