Evolutionary change will best resolve the issues of abortion, welfare, and social security in the U.

There are three reasons why government policies should be changed conservatively rather than radically. They are:1. Planning. People plan their lives under assumptions of what the laws are. The more the government controls, the more that people must account for the laws in their planning. It is unfair to suddenly upset those assumptions. People need to be given fair warning of dramatic policy changes in order to adjust.2. Correction. The radical solution may be wrong, no matter how certain the proponent believes it correct. If it is introduced gradually, there is a possibility of modifying the approach to correct unanticipated consequences while still keeping the general thrust of the new policy. If no correction works, the policy can be changed back before it does substantial harm.3. Accommodation. A solution that would have worked if it were introduced slowly may fail dramatically when suddenly imposed. This is especially important when a government regulation or subsidy is removed, and a private sector alternative needs to develop to take its place. If it isn't done gradually, the public is likely to demand reimposition of government controls.Now let's look at the featured issues of this debate.AbortionThe abortion issue cannot be resolved by logic. It depends upon the values of the population and those values evolve with society. The Europeans are a good model for treating the issue. Europe does not have uniform abortion laws. They simply vote to to establish and change the laws. That does not resolve the issue by providing a single uniform solution, because the issue is not resolvable in that sense. If an attempt were made to uniformly ban abortion, one of the unintended consequences would be the rise of illegal abortion. Currently most abortions are drug induced, and the main cost is having medical staff on hand in case of medical complications. Consequently, making abortions illegal could drive the costs down while increasing the risks. Of course, illegality involves the risk of being caught and punished, so illegal providers might demand more money than for legal abortions. My point is that making abortion illegal does not resolve the issue, and more than making drugs illegal resolved the problems of drug use.There are dozens of issues to be resolved when abortion is forced to be legal. These issues include requirements for counseling, the availability and promotion of alternatives, parental consent, informing authorities of potential rape and child abuse, the limits of abortion (such as third trimester abortions), the methods for abortion (such as the availability of early-pregnancy abortifactants), and government financing of abortions. The U.S. Supreme Court rule there is a right to abortion, but rather than resolving the issue, that made it substantially more contentious than it is in Europe where there is no such ruling.The best approach is to return the abortion issue to the States and et a pattern of approaches evolve. I'm not sure that a consensus would eventually emerge, but I suspect over decades it would. What is certain is that the country would be better off if were taken off the national agenda. The issue depends upon the values of the voters, and those values vary from state to state. WelfareMost people agree that the purpose of welfare is to provide a social safety net in extreme circumstances, but to return able-bodied people to productive lives as quickly as possible. Exactly how to accomplish these goals is a matter of much dispute. Libertarians argue that private charity would take over the present government role if government programs were ended quickly. Some on the left argue that the problem cannot be resolved until the basic structure of society is changed, so that for the short term few improvements are possible. A radical change would be to substantially reduce government support immediately. The potential problem with that is we immediately get orphans begging in streets, or other immediate bad effects that cause voters to reject the private charity approach. One evolutionary approach is to select a subset of welfare recipients and temporarily fund a private charities to take over that part of the problem. The funding would be provided through competitive bidding with metrics to measure success. When the private organizations are doing the job successfully, government support could then be gradually phased out. Perhaps additional tax incentives could be provided to donors for a time to ease the transition.Returning welfare control to the States would encourage the development of alternatives. The Federal government might make block grants to provide some additional support for poor states, but evolution works best when there are many alternatives tested, rather than a uniform national policy. When there are no alternatives, the one approach in place is inevitably called a success, because there is no apparent alternative.Social SecurityI think it is reasonable to require people to provide for their retirement. If they do not, the question is then put to the voters: "You are not going to let people starve, are you?" and voters invariable respond that they will not. Proposals for radical changes are therefore non-starters. The issue is subject to intense demagogy so any change, no matter how infinitesimally small, is characterized as radical. The reason for keeping Social Security the way it is is to use the Social Security contributions to finance the Federal deficits. Liberals favor having private accounts for educational savings plans, and they exempt government employees from SS, allowing private investment instead. 401K plans have been proved to be a sound alternative.So if Social Security is ever going to be reformed, it's going to have to be done incrementally. One starting point is break out the welfare part of social security from the retirement. About a third of SS goes to disability payments, surviving children, etc. This could be done with an agreement to make rich people pay more into the welfare part while reducing their SS retirement benefits. Another possible route is to allow people to elect to put part of their SS contributions into a 401K. Still another possibility is to allow states to offer retirement plans as an alternative to the Federal government version of Social Security.It's fair to say that any change to Social Security faces a mountain of demagoguery. My point is that if any reform is to be accomplished at all, it will only be accomplished incrementally. that's the best way to do it in any case, because every small change is put to a test of how well it works. Radical change won't happenHow has government control of the economy expanded? For many decades, government has been "solving problems" through increased regulation. An attempt to institute all of the regulations at once would have been rejected. But incremental expansion was effective. When expanding government control, the key is to destroy alternatives. That's done by moving power out of private hands to government, and by moving power out the States to the Federal government. Government "solutions" are obviously failing, but the game is to make sure that alternatives are suppressed.By refusing to press incremental reforms, opponents of increasing government control are effectively marginalized. Voters do not trust theoretical arguments for radical change, and they should not. Note how Obamacare was sold as just a small change by which more people would get health insurance. Proponents did not talk about government controlling every detail of what care was allowed, who could provide it under what circumstances, and what costs the government would be allowed. If it's going to be undone, it will have to be through incremental reforms. Refusing to work for incremental reforms ensures that the government system will never be undone.