Partial Birth Act Upheld

[Ilya Somin]

That is true. But Friedman viewed the NIT as a second best solution (with first being almost no redistribution at all). See Ebenstein's recent biography of him. 

Hayek became more and more negative about redistribution as he got later in his career, but it is true that he never explicitly said that he wanted to abolish it all.  In any event, Friedman and Hayek both favored significantly lower levels of redistribution than exist in the US today, and also lower than are favored by most modern US conservatives, especially politically viable ones. And it is the views on redistribution of modern US conservatives that this debate is about.

Ilya Somin
Assistant Professor of Law
George Mason University School of Law
3301 Fairfax Dr.
Arlington, VA 22201
ph: 703-993-8069
fax: 703-993-8202
e-mail: isomin at gmu.edu
Website: http://mason.gmu.edu/~isomin/
SSRN Page: http://ssrn.com/author=333339


----- Original Message -----
From: Frank Cross <crossf at mail.utexas.edu>
Date: Friday, April 20, 2007 7:38 pm
Subject: RE: RE: Partial Birth Act Upheld

> 
> Just to clarify the record, Milton Friedman supported a measure of 
> government income redistribution via a negative income tax.
> He was dubious of bureaucracies and rules that limited how the 
> poor 
> spent the resources they were given.
> 
> Hayek also supported some income redistribution, I think.
> 
> 
> At 04:56 PM 4/20/2007, Volokh, Eugene wrote:
> >         I am no expert on economics, but my understanding is 
> that quite
> >a few economists generally oppose welfare-state programs.  Nobel 
> prize>winner Milton Friedman, who one might think had at least 
> looked at a
> >wide rage of evidence (the only question on the table -- I'm not 
> saying>he got it right), generally came out against them; I think 
> others have
> >as well.
> >
> >         Now I agree that even Friedman didn't oppose all public 
> spending>for the general welfare (even setting aside core 
> libertarian matters
> >such as the military and the police).  He supported public 
> funding for
> >K-12 education, though he thought the money was best spent using 
> school>choice programs.
> >
> >         But recall that this all started from the claim that 
> abortion>opponents generally don't care about people, because they 
> oppose various
> >welfare spending.  The claim was later slightly modified to this: 
> I
> >wrote "But being wrong is not the same as being insincere."  Malla
> >Pollack responded: "Yes, but distinguish error from insistance on
> >refusing to look at opposing evidence."
> >
> >         Surely Malla couldn't have been claiming, either in her 
> original>claims or her revised claims, that abortion foes opposed 
> all government
> >spending programs, including the GI Bill, public schooling, and the
> >like.  (I know of zero evidence that abortion foes as a class 
> take such
> >a view.)  The claim was that they generally oppose most modern
> >welfare-state proposals.  Even if that's so (and it's not clear 
> that it
> >is), my guess is that the stuff they'd oppose is pretty much the 
> stuff>that Milton Friedman and other anti-welfare-state economists 
> would>oppose.
> >
> >         So the bottom line:  Maybe Friedman was, and other 
> economists>are, mistaken.  Maybe those anti-abortion advocates who 
> oppose various
> >welfare-state programs are mistaken.  But it's hard to say that to
> >oppose welfare-state programs (of the sort that conservatives 
> tend to
> >oppose) reflects "insist[e]nce on refusing to look at opposing
> >evidence," unless one thinks that Friedman et al. just haven't 
> looked at
> >the evidence.
> >
> >         Eugene
> >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: HOWARD H SCHWEBER [mailto:hhschweber at facstaff.wisc.edu]
> > > Sent: Thursday, April 19, 2007 2:10 PM
> > > To: Volokh, Eugene
> > > Cc: Con Law Prof list
> > > Subject: Re: RE: Partial Birth Act Upheld
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > >     As to refusing to look at opposing evidence, some very
> > > smart  people
> > > > who have looked at a wide range of evidence nonetheless
> > > conclude that welfare-state programs do more harm than good.
> > >
> > >
> > > ???  Can you cite to such a finding?  I have never seen
> > > anything of the sort.  I have seen arguments that *specific*
> > > programs in the United States do more harm than good,
> > > although actually the evidence does not really show that --
> > > some programs have done harm, but the "more than good" poses
> > > an unprovable counterfactual.  But as a statement about
> > > social welfare programs generally this is not merely
> > > unfamiliar, it is outright bizarre.  The GI Bill did more
> > > harm than good?  Finland provides the families of newborns
> > > with a basket of goodies -- diapers, wipes, baby clothes.
> > > There is evidence that this causes harm???
> > >
> > > Howard Schweber
> > > Dept. of Poli. Sci.
> > > UW-Madison
> > >
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