Quotation of the Day…
(Don Boudreaux)
Tweet… is from page 253 of Milton & Rose Friedman’s great 1980 book, Free To Choose:
Inflation is a disease, a dangerous and sometimes fatal disease, a disease that if not checked in time can destroy a society.
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Capitalism Myths: Part 2
So many myths about capitalism! In this video, we debunk 4 more myths. ---- So you don’t miss the weekly video from Stossel TV, sign up here: https://johnstossel.activehosted.com/f/1 ----Economist Dan Mitchell helps me set the record straight on how: Even without government's safety rules, free markets make us safer.“Robber barons” neither robbed, nor were barons.Automation won’t take away everyone’s jobs.Capitalism is the system that ...
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Slavery Did Not Enrich Americans-AIER
In 1846, Karl Marx wrote the following to Pavel Vasilyevich Annenkov: “Direct slavery is as much the pivot upon which our present-day industrialism turns as are machinery, credit, etc. Without slavery there would be no cotton, without cotton there would be no modern industry. It is slavery which has given value to the colonies, it is the colonies which have created world trade, and world trade is the necessary condition for large-scale ...
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There Is Only One Adam Smith
In 1759, Adam Smith published the first edition of The Theory of Moral Sentiments (hereafter, TMS). As soon as TMS was published, Smith began a process of revision and improvement that would occupy him for much of the rest of his life; the second edition was revised and published in 1761; the sixth and final edition was published in 1790, the year of Smith’s death.
Smith did other things, of course. He gave lectures, and visited and ...
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Celebrating the Repeal of the Corn Laws
(Don Boudreaux)
TweetOne week from today – June 25th – is the 175th anniversary of the repeal of the corn laws. On June 25th, 1846, the Duke of Wellington persuaded the House of Lords to join the House of Commons in repealing Britain’s protective tariffs on grain imports. This move was a major step on Britain’s road to a policy of unilateral free trade.
To commemorate this historic event, I spoke last month about the corn laws, their ...
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New Report: US Housing Market Needs 5.5 Million More Units. Guess What Stands in the Way?
These shortages, it must be emphasized, are not naturally occurring. Rather they almost always trace their origins back to bad government policies and intervention into the free market.
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Open Borders on PBS
My interview on Open Borders aired last night on the PBS NewsHour. Check it out!
(10 COMMENTS)
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Caplan on Open Borders
A good interview. I take it personally, however, when Bryan says “it’s bad for me when we let in foreign economists.” 🙁
Do buy Bryan’s excellent graphic non-fiction on these questions.
The post Caplan on Open Borders appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.
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3 Ways Rising Price Inflation Hurts Everyday Americans
Price inflation sometimes feels like an abstract concept. But here are three ways that the surging consumer prices revealed in the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics report will hurt everyday Americans.
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Has the Government Forgotten How Society Works?
The American experience with Covid-19 and the policies unleashed by our government should have been the millionth wake-up call that perhaps, our leaders really aren’t with us. Lockdown policies based on no solid empirical evidence were upheld as if they had always worked.
This is all frightening and concerning, but with Covid-19 fading into the background here in the United States, the next step is to understand that this behavior was not ...
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The 1980s Called, And It Wants Its Industrial Paranoia Back
How soon we forget. It was 24 years ago this summer that Steve Jobs was coaxed back to Apple. The only thing was that investors weren’t interested. Titans of tech at the time like Michael Dell dismissed Apple’s long-term potential, and said the company’s assets should quite simply be sold off ahead of it folding altogether.
Apple nearly died, but for a $150 million investment care of Bill Gates.
Funnily enough Netflix opened its doors ...
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This Claim of Market Failure Deserves No Credit-AIER
Among readers of my blog, Café Hayek, a recent Vox essay – “The ugly truth behind your fancy rewards credit card” – is drawing attention. This essay was emailed to me by three different readers. Each one correctly senses that something about this essay’s argument is fishy. The essay’s author, Emily Stewart, relies on research by Brookings Institution scholar Aaron Klein to argue that credit-card reward points are a scheme ...
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Capitalism Myths: Part 1
Everywhere people trash capitalism. But that’s mostly because they don’t understand it.In this video (and the next), I’ll set the record straight, and debunk 7 myths about capitalism.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So you don’t miss the weekly video from Stossel TV, sign up here: https://johnstossel.activehosted.com/f/1 ...
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With Capitalism, Cooperation Is Just as Important as Competition
It has often been asserted that we should cooperate rather than compete in society. For instance, FDR said, “Competition has been shown to be useful up to a certain point and no further, but cooperation, which is the thing we must strive for today, begins where competition leaves off.” Bertrand Russell expressed it even more sharply when he said, “The only thing that will redeem mankind is cooperation.”
However, such views, now as well ...
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If I Could Paint
If I possessed even modest talent at painting, I’d paint a picture to convey some sense of the modern economy’s inconceivable complexity, dynamism, and vastness.
As I imagine it, my picture would give the viewer the impression of looking at the surface of an ocean at eye-level. That which is above the surface would be visible to anyone, but that which is below the surface would be invisible to all but the privileged viewer of the ...
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Echoes of the 1970s and Why It’s Time to Watch Free to Choose Again
It’s time to remember the legacy of the famous 1980 series amid a rising inflation and growing government déjà vu.
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5 Historic Examples of Foreign Aid Efforts Gone Wrong
One of the earliest examples is Mansa Musa, who decided to visit Mecca in 1324.
On his way, the Mansa of Mali stayed for three months in Cairo. Every day he gave gold bars to the poor, scholars, and local officials.
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How Henry VIII Debauched English Money to Feed His Lavish Lifestyle | Lawrence W. Reed
Once there was a king who was only twelve inches tall. As the story goes, he was a lousy king but he made a great ruler.
You’re groaning, I know. Cut me some slack. I’m an economist and historian, not a comedian.
I am keenly interested, however, in the real-life differences between a lousy king and a great ruler in at least one important matter: how they handle money. I refer not to their spending habits but rather to their honesty (or ...
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Uber, Lyft Prices and Wait Times Are Surging—Here’s Why
Uber and Lyft prices are up roughly 40 percent over the last year.
Here's why.
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Against Environmental Anti-Humanism - HumanProgress
On April 25, British Vogue published an article titled “Is Having a Baby in 2021 Pure Environmental Vandalism?” The author, Nell Frizzell, “worried about the sort of world” that she would bring her “child into — where we have perhaps just another 60 harvests left before our overworked soil gives out.” In the end, she decided to have a son and teach him to live within humanity’s “environmental means” and free of “the ...
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FAVORITES
Is life today bad? Or is it awesome? “Economics Made the World Great” shows changes that have taken place in the past three centuries that have made the world better. Can it be better still?
Jon Favreau’s heartwarming 2014 independent film, “Chef”, is a case study in entrepreneurial value creation. Even better, it shows us how we can achieve economic success and personal fulfillment simultaneously, provided that we figure out how to take our passions and turn them towards making other people’s lives better.
Magatte Wade was born in Senegal but spent much of her childhood in France. Growing up, she saw the extreme differences in wealth between Africa and Europe. This disparity sparked a question… Why are some countries rich, and others poor?
How do we summarize the 2010s? Many think it was an awful decade, ten years of horror, unfair distribution and environmental disaster.
It’s a Wonderful Loaf is an ode to the hidden harmony that is all around us–the seeming magical ways that we anticipate and meet the needs of each other without anyone being in charge.