Too often we want to pass laws to solve problems. If there’s a school shooting, people say, “Let’s make guns illegal”. People that are against abortion say, “Let’s make it illegal.” Whatever the problem (or perceived problem) is, there’s somebody out there pushing for a law against it.
I’m certainly not against all laws, but the truth is that they often really don’t solve problems.
Heroin is illegal. Child abuse is illegal. Rape is illegal. Murder is illegal. Throwing trash out your car window is illegal.
And people still do all of these things on a regular basis.
Making a law against something does not somehow magically solve the problem.
In some cases, laws may reduce the number of people doing an unwanted thing. More likely, it just means that society can punish them for it after the fact, if they are caught. This also comes with a burden to society- law enforcement, courts, prosecutors, and jails that all need funding.
Most of us that don’t commit certain crimes aren’t deterred by the fact that they are illegal. We’re deterred by our own consciences and the fact that we don’t want to do awful things.
The people that commit child abuse do it even though it’s illegal. Those that don’t commit child abuse most likely wouldn’t do it even if it was legal.
(I do think child abuse should be illegal and we should punish the people that do it. I just don’t believe that it being illegal solves the problem.)
There are a few things that I do because it’s the law: I pay my taxes because I don’t want to go to jail. For most things my actions have nothing to do with what is legal and what isn’t: I don’t throw trash out the car window just because I care about the environment. Sometimes I drive faster than the speed limit.
It’s easy to push for laws to solve problems. I wish that special interest groups and legislators would really stop to ask if a certain law will actually solve the problem that it’s intended to.
Sometimes, I think we need to look a lot deeper as a society to come up with solutions. Maybe one of the reasons that we don’t do this is because it’s hard.
For example, there has been talk about a law in Albuquerque to make more regulations for pawn shops in hopes of reducing the sales of stolen goods and thus reducing theft. I am quite sure that the people selling stolen goods will find another avenue- Craigslist, eBay, selling to pawn shops in other towns, or something else. Levels of theft would be the same and pawn shops would be burdened by more regulations.
I can’t, however, come up with some brilliant idea on how Albuquerque could fix the theft problem. Real solutions are a lot harder to come up with and implement than some new law.
I wish that more people recognized that:
- Laws often don’t solve the problems they’re meant to, even if people follow them.
- Just because something is against the law does not stop people from doing it anyway.
- Laws are difficult and costly to enforce.
I certainly think many things should be illegal. But I wish we could get rid of the magical thinking that laws are likely to solve most problems.
