Kinh tế học cấm đoán

by Mark Thornton, Phạm Nguyên Trường (Translator)

Từ xưa đến nay, rượu và ma túy vẫn là những chất gây nghiện bị cấm đoán ở mọi nơi trên thế giới bởi những hệ lụy mà nó gây ra. Không chỉ tàn phá cơ thể con người, những chất cấm này còn là tác nhân gây ra vấn nạn buôn lậu, tham nhũng và những tác động gián tiếp đến thế hệ mai sau. Vậy, đã bao giờ bạn tự hỏi tại sao những hành động cấm đoán mạnh tay của chính phủ các nước trên thế giới vẫn không thể tiêu diệt được hoàn toàn các loại chất cấm này? Đầu thế kỉ XX, Mĩ đã từng ra Luật cấm rượu, có Liên minh bài trừ quán rượu và thậm chí là Đảng cấm rượu, thế nhưng những hành động mạnh mẽ đó lại chỉ tạo ra những tác dụng ngược. Thống kê cho thấy số lượng người phạm tội có liên quan đến rượu ngày càng tăng, tỉ lệ tham nhũng và buôn lậu cũng tăng cao chóng mặt. Chính những điều này đã khiến chính phủ Mĩ phải xem xét lại và hủy bỏ luật cấm kia. Vậy phải chăng chúng ta nên thay vì cấm đoán, hãy mở ra một lối đi khác để giảm bớt những hậu quả mà các quy định cấm đoán gây ra?

Cuốn sách Kinh Tế Học Cấm Đoán sẽ nói với bạn rằng về cơ bản rằng những cấm đoán, ngăn cản trong xã hội mà bạn vẫn cho là thật hợp lý về đạo đức, được luật pháp hay các phương tiện gần như luật pháp bảo hộ, hầu hết chúng đều không có tác dụng, nếu không muốn nói là phản tác dụng. Tức là chúng thường tạo thêm những điều tồi tệ hơn cho nhiều thành phần trong xã hội, hoặc làm phát sinh thêm những vấn nạn mới như tội ác khốc liệt hơn, dung dưỡng tham nhũng, đặc quyền và hình thành thêm các băng đảng.

Kinh Tế Học Cấm Đoán là một cuốn sách rất đặc biệt mà bạn phải đọc một cách cẩn trọng, đa chiều, cởi mở, và qua đó, hãy nhìn nhận các vấn đề dưới con mắt của một trí tuệ tự do - điều mà những người trong ngành kinh tế luôn tự nhủ phải giữ gìn. Có như vậy, bạn mới có thể tránh khỏi “chấn thương” khi tiếp nhận những thông tin thú vị mà cuốn sách đưa ra.

Nội dung sách bao gồm các chương:

Chương 1: Các nhà kinh tế học và cấm đoán

Chương 2: Nguồn gốc của cấm đoán

Chương 3: Lí thuyết về cấm đoán

Chương 4: Hiệu lực của các loại ma túy bất hợp pháp

Genres: Economics, Nonfiction, History

325 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1991

About the author

Mark Thornton is a Senior Fellow at the Mises Institute and the book review editor of the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics. He has authored seven books and is a frequent guest on national radio shows.

Reviews

[Nguyễn Quang Vũ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nói nhanh, đứa nào bảo "quyển này dễ đọc lắm, cứ đọc đi" là nó lừa đấy. Suy từ bụng mình ra bụng người thôi. Nếu chỉ đọc để "hiểu một vài ý chung" thì OK. Đại loại là Mark Thornton chứng minh rằng việc cấm đoán ma túy (từ cần sa đến côcain hay hêrôin và các biến thể của nó) thì chỉ làm cho tình hình kinh tế xã hội trở nên tệ hại hơn mà thôi. Ông chứng minh bằng cách tính toán các loại chi phí do cấm đoán gây ra rồi đến lợi ích của việc bãi bỏ nó và ảnh hưởng của nó đến xã hội. Ông dẫn chiếu đến Luật Cấm Rượu kinh điển ở Mỹ từ năm 1920 đến năm 1933. Cuốn sách có bổ sung thêm phần phụ lục cũng khá là đáng đọc liên quan đến chủ đề cấm đoán kinh tế, trong đó có cả việc cấm đoán mại dâm, với cùng tinh thần đề cao tự do trong kinh tế.

Quyển sách đúng là rất nên đọc với dân kinh tế, với những nhà làm luật hay nghiên cứu khoa học xã hội. Nó cũng là loại sách thay-đổi-suy-nghĩ rất đáng để đọc với những ai thích thể loại này.

Mình đọc quyển này cũng vì người dịch nó là bác Phạm Nguyên Trường :D - một dịch giả có tinh thần tự do rất đáng trân trọng.

[Mark Geise · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed "Economics of Prohibition". It is a short book (under 200 pages), but it is long on information and short on speculation. Some knowledge of economics would help one to understand some of Thornton's points more clearly, but the terminology and concepts can easily be looked up by complete economics novices.

Thornton lays out this book by discussing the history of prohibition, the effects of prohibition, the theory of prohibition, and the future of prohibition. He tends to focus primarily on the prohibition of alcohol in the early 20th century and narcotics and marijuana prohibitions throughout the rest of the 20th century. He looks at prohibitions from an economic and free market perspective, illustrating how prohibition rises the prices of drugs and decreases users' real incomes. This necessarily reduces their standards of living, as they have less to spend on food, clothing, shelter, and other products and services. This reduction in real incomes makes crime more attractive; the risks to one's job and future income are now less valuable and less stark. The opportunity costs of crime are now lower, so more crime will be committed all else being equal.

Also, Thornton explains that more law enforcement resources are diverted to the enforcement of drug laws under prohibition than under other forms of government intervention. These resources are diverted from enforcement of crimes like theft and rape. These crimes all the sudden become less costly to the criminal under prohibition because the chances of being caught are lower. This two-pronged effect increases crime from both ends. The interaction between those two factors was something I hadn't thought of before reading this book.

Another important thing I took away from this book was Thornton's history of prohibitions. They have tended to be formed due to some combination of racism/anti-immigrant sentiment, coalition building by major political parties to garner support of interest groups, and the direct support of large corporate interests. Not surprisingly, the progressives of the early 20th century, with their brand of racism and belief in big government, absorbed prohibition into its platform. I believe that if more people understood the original sources of prohibition laws, there would be more public outcry against them.

I'd recommend this to anyone that is interested in drug and alcohol prohibition and a free-market perspective on those topics. Though it seems as if everyone is in favor of marijuana legalization now, I was happy that Thornton strays from marijuana legalization and talks about the legalization of heroin and other narcotics. This is a much more controversial topic, but I believe he handles it with aplomb. Heroin prohibition has the same effects as marijuana prohibition, so if one embraces one, he should embrace the other. This is a thought-provoking book with a lot of quality information from disparate sources. Best part about it: it's available for free from the Mises Institute website in PDF form!

[〰️Beth〰️ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Probably not for the casual reader.

Very enlightening book but reads more as a dissertation than your basic non fiction. Don’t get me wrong, I still found this a very interesting read. Very well researched and follows the treads of prohibition from the late 19th century to the late 20th. I did not realize this was published in 1991 while full of great insights it is sad to see that some of what Thornton summarizes thirty years later the US is still grappling with issues related to prohibition of substances and the socio-economic issues that have gone hand in hand with it.

[Jon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Let me start off by saying that I've read a few titles and watched many documentaries on the harms of prohibitionist policies, each having their own specific elements and focus, but largely touching on the same things:

Marijuana Myths Marijuana Facts: A Review Of The Scientific Evidence
Drug Crazy : How We Got into This Mess and How We Can Get Out
Marijuana is Safer: So Why Are We Driving People to Drink?
The Revolution: A Manifesto <-- Chapter 5.

The books covers alcohol and narcotics prohibition and all of the unintended consequences. It is very well cited and presents both sides of the arguments. Its focus is mostly economic but covers other social sciences as well.

Mark Thornton's book is the most well researched of the ones I've read, I'd attribute this to his presence in academia and/or hard work.

Quote from Wikipedia: "Thornton received his B.S. from St. Bonaventure University (1982), and his Ph.D. from Auburn University (1989). Thornton taught economics at Auburn University for a number of years, additionally serving as founding faculty advisor for the Auburn University Libertarians. He also served on the faculty of Columbus State University, and is now a senior fellow and resident faculty member at the Ludwig von Mises Institute."

Mark tries to hit home on public policy, emphasizing the free-market approach as the best solution. The book touches on a huge variety of studies in various fields: political economy, sociology, criminology, psychology etc.

There's an entire chapter dedicated to economic theory, hence the title, a variety of supply and demand charts and some indifference curves to illustrate basic concepts. The book is also full of statistics, graphs/ed. Mark briefly talks about the Austrian approach, by introducing praxeology as well.

A thorough history of the prohibitionist and temperance movements are covered starting with colonial times and proceeding through the progressive era (1900-1920).

Right off the bat, Mark makes the distinction between "rent seeking" behavior and "corruption" as this plays a big part in analyzing the incentives of the rampant crime coming from governmental institutions.

Mark touches on different schools of economic thought (German Historical School, Chicago School, Austrian, Classical) and the role of influential economists on public policy, the most notable proponent of prohibition being Irving Fischer and opponents being, Milton Friedman and Gary S. Becker.
Fischer was "champion of Prohibition within the profession. He organized round table discussion of the topic at the American Economic Association meetings in 1927.".."Fischer was clearly an advocate of government intervention in the economy".
"A key insight into his viewpoint....his speech at the Yale Socialist Club....in November 1941.."I believe [William Graham Sumner] was one of the greatest professors we ever had at Yale, but I have drawn far away from his point of view, that of the old laissez faire doctrine".

Thornton breaks the development of prohibition into three periods: the birth - from colonial times to Civil War, the politicization - from Civil War to around 1900, and the national prohibition adoptions - in the Progressive era (1900-1920).

Origins, Colonial Times:
"First, while alcohol was an accepted part of society, the Puritan ethic did discourage excessive use of alcohol. Puritans established sumptuary legislation designed to limit alcohol consumption and to prohibit tobacco consumption. This type of legislation was found to be in-effective and self-defeating and was later abolished"

"Second, legislation was passed to prevent the sale of alcohol to Indians, slaves, servants, and apprentices"
"Third, the colony of Georgia was organized as an experimental society by George Oglethorpe to promote temperance. In 1735, restrictions were placed on spirits, and subsidies were provided for beer"

Temperance to Prohibition:
"The temperance movement had grown to over a million members by 1833, consisting largely of northern evangelicals from the Baptist, Congregationalist, Methodist, and Presbyterian churches. Born in the revival movements of the 1920s and the 1930s, evangelical Protestantism is best described as post millennial pietism because its adherents believed that there would be a thousand-year kingdom of God on earth and that it was their job to prepare the world for Jesus' return. It is not surprising that as this group matured it turned increasingly to the power of the state to bolster the battle against alcohol."

Mark covers many groups and parties that developed, along with the role of women in prohibition:
Anti-Saloon League (evangelical group), Women's Christian Temperance Union (protestant women), Prohibition Party, American Temperance Society, National Women's Suffrage Association, American Woman Suffrage Association, United States Brewer's Association, National Retail Liquor Dealers etc.

Mark touches on the involvement of the American Medical Association and the American Pharmaceutical Association in prohibition movements.

He then delves into the history of the Harrison Narcotic Act of 1914 and continues to marijuana prohibition, cocaine, and heroine.

Fun fact: Excise taxes led to more nicotine content in each cigarette.
Fun fact: The alcohol industry were one of the biggest supporters of narcotics legislation

Mark becomes a heavy hitter on negative externalities/the unintended consequences of prohibition e.g. alcohol prohibition led to an increase of hard liquor consumption, "the alcohol prohibition movement unwittingly played a significant role in the spread of opium addiction".

Different theories of crime and economics are touched on:

Two hypothesis for the discussion of the origins of marijuana prohibition:
"Anslinger hypothesis" - Harry Anslinger, prohibitionist commissioner of the Federal Narcotics Bureau, played an entrepreneurial role in bringing marijuana attention to the public... and the "Mexican hypothesis" - discrimination and racism of others who are known to be users of the drug.
Mark argues that they are both right and one needs to put them together for a more mature understanding.

In the chapter on crime, he discusses different views of crime: economic theory (standard of living), sociological (environmental factors), and the Marxist theory (social class)

There is so much information in this book, I wish I could share more of it with you.

In sum: prohibition leads to more crime, dangerous drug substitutes/alternatives, an increase in potency, higher costs of drugs, increase in poverty, more death/homicides, political corruption, more individuals in prison, more tax payer dollars, rise of organized crime etc.

It is a slippery slope, the demand for drugs is inelastic, cutting out the suppliers only draws more into this extremely lucrative business.

[Hiep Nguyen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not easy-to-read book with...dozens of unable-to-understand graphs & charts.
Yet, it's very mind blowing with deep discussions over various economical consequences resulting from prohibition (liquor & heroine markets) such as: corruption, control costs, worsening effect of heroine innovations, seeking of lethal alternative drugs & killings among underground parties. The main implication is to free the market, following demand-supply principle so as to avoid those issues. It also relates to a similar prohibition market (i.e. prostitution) with interesting explanation. A worth-reading book.

[Khoa Trần · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sách khó nuốt, phần phụ lục khá hay.

[Dino Silvestri · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read it.

[Kat M · Rating 4 out of 5]

This would get 5 stars if it contained better prose for the amount of information that it contains. I think this was a dissertation thesis first, so the intended audience would not have been the layperson, but rather other economists, and that explains the inferior readability.

The author focuses his data analysis on the prohibition of alcohol in the US in the 20's, but he also gives a history of the drug war and temperance movements as well as a theoretical explanation of the effects of prohibition (of anything).

Prohibition of substances has historically been racially motivated and backed by guild-like organizations like the AMA and APhA as a way to limit competition. An economic history analysis of alcohol prohibition shows that it was bad for the economy - more resources are put towards evasion instead of other productive uses - and society - higher crime, stronger alternative substances are developed, corruption, etc... - in numerous ways. In fact, the major political motivation for repeal was to raise tax income during the Great Depression. This would lead one to hope for repeal or loosening of the Drug War in the current depression, but the Obama administration is not as progressive on this point as one would hope.

But the real crux of the argument is theoretical. Of course prohibition causes harm to the economy, corruption, crime, and other ills. Just follow the logic to its conclusion. Today we see the ravages of the Drug War everywhere, but especially in our prison population. What the state is doing is immoral - it is telling people what they can and can't put in their own bodies at the point of a gun. We are told lie after lie to justify the war, but it is really about control of political power. The best thing - economically and otherwise - is to get rid of these dangerous prohibitions.

[D. Jason · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gets a bit heavy on comparing what various economists said in which publication at times, but apart from that this is an absolutely fascinating look at how prohibitions increase (or even create) the problems they are claimed to be trying to prevent.

[Justin Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a great book that I used to help support a paper I wrote for a history class covering 1919-1941. I found it to be a very enjoyable read and easy to understand what was going on at the time.