… a continuing series.  Today we explore the disinclination of people to do things they don’t want to do regardless of the level of persuasion placed on them by other people who think they know what’s best for everyone.

Draw Your Own Conclusion

Two things have jumped out at me from the news in the last few days.  The first one is that two states, New York and Massachussettts have recently passed legislation requiring that owners of certain rifles register them with the state and that the laws have been largely ignored.  State officials were taken by surprise and are not sure what the next step will be.  The second is that after the deadline has passed requiring people to enroll in a healthcare plan under The Affordable Care Act, many are still not doing it.  And their reasons for not purchasing healthcare insurance are the same reasons they didn’t do it before the law was passed.  And so passage of the law had no effect on their reasoning for inaction.

Moral?  Some people cannot be coerced into taking an action they do not wish to take regardless of whether it is actually (arguably) in their best interest to take that action.  People will do what they want to do and they won’t do what they don’t want to do.  But what I find discomforting about all this is that there appears to be a belief among our political class that they can circumvent human nature (or laws of physics, or economics) with the stroke of a pen.  And even more discomforting is that they feel no guilt over their actions since they believe are “helping” you.