… is from page 162 of Richard Epstein’s magnificent 1995 volume, Simple Rules for a Complex World:
The entire regulatory process [of wrongful dismissal of workers] shows the constant preoccupation with the direct effects of decisions on named persons, without regard to the vastly greater indirect effects on other persons similarly situated. The effort to preserve a single job for one discrete, named individual results in the nonformation of numerous other jobs for other people.
DBx: Yes – or results instead in reduced pay for all workers covered by this regulatory doctrine.
The particular setting in which Epstein here warns of the unseen ill consequences of efforts to achieve a good seen result is an example of a more general phenomenon. Protectionism, for example. often wins the day politically because it saves the jobs of seen workers, while workers who, as a result of the protectionism, lose jobs or suffer lower wages – not to mention the consumers who pay higher prices – are unseen and, hence, ignored.
