February 10, 2024
The Obama 'Nudge Unit' Rides Again
By Robert L. Kinney III
One of the things the Obama-Biden Administration is known for was its use of psychological tricks to get Americans to do what government officials wanted Americans to do. Some describe this method as a government “nudge” while others describe it as manipulation or coercion.
Politico described it as the government “using psychology on citizens” as a way for policymakers to change people’s behavior:
For the past year, the Obama administration has been running an experiment: Is it possible to make policy more effective by using psychology on citizens? The nickname is “nudging” -- the idea that policymakers can change people’s behavior just by presenting choices or information differently. […]
Nudging has gained a lot of high-profile advocates, including behavioral-law guru Cass Sunstein and former budget czar Peter Orszag. Not everyone likes the idea --“the behaviorists are saying that you, consumer, are stupid,” said Bill Shughart, a professor of public choice at Utah State University -- but President Obama was intrigued enough that he actually hired Sunstein, a law professor at Harvard who co-wrote the best-known book about the topic, “Nudge.”
The president officially adopted the idea last year when he launched the White House’s Social and Behavioral Science Team (SBST), a cross-agency effort to bring behavioral science research into the policymaking process. Now the team has published its first annual report on this experiment.
more
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2024/02/the_obama_nudge_unit_rides_again.html
