Sunday, May 3, 2026

day no. 17,359: sin farms

"If you pay firefighters by the fire, you are tempting some of them to become arsonists. Once a third world country was trying to deal with a rat infestation, and they had the bright idea of paying a bounty to anyone who brought in a rat tail. The natural consequence of this, because incentives work, was that some folks took up rat farming." — Douglas Wilson, Hate Farm Subsidies from the SPLC

You get more of what you incentivize and less of what you penalize. If you pay people for dead snakes, you will not end your snake problem, you will gain a bunch of snake farmers. If you get paid every time someone breaks the speed limit, you will not get less speeders, you will get cameras at every intersection and planes in the air monitoring your speed. 

The civil magistrate cannot profit off of justice. If and when it does, you will find more injustice about, not less. When the authorities make money off of your disobedience, you will be sure to find authorities who are cheering for and sometimes even generating more disobedience in order for them to turn a greater profit, just ask the SPLC.

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