I repeat below the top part of the blurb, because I think it's almost great -- I wish that the "most were dying" included a range of numbers, 50-80% for instance, to go along with the 90% after.
I mention this because, as part of the excellent idea that incentives matter, even with incentives you seldom reach 100% of desirable outcome. And too much gov't is to try to get this 100% by "free" regulation, rather than market incentives (IMO). Have others read the book? This promo makes it look really good; congratulations to Alex Tabarrok (again). Tom Grey ENTERPRENEURIAL ECONOMICS FOR FUN, PROFIT, AND A BETTER WORLD Until self-trained economist Edwin Chadwick came along, 19th-century Britain had a huge problem with its convicts bound for Australia: most were dying before they reached the "fatal shore" down under. Chadwick, however, proposed a solution as effective has it was simple. Instead of paying sea captains by the number of convicts that boarded their ships, he suggested paying them for the number of convicts who disembarked from their ships -- under their own power. It worked. Soon after Chadwick's policy was implemented, convict survival rates surged to over 90 percent. Clearly, incentives matter! This point is abundantly illustrated with novel examples in the new Independent Institute book, ENTREPRENEURIAL ECONOMICS: Bright Ideas from the Dismal Science, explained its editor, Alex Tabarrok, in a talk at the FEE National Convention in Las Vegas in May.
