I too find it hard to get inside the heads of politicians, and I don’t find rational choice assumptions very illuminating in this regard. By insisting that politicians are motivated by considerations no different than businessmen or anybody else, public choice economists have helped slay the pernicious myth that politicians are generally warmly other-regarding public servants. But the economist’s assumption of motivational uniformity fails to capture that politicians do in fact seem to be really odd people who don’t seem to be primarily motivated by the same considerations that motivate most of us most of the time. The incentives of the political process create a kind of filter that selects for individuals extraordinarily fixated on power and status and extraordinarily motivated to keep it. If this is right (anyone know of personality studies of politicans?), then the problem with standard public choice is that it gives too much credit to politicians by assuming they’re like everyone else and therefore it fails to capture just how exceptionally prone politicians are to narcissism, motivated cognition, self-deception, and brazen lying.

Will Wilkinson postituses The Trouble with Public Choice: Too Generous to Politicians, millega on keeruline mitte nõustuda. Avaliku valiku (public choice) suurimaks probleemiks näib olevat kerkinud järjest suurem rõhuasetus inimeste irratsionaalsusele (näiteks Thaler, Sunstein, Caplan jpt).

Kulude, tulude ja riskide hindamine võimaldab küll jätkuvalt nii mõndagi selgitada ja mõista, kuid olen ka ise kokkupuutunud juhtumitega, kus mõnede avaliku sektori töötajate otsuste tagamaid lahates pole ratsionaalsuse ja loogikaga midagi teha, seega rõhutaks veel kord Wilkinsoni viimases lauses toodud tähelepanekut, mis sobib eriti hästi tipp-poliitikute kirjeldamiseks:

…the problem with standard public choice is that it gives too much credit to politicians by assuming they’re like everyone else and therefore it fails to capture just how exceptionally prone politicians are to narcissism, motivated cognition, self-deception, and brazen lying.