City AM is great so frequently that it hardly seems worth linking to – you read it already, right? – but this is great because it exposes the underlying assumptions and arrogance of statist politicians:
Former Labour party adviser John McTernan warned the BBC’s Newsnight of the “moral hazard” associated with giving people more freedom. “You cannot trust people to spend their own money sensibly,” he added
He was commenting on a rare bit of liberalisation that sees that we are now able to choose what to do with our pension pots on retirement.
If you cannot trust people to spend their own money wisely, what hope is there when they are spending other peoples’?
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Yes, men may not always act sensibly, may act irresponsibly, with their own money. So what?
If I call another person’s action irresponsible this means: “I wouldn’t have done that”.
If I call a previous action of mine irresponsible this means: “If I’d known then what I know now I wouldn’t have done that.”
The first is a complaint that this other person isn’t my slave. The second is a complaint that I am not omniscient. Which of these deserves to be taken seriously?
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