Government intervention in the economy always makes it worse.
an uneducated populace that in too many instances can't afford or chooses not be seek knowledge,
Sounds like inner city public schools to me.
untrammeled substance abuse,
Which we have now. The historical experience of Prohibition shows that it only gets worse when the government bans objects. (BTW, if the prohibition of alcohol needed an amendment to be Constitutional, why doesn't the prohibition of other drugs?)
irresponsible procreation,
Made possible by using the government as a solution for the first problem you listed.
environmental pollution,
You have a point, but I maintain that a way can be found to address it in a property rights framework.
Actually, not always, but often. The federal reserve does a pretty good job these days in dampening business cycles. The larger point of course is that some subsidies for the poor may benefit society as a whole, ie to the old poor, and to the physically handicaped, and perhaps to some others on a selective basis. The devil is in the details.
Sounds like inner city public schools to me.
Yes, but the issue is the subsidy. I am a big fan of school vouchers, but that involves a subsidy.
Which we have now. The historical experience of Prohibition shows that it only gets worse when the government bans objects. (BTW, if the prohibition of alcohol needed an amendment to be Constitutional, why doesn't the prohibition of other drugs?)
Yes, but maybe the legalization of all drugs is a bad idea. That is an empirical issue. I won't get into the constitutional issues. It is a states rights matter, and back when, the commerce clause had a more circumscribed interpretation.
Made possible by using the government as a solution for the first problem you listed.
As to procreation, maybe the government should be engaged in agitprop here. Cutting checks to welfare mothers was indeed a bad idea in practice as it turned out. Again, it is an empirical issue.
You have a point, but I maintain that a way can be found to address it in a property rights framework.
Much enviromental polution can be addressed with pollution credits etc, but again that involves governmental intervention. It is not practical to round up the hundreds or thousands or millions that are affected by a polluter, to contract it out. And sometimes even pollution credits, for reasons I won't get into, are simply not practicable, and proscription is the only alternative.
BTW, if the prohibition of alcohol needed an amendment to be Constitutional, why doesn't the prohibition of other drugs?
Great question! I don't see how there can be a logical answer other than there must be a Constitutional amendment for federal prohibition of these things. It's these gaping unconstitutional pot holes that never get looked at or talked about -- much less filled -- that make me doubt this nation's collective sanity sometimes.
And Social Security, Medicare, federal welfare, and federal involvement in education -- do they have even a fig lead of Consitutional legitimacy? I don't see how they can, but the fact that their legitimacy is never questioned (except by the occasional libertarian here at FR) makes me think that maybe I'm overlooking something. I'm not, am I?