Reality based economics

"The 19th-century laissez-faire thinker William Graham Sumner famously wrote of “the forgotten man” who bears the costs of feel-good economic policy. Sumner said that “he is the man who never is thought of. He is the victim of the reformer, the social speculator, and philanthropist.” The left must always pretend he doesn’t exist — and excoriate those mindful of him — even as it prides itself on its robust empiricism."

For those so inclined here is the essay by F. Bastiat from the mid-19th century that talks about the dangers of "feel-good" economic policy:

That Which is Seen, and That Which is Not Seen

by Frederic Bastiat, 1850