In La Bégueule (1772), Voltaire wrote Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien, which is often translated as "The perfect is the enemy of the good" (literally: "The best is the enemy of the good").
The nirvana fallacy was given its name by economist Harold Demsetz in 1969,[REF][REF] who said:[REF] The view that now pervades much public policy economics implicitly presents the relevant choice as between an ideal norm and an existing "imperfect" institutional arrangement.