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Still, if Lowrey really thinks the world would be improved with reduced inequality, the answer is simple: abolish the internet, along with airplanes, cars, phones, and any other technology that shrinks the world each day in a figurative sense. If so, people like Bezos will only be able to serve...
According to the Center for American Progress, criminal recidivism reduces annual GDP by $65 billion a year. Moving to a less punitive criminal justice system in which prisoners have access to more educational and job-training opportunities would reduce recidivism, and, by expanding the labor...
Given all the practice everyone is getting, why are millions of decent arguments made by clearly thinking individuals almost all utterly useless when it comes to enlightening others—let alone changing their minds?
This article will give you the answer. Understanding it may change your...
In another unfortunate instance of overcriminalization, after efforts to make it a crime to label nondairy products as “milk” stalled in the Senate, the Food and Drug Administration may now be trying to do through regulatory means what Congress has been unwilling or unable to do through...
My best guess is that Ocasio-Cortez’s comments suggest a belief in a hyperpolarized, “1 percent vs. 99 percent” modern America. There’s only the rich getting richer and then everybody else. But that doesn’t appear to be an accurate description of what has been happening with incomes.
Here’s the problem: In insurance markets that are unregulated, insurance companies tend to base rates on expected future payouts. Past losses are sometimes a good guide to future payouts, to be sure, but they’re often not a good guide. Fires in California this year, for example, could easily...
It’s been a year since the White House launched a trade war with China. On Aug. 14, 2017, President Trump instructed U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to investigate Chinese policies under Section 301 of the U.S. Trade Act.
One year later, two important questions remain: What...
This is the great secret behind Bird and Lime’s success: no one is following the restrictive helmet and sidewalk rules, and few people ever have. In choosing to ignore them, we consumers have given fuel to a new industry that will soon be here to stay.
Brett Kavanaugh’s impending confirmation hearings have sustained what has been over a decade-long Democrat “go to” Supreme Court strategy—calling nominees they don’t like “out of the mainstream.”
So what is the point of all the mainstream rhetoric? To be in the mainstream sounds good; to...
The uproar over periodic resistance to reciting the pledge typically originates with Constitution-waving, Tea Party conservatives. Ironically, the pledge itself (which was written by a socialist) is not only un-American but antithetical to the most important principle underpinning the...
On the surface, the Amish do not seem like the ideal target audience for ridesharing apps. For starters, while some have embraced modern technology, many still do not use smartphones making the entire model of ordering a ride via your smartphone completely useless. And if handheld electronics...
Despite the growing economy, Amsel says his business is down by 20 percent because New York’s regulatory environment is crushing him. In particular, during the past several years, the regulatory state has delivered a triple whammy: an insanely high minimum wage hike, bag taxes, and now a...
Harley-Davidson is being hurt by government because Trump’s steel and aluminum tariffs have raised the prices of inputs. But the company also is being hurt because other countries have responded to Trump’s protectionism with tariffs that will penalize the company.
The truth is that transit was obsolete before Uber and Lyft were invented. Nearly 96 percent of American workers have cars and most of the 4 percent who do not don’t take transit to work. Outside of New York City, transit plays a minor role in urban transport, and outside of New York, Chicago,...
The good news is that the evidence shows that economic turmoil appears to be associated with pro-market reforms. At least with regard to regulatory policy.
Today, I’m going to share more good news. We now have some empirical research from two Danish economists showing that voters like...
That’s how the Laffer Curve works. When tax rates change, that alters incentives to engage in productive behavior (i.e., how much income they earn). In other words, to figure out tax revenue, you have to look at taxable income in addition to tax rates.
For some odd reason, this is a...
It is difficult to read the phrase “avocados from Mexico” without singing the catchy tune from a popular Super Bowl commercial. These commercials ring true today for American guacamole lovers because the triple-digit heat and wildfires in California are hurting their avocado crop.
Why are scooter-sharing start-ups succeeding where so many city-government bike-share schemes failed? #Lime #Bird
Sen. Sanders’ bill provides universal coverage with full benefits that also include dental, vision, and hearing care, with no direct costs whatsoever for patients. This would be so expensive that even an impossible 40 percent cut in provider payment rates would be needed to roughly break even (...
Due to the City Council’s artificial supply constraint on Uber-style vehicles, consumers can expect to wait longer and pay more. Ironically, this style of heavy-handed government interventionism in the transportation market is what set up the taxi industry to fail today.
I’m very irked by what Trump is doing on trade, government spending, and cronyism, but I give credit where credit is due. I suspect none of the other Republicans who ran in 2016 would have brought the federal corporate tax rate all the way down to 21 percent. And I’m immensely enjoying how...
The importance of the principle to which Dawkins here refers cannot be overstated—and it applies across nearly all of existence, including human society. As complicated as is a radio, a jumbo jet, a horse, or a human body, human society is vastly more complex.
A decade ago, calling someone a social justice warrior was merely a description, and in some cases, even a compliment.
Does a crisis caused by bad government lead to even more bad government, which is the pessimistic hypothesis in Robert Higgs’ classic, 'Crisis and Leviathan'? Or does an economic crisis force politicians to actually scale back the size and scope of government, which is the hypothesis in Naomi...
