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Old 05-06-2011, 01:50 PM   #51
Andrew H.
Grand Master of Flowers
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Quote:
Originally Posted by tompe View Post
But that is like saying that laws to always wear a seatbelt is a "loss" because given the choice consumers nearly always choose not to wear a seatbelt. And so on. What people do is not necessarily correlated with what is good for people.
True enough.

And yet your example makes things too easy. There is a fundamental difference between regulating things because they relate to health and safety and regulating things because you think that certain businesses are better than others. And while I'm not of the opinion that favoring certain businesses over others is always wrong, making me pay more for a car because the safety devices in the car will demonstrably reduce the number of people killed or injured is a lot more justifiable than making me pay more for a consumer product because otherwise someone's expensive business model will suffer.

(Again, not to say that it isn't justifiable - but it's a lot harder to justify).
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