Welcome, this is Anastasia Yuglova bringing you the Cato Daily Podcast.

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In his article for the summer 2006 edition of Cato's Regulation magazine, Harvard University

Professor of Economics Edward Glazer argued that decisions made on behalf of the public

will be less accurate and less likely to produce beneficial results than private

decision-making. He makes the case against hard and soft paternalism once again in today's podcast.

How does soft paternalism differ from traditional hard paternalism?

The major distinction between soft paternalism and hard paternalism is that soft paternalism doesn't actually involve restrictions on people's choices.

Instead of a traditional hard paternalistic policy like a ban on smoking,

for example, in the workplace or a tax on cigarettes

soft paternalism attempts to move people's decisions using non-forceful means.

So for example, warning labels on cigarettes would be an example of soft paternalism.

One thing that's particularly favored by soft paternalists is just changing the default.

So let's say the default within a

company is not to put your money in a 401k. The default might be putting your

money in a 401k, which the reasoning goes, doesn't restrict anyone's freedom but rather

still induces them to do what the soft paternalists think is the right thing.

There's a belief among some scholars Richard Taylor and Cast Sunstein of the University of Chicago for example that soft

paternalism is completely innocuous and benign.

You would disagree?

I think it depends on the context.

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