The bronze goes to Switzerland. Silver goes to New Zealand. And the gold medal goes to...
Destroying kids’ sense of certainty and autonomy, inculcating them with the belief that any innate drive to succeed and obtain a higher status among their friends is shameful, and that the people of the world should be seen first and foremost as part of their respective identity groups and not...
As back-to-school time approaches, parents are bracing for school-related trauma. The threat of bullying, violence, school shootings, and mental health maladies looms large as a new school year emerges. A 2018 poll found that one-third of parents are concerned about their child’s safety at...
Uncertainty makes human beings uncomfortable. Not knowing what’s going to happen in the future creates a sense of unrest in many people. That’s why we sometimes draw on predictions made by leading experts in their respective fields to make decisions in our daily lives. Unfortunately, history has...
The collapse of the U.S. steel industry in the 1980s sent once-thriving Pittsburgh into a severe economic depression.
Pittsburgh has struggled to rebuild and rebrand itself for decades. Yet the city today is not the crumbling, desolate place one might expect.
In fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, most private property was not widely confiscated, but all private enterprise ended up being made subservient and obedient to the dictates of the totalitarian state.
In a chapter titled “Affordability” in The Thomas Sowell Reader, economist Thomas Sowell addresses the key issues of affordability, basic necessities, rights, entitlements, and trade-offs.
What all this means is we can train the AIs on data and see what happens, rather than trying to understand the complex interactions, something we can’t do anyway. If the last century has taught us anything, it’s to avoid those two key errors: trying to plan complex systems and assuming a world...
When the government subsidizes biofuels, what is not seen is that labor and capital could have been invested elsewhere in the economy, but are not. Private-sector investment that is not the result of regulations, subsidies, or mandates is the true root of economic growth and prosperity.
President Trump says, "we'd save a h*** of a lot of money" without trade. We might save dollar bills, but those dollar bills wouldn't buy nearly as much. It's not the kind of saving any of us should want.
Problems may exist that we cannot spontaneously solve without a coordinating state, like recessions and collective bargaining, or rent-seeking by monopolistic businesses. Reasonable people can disagree about these things, while still agreeing about the values they’re trying to work towards.
And while we are each free to disagree with the decision to censor certain users, debating the constitutionality of Facebook and Apple’s decision ignores the real heart of the matter: Facebook, CNN, Apple, YouTube, and Fox News are not responsible for the spread of misinformation, no matter how...
Douglass declared that his campaign for freedom was motivated by the highest form of patriotism: “So long as my voice can be heard on this or the other side of the Atlantic, I will hold up America to the lightning scorn of moral indignation,” he pronounced. “In doing this, I shall feel myself...
It is time to rethink what has become the longest war in American history. We need to prevent the War on Terror from continuing forever so my generation doesn’t have to pay an even higher price.
This “emergency tariff-aid package” is flawed in many ways, including its name. This bailout is not emergency, but an unfortunate outcome of a trade war gone wrong, resulting in taxpayers covering the costs of lost profits.
Most of us take modern restrooms for granted, but proper sanitation is a relatively modern phenomenon and is still far too rare in the poorest regions of the world.
In July, the mayor of San Francisco frankly stated that poverty in the city is so bad, that “there is more feces on the sidewalks than I’ve ever seen.” And it’s not just her—the local NBC investigative unit found a “dangerous mix of drug needles, garbage, and feces throughout downtown San...
If we want to defeat the Nanny State, we need not only oppose the individual policies that governments introduce, we also need to empower individuals to believe in their ability to act as responsible individuals.
Get the suckers in government to use taxpayer money to buy your product at a price well above market value. Now that’s cronyism for you!
I mentioned in the interview that the central bank is trying to “normalize” interest rates. I hope the Fed is successful, though I worry that financial markets (and housing markets) have become dependent on easy money and will take a hit.
In 2011, tech companies were given a payroll tax break in exchange for moving into Mid-Market, a rough area in San Francisco near City Hall. The city had hoped that if these tech companies to move into the neighborhood, they would bring jobs and commerce with them. But this plan has not unfolded...
One line of dialogue transforms the Empire from a militaristic antagonist with an entirely unknown policy agenda to a totalitarian government with a state-run economy that bears a strong resemblance to both Hitler’s National Socialism and Stalin’s “socialism in one country...
In developing modern welfare states, governments across the Western world have diminished both the culture and institutions of voluntary welfare and charity. Government has replaced civil society as the caregiver.
Despite the false narrative of rising trade deficits leading to US job losses, the exact opposite has been true for nearly the last half-century as the chart shows: Rising trade deficits over time have been closely associated with increased levels of employment in the U.S.
Power does so much more than corrupt. It attracts the already-corrupted and gives them the wherewithal to administer their corruption. It feeds on arrogance, narcissism, and self-deception. It dements the mind until it embraces schemes that ruin the lives of others. It rots the soul. I can think...
For at least half a century (Medicare turned 50 last year), health insurance policies have been hotly debated. The most recent skirmish is over the Trump administration’s final rule expanding the availability of short-term, limited-coverage insurance. Single-payer and Obamacare stalwarts have...
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