>Simply put, the people proposing and creating the programs have zero understanding of the people whose lives they are trying to influence and control.

I mean I think that's definitely true in some cases but it's a wide wide world out there, and the universe of things that count as "social programs" is impossibly vast, and some of them are quite well researched and simply work when rolled out. Congestion pricing in NYC for instance was the product of policy nerds and seems like it simply worked.

I completely agree there's unintended consequences and regulation can make things worse but not to the point of a universal anti government ethos.