Arnold Kling opens The Collectivist Feeling with the Myers-Briggs definitions of thinking and feeling. Then:
In my experience, libertarians and collectivists often talk past one another. Libertarians believe that collectivists are not thinking, while collectivists believe that libertarians are not feeling.I view economics as training in thinking. That does not mean that you lose your empathy with people. It means, however, that you pay attention to the consequences of policies, regardless of their motives. Or, as Alan Blinder put it, economists have Hard Heads, Soft Hearts.
Then he looks at the question asked by Dan Klein’s The People’s Romance:
Why do people who claim to be concerned for the poor so often support or go along with policies that are obviously and predictably bad for society and especially the poor? Why do they support government schooling, antidevelopment land-use policies, rail transit projects, and policies to discourage the use of the private automobile?… atrocious policies such as the war on drugs can be enacted and cheered and can persist. Even though Republicans supposedly care about freedom and Democrats supposedly care about “the little guy,” the politicians do nothing to abate the policy.
Some answers:
Klein suggests that collectivist policies such as Social Security or public schools serve the same function as ritual tribal dances. By the same token, following Thomas Szasz, he suggests that the war on drugs serves the same function as tribal scapegoating. I would add that crusades against tobacco, fast food, or Wal-mart also can be seen in terms of tribal scapegoating.