海角大神

鈥淲hat鈥檚 with all the teenagers without costumes coming to my front door and expecting candy?!鈥� This was the gist of several Facebook status updates I saw last night. I don鈥檛 discriminate against the uncostumed because it isn鈥檛 worth ruining someone鈥檚 evening to save a dollar or so worth of candy, but at least one friend has a 鈥渘o costume, no candy鈥� policy that鈥檚 not always popular. Halloween is an interesting object lesson in the law of unintended consequences: when we say 鈥渉ey, come get free candy,鈥� we can expect (predictably) that a lot of people are going to invest in getting that 鈥渇ree鈥� candy. People will be disappointed to see adults and teenagers without costumes 鈥渢aking advantage鈥� of their neighbors鈥� generosity and then either attach strings or complain about Them, the people coming from outside Our Neighborhood to get the candy that we bought for Our Neighbors. It鈥檚 probably good for at least a couple of days鈥� worth of neighborhood gossip and/or venting on social networking sites. Social capital erodes (and prejudices might be reinforced) as we come to see people from outside Our Neighborhood as cynical opportunists. And so on.

So the policy question is this: if giving away candy bars at Halloween is going to be so divisive and problematic, why do we expect large-scale tax-and-transfer programs involving billions of dollars to succeed harmoniously and without cynical opportunism?

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