I’m normally not a big fan of the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development since it is an international bureaucracy that persecutes low-tax jurisdictions. But the economists at the OECD sometimes do good work (the same can be said of the…
Daily Analysis
Producers on Strike
The Wall Street Journal wisely warns against drawing too many conclusions from one month’s job data, but they also point out that the economy is much weaker than the White House claimed – in large part because of a series of public policy decisions that…
The Way Healthcare Should Function
This article from the Weekly Standard almost makes me want to cry with frustration. It shows how the healthcare system generally would function in the absence of government-imposed distortions such as Medicare, Medicaid, and (especially!) the tax loophole for…
The Enduring Influence of Ayn Rand and Atlas Shrugged
In a review of two new biographies about Ayn Rand, Charles Murray explains what made her books – particularly Atlas Shrugged – so powerful and persuasive: In 1991, the book-of-the-month club conducted a survey asking people what book had most influenced…
The Sleazy Combination of Big Business and Big Government
There’s an article in the Wall Street Journal showing how already-established companies and their union allies will use the coercive power of government to thwart competition. The article