I'd probably do this:

#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;

open( NAMES, "<", "name.txt") or die $!;
my @list = <NAMES>;
close(NAMES);
print "list = @list\n";

for my $name (@list) {
    open(OUT, ">", $name) or die $!;
    print OUT "hello";
    close(OUT);
}
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Notice the differences:

1. use strict and use warnings;
2. use the "$!" so you get the explicit error when there is one
3. you didn't define $y - and it looks to be unnecessary for this
4. you didn't close the FILE handles
5. you need to specify the FILE handle you want to write to
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Start with "use strict" and "use warnings" and that will be very helpful!
hth, dave

Update: Oops, forgot the .txt part - see madtoperl's node.