A regulation that prevents me as an adult from investing in a high risk instrument is not protection against aggression (which is a justifiable prohibition). It is nanny state authoritarianism and denies me as a banking customer options because of an assumption on the part of busy-bodies that I can't be trusted to make wise investment decisions for myself.
>Well, if you believe citizens are too short sighted to vote rationally, then I don't know how you can argue that they are not too short sighted to make other decisions rationally.
Can't you see that this argument can be made more compellingly against your position than mine? If you think consumers are not smart enough even to make purchasing decisions for themselves, how could you possibly entrust them with to elect politicians that will impose thousands of force backed mandates and prohibitions on the economy, that intimitaly affect every aspect of our lives, and determine the winners and losers among thousands of companies?
Either we accept the precepts of liberal democracy, and assume an adult has a right to determine their own path in life, or we give into fascism and make decisions for them. If we choose the latter, there's no principled reason to preserve the right of the masses to vote.
All of the arguments given for prohibitions on mutually voluntary actions to "protect society" or "protect consumers" seems like hollow justifications for authoritarianism to me.
Eh, depends on the law in question. Banking regulations, for example, protect consumers and the broader economy from short sighted actions in the part of bankers. I don't think the justifications are hollow given the history.
> and usually premised on the idea that adults are too incompetent to make correct consumer, employment, etc decisions for themselves.
Well, if you believe citizens are too short sighted to vote rationally, then I don't know how you can argue that they are not too short sighted to make other decisions rationally.
But more to the point, some laws are truly intended to protect people from their own decisions (often in the context of hardships, such as usury laws), but many are intended to protect society as a whole, where the belief is that individuals are harmed collectively by the actions of others.
> E.g. laws against selling dangerous products like drugs to adults.
I don't feel like drug laws and market regulations have much in common.