Category Archives: Economics

Income Inequality

(Updated October 31, 2011) There has been an increasing amount of news lately, particularly surrounding the Occupy Wall Street movement, fussing that the gap between the rich and the poor is growing, bemoaning the declining lot of the poor and … Continue reading

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Minimum Wage, Minimum Rights

Minimum wage laws should be abolished. They are morally indefensible because they cause more harm than good. They are economic foolishness because they thwart the price signal that lets workers and employers arrive at the optimal price for labor. First, … Continue reading

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The Essence of Libertarianism

If I succeed with this post I will convince the reader that there are a narrow set of clear rules that should guide the debate over the appropriateness of any government activity. I claim that those rules are simple and … Continue reading

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Moral High Ground for Libertarians

I believe libertarians can make a strong claim for occupying the moral high ground on many issues. Opponents often argue against freedom by claiming that only the rich and powerful will benefit. Quite the opposite is true. I’m going to … Continue reading

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Roger Pilon Explains the Essence of Libertarianism

Roger Pilon of the Cato Institute presented at talk at a Cato event entitled “The Moral Implications of the Deficit, Debt and the Budget Battles” on June 9, 2011. His talk was part of a debate with Amatai Etzione that … Continue reading

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Price Controls: Yet another way some seek advantage over others through the government

I just read a great summary on The Freeman Online of the many problems with price controls. It was written in 1978 but is still quite relevant today. I highly recommend it. Congress is currently debating reducing price supports on … Continue reading

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Unregulated by Government is Still Well Regulated

Steven Horwitz has a post on the FreemanOnline that is just excellent. It makes the point that a market unregulated by the government is not necessarily an “unregulated market” in the sense that nothing governs how it behaves. Rather a … Continue reading

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Powerful because of wealth versus Powerful because of influence. I’ll take the former.

Hayek in the Road to Serfdom makes the point that in a socialist economy the only way to advance is through successfully lobbying the government so that your group is accorded greater privileges. If you have the misfortune to belong … Continue reading

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Electronic Currency (e.g., BitCoin) – An End Run Around the Fed?

When I first heard the position that the federal government should get out of the business of providing a currency I thought it sounded like the authors were not quite as connected with reality as one would hope. However, I … Continue reading

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Obama’s magic math – can I use that at home?

Today President Obama announced a new plan “for America’s energy security, including increased responsible domestic production and winning the future through a clean energy economy.” I find it puzzling that Obama can claim to be fighting high oil prices by … Continue reading

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