by Dan Mitchell | Dec 12, 2018 | Blogs, Economics
What’s the world’s freest nation? I’ve suggested that Australia as an option if the United States ever suffers a Greek-style collapse, but my answer wasn’t based solely on that country’s level of freedom. Another option is to look at Economic Freedom of the World,...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 11, 2018 | Big Government, Blogs, Welfare and Entitlements
The world is in the middle of a dramatic demographic transition caused by increasing lifespans and falling birthrates. One consequence of this change is that traditional tax-and-transfer, pay-as-you-go retirement schemes (such as Social Security in the United States)...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 10, 2018 | Big Government, Blogs, Welfare and Entitlements
There was a book last decade by Thomas Frank, What’s the Matter with Kansas?, that asked why lower-income voters in the state didn’t vote for greater levels of redistribution. The author claimed these voters were sidetracked by cultural issues, which may very well be...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 9, 2018 | Big Government, Blogs, Bureaucracy
I periodically will make use of “most depressing” in the title of a column when sharing bad news. And new data from the Census Bureau definitely qualifies as bad news. It confirms what I’ve written about how the Washington region has become the richest part of...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 8, 2018 | Big Government, Blogs, Taxation
Maybe there’s hope for France. When Greeks, Belgians, and the Brits riot, it’s because they want more handouts. The French, by contrast, have taken to the streets to protest higher taxes. And they have plenty of reasons to be upset, as the Wall Street Journal reports....
