Again, the book will be released next week.
Another point Boudreaux makes is that in a specialized economy, our production activities are much narrower than our consumption activities. This makes rent-seeking more prevalent on the production side.
This point is easily missed. For example, Stephen G. Cecchetti and Kermit L. Schoenholtz write about the mortgage interest deduction as if its political strength comes entirely from home owners. (Pointer from Mark Thoma.) In fact, I would argue that it is the NAR, NAHB, and the MBA that make it inviolable.
We know that food stamps are popular with the farm lobby. And perhaps Medicaid does not benefit recipients as much as it does providers of medical services.
One wonders for how many government programs one could make similar claims.
If the null hypothesis in education is correct, then the vast majority of the whole public education system is essentially a giant rent-seeking enterprise that mainly benefits school employees and administrators, with a incidental benefit of 40 hours of subsidized day-care for parents.
Whatever the kids get out of their +10,000 hours of education time, it isn’t showing up as a premium in their lifetime economic outcomes when one corrects for cognitive potential and productivity-enhancing personalty traits.
That’s not “subsidized day-care.” That’s virtually zero marginal cost day care. It is by no means an incidental benefit.
What these things have in common, (food, medical services, education, etc.) is that they are ostensibly universal needs, and thus “shouldn’t” be denied the poor. So, they have narrow supply while also being on the narrow side of the demand options. So I would guess some pretty basic voter theory would suggest the current situation.
So, perhaps the most promising (though not very promising) strategy is to undermine the idea that these products and services are universal, monolithic commodities.