Tory Authoritarianism: The Nudgers Approach

Oh dear. George Osborne and his guru, Richard Thaler, have been at Davos. This means, sure as eggs is eggs, that there’s a piece celebrating behavioural economics on the way. And, yup, it duly arrives in the Guardian today. I’ve mentioned the Nudgers before and few people doubt that there are some useful ideas that it can bring to bear on policy. Then again Thaler and Cass Sunstein call their ideas “libertarian paternalism” which, while confusing is at least vastly less confused than Tory policy seems to be.

Apart from anything else, David Cameron frequently rails against libertarianism (or, to be more precise, his idea of a libertarianism built of straw) which would seem to leave us with merely the paternalism part of the bargain.

And, indeed, that does seem to be the case. Consider the example of “good practice” Georgie Osborne chooses to highlight:

[B]ecause the behavioural sciences show that people often make bad decisions when they’re excited by the prospect of immediate gratification, a Conservative government will impose a seven-day cooling off period for store credit cards, so shoppers can’t immediately rack up debts on them when they sign up at the till.