Writing for Forbes, Bruce Bartlett puts forth an interesting hypothesis that healthcare legislation could have been made better (hopefully he meant to write “less destructive”) if the GOP had been willing to compromise with Democrats: Democrats desperately wanted a bipartisan bill and would have given a lot to get a few Republicans on board. This undoubtedly would […]

Good news for entrepreneurs and investors, at least the ones who are very sick. As of January 1, the death tax is repealed. But this silver cloud has a couple of dark linings. First, the tax springs back to life next January 1, so healthy taxpayers are out of luck. Second, the grave-robber politicians may […]

A column in the Wall Street Journal reports on a new study showing that people tend to be unhappiest in high-tax states. This type of research is very imprecise, to be sure, and it may be that the causality (if any) is that unhappy people vote for higher taxes. The most persuasive part of the […]

A column in the Washington Examiner compares the bloated payrolls and happy times for the bureaucracy with the challenging times for workers in the productive sector of the economy. The column does not mention that bureaucrats also are vastly overpaid compared to private sector workers: It looks like a happy new year for you — if […]

Great column by Arnold Kling and Nick Schulz on how markets really operate – and why government intervention either causes problems or prevents markets from fixing them. For those of you who care to get in the weeds, this is one of the reasons why the “Austrian School” of Hayek and Mises is better for […]

Isn’t this just wonderful? The feds have announced new rules, but it’s not clear what they are. According to some reports, though, passengers will not be allowed to have anything it their laps. Does this mean books? Blackberries? Are we allowed to twiddle our thumbs? Since I have speeches next month in Canada and the Cayman […]

The proposals on Capitol Hill will make government more expensive and increase deficits. Government programs almost always cost more than the preliminary estimates, and projections for healthcare spending have been notoriously inaccurate. Moreover, tax increases will not collect as much revenue as politicians want because of “Laffer Curve” effects. Last but not least, the promised spending restraint is a farce. If congressional forecasts are modified to be more realistic, deficits and debt will climb by at least $600 billion – and perhaps more than $850 billion – over the next 10 years.