Comment by pdonis

> Or the ban against lead additives. Or against child labour.

Sometimes the government manages to mandate something that happens to be a good idea. But that does not mean that government mandates, overall, are a net benefit.

> Or any one of hundreds of massive benefits that government fiat has brought us.

If you really think there are "hundreds of massive benefits" brought to us by government fiat, I suggest a review of history. You will find many, many more cases of government fiat causing harm than of it doing good. In the extreme, government fiat killed hundreds of millions of people in the 20th century.

If you want more local, individualized information, try asking anyone who has had to deal with a government bureaucracy when it makes a bad individual decision (which happens all the time) about their experience. (My wife and I have had this experience multiple times with multiple government bureaucracies.) You will get a very different viewpoint on the "benefits" of government fiat.