Tag: Economics
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Walter Block on Economics in One Lesson
Walter Block talks about Economics in One Lesson, perhaps the most approachable book about economics. And, it’s a free-market, liberty-friendly, Austrian approach. What could be better?
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Pat Buchanan Tallies the Total
The news from Washington over the past few months — $25 billion here, $700 billion there — is hard to keep track of. The amounts themselves are huge, but when added together, the sum is beyond comprehension. Pat Buchanan, in his column Socialist Republic, adds it up: Thus, we have the $700 billion Bush bank…
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New York Times: 10 Weeks of Financial Turmoil
The New York Times has a nicely-done interactive timeline of the events since September 7, 2008, when the government took over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It holds video and links to news stories. It’s more than a little unsettling to replay these events. Click here to see the bad news.
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The Austrian Prescription for Today
Murray N. Rothbard, in his book For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto, wrote a chapter that is highly relevant to the situation we face today. Unfortunately, if Rothbard’s analysis of the business cycle using Austrian economics is correct — and I believe it is — what’s going on presently in Washington, and what president-elect…
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Introducing Economics in One Lesson
In This Book is So Me, Walter Block introduces a book that I’ve quoted from and used extensively: Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt. Every widespread economic fallacy embraced by pundits, politicians, editorialists, clergy, academics is given the back of the hand they so richly deserve by this author: that public works promote economic…
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Bryan Derreberry and the Chamber’s goals for Wichita
When the head of a chamber of commerce speaks or writes, it pays to listen or read carefully. While chambers are nominally pro-business, that’s a long way from saying they’re pro-liberty. Instead, they increasingly exist to serve a narrow interest. Using words and language like “pride,” “community,” “investment,” and “economic development” — all words that…
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Wichita Chamber of Commerce values
Here’s a message that Bryan Derreberry, president of the Wichita Metro Chamber of Commerce, sent to Chamber members. Note that this message doesn’t mention the role its political action committee played in the third Sedgwick County Commission district. In that race, the PAC spent some $19,000 of its $48,000 in an effort to elect Goddard…
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Pragmatism must recognize reality
Any editorial that starts with “Karl Marx was right about at least one thing …” deserves close examination, especially when it appears in Kansas’ largest newspaper and is written by that newspaper’s former editor. The thrust of Davis Merritt’s article is that the theory of free markets hasn’t worked: “We’re painfully experiencing right now the…
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Joe Scarborough: Please Stop Saying Laissez-faire
I’m listening to Joe Scarborough on MSNBC, and he says: “Laissez-faire capitalism is a wonderful thing except in this case …” I’ve heard stuff like this over and over the past few months: A politician says “I’m a big free-market guy, but …” What’s sad to realize is that these people think that what we…
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The Fallacy of “Green Jobs”
Does climate change offer an opportunity to spend ourselves out of a possible recession? John Stossel doesn’t think so, and in his piece The Fallacy of “Green Jobs” he lays out the case. Key points: “The fallacy is the same in every case: Even if the program creates jobs building bridges or windmills, it necessarily…
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United States Government Spending (dot com)
I recently discovered usgovernmentspending.com. It seems like a great place to get data not only for the federal government, but for the states, too.
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Pencils Reveal the Impossibility of Government Planning
I, Pencil is one of the most important and influential writings that explain the necessity for limited government. A simple object that we may not give much thought to, the story of the pencil illustrates the importance of markets and the impossibility of centralized economic planning. The size and scope of government, both at the…