A reader who is shocked, without having done any home wiring work at all:

“Derb—Your remarks on social security are as astounding to me as anything

you have ever said. Is there really that much of a leap from your

slothfulness to endorsing nationalized medicine because you are too lazy to

find your own doctor? Nationalized housing because you are too lazy to buy

your own house? Nationalized employment because you are too lazy to find

your own job? None of this appears to be remotely conservative.”

Well:

(a) I grew up under nationalized medicine and WE HAD TO FIND OUR OWN DOCTOR.

And when we didn’t get on with him, we switched. So you aren’t necessarily

bereft of choice in a nationalized system. However, health care is a big

knotty issue that I have never been able to come to firm conclusions about.

I really don’t see how it can be done without SOME public provision, though

I certainly don’t want to return to the state socialism of my childhood.

(No, not even with the free cod liver oil we used to get.) I am going to

wait until Ramesh writes an article on health care before I tell you what I

think.

(b) Again, nationalized (at any rate, municipalized) housing worked well for

me — I spent my 3rd to 18th years in it. That was then, however, and this

is now. The municipal tenants I grew up among were decent working people.

Municipal tenants nowadays are the feckless and hopeless. No, no

nationalized housing, thanks.

(c) Nationalized employment? No thanks. I’ve seen it in action, in Maoist

China. Doesn’t work. Really, really dumb idea, in fact.

You have to take issues on their merits, see? I am not a libertarian, and

in fact have written unkind things about libertarians. There are lots

of thing my government can legitimately do to me, and for me. Every one of

those things involves a small diminution of my freedom, of course; but

that’s the price of living in a coherent society. You have to try to think

each issue through.

Managing investments is a thing that some people are terrifically keen on

and good at, and will do well at, while other people take it as an

irritating chore, can’t really understand what they are doing, and will get

lousy results. (Unless the whole process is regulated to death by the

govt., in which case we are back where we started.) It’s no use saying:

“Well, they should try harder, and get with the program.” People are made

differently, and you are setting up a competitive system based on particular

inclinations and abilities. I don’t much mind weakest-to-the-wall among

30-yr-olds, but it seems cruel to me to make life that competitive for

80-yr-olds. Old age should be RESTFUL.