I do very much like Thaler and Sunstein’s book Nudge. They promote the idea of liberal paternalistic state, which nudges, but doesn’t force, people to do the right decisions. An example would be a choice architecture, which encourages people to consume more vegetables, buy an insurance policy, save for retirement, etc.
Recently they have posted a Simpson comics at their blog featuring a supposedly good choice architecture.
Of course, I don’t like the comics. First of all, why should an entrepreneur care for someone’s health? An entrepreneur should care for his profit, not Homer’s diet! The only reason why the entrepreneur rearranged his store, and so impeded his profits, was to meet some bureaucratic regulation! Good choice architecture improves the welfare of some while not diminishing welfare of others. A choice architecture that arbitrarily helps some (Homer), while damaging others (Indian shopkeeper Apu) is a bad choice architecture.
The risk of liberal paternalism is that the liberal part of the choice architecture will be omitted, and we will end up living in a paternalistic state, where everyone will be told what to do in order to achieve the highest level of welfare, like in North Korea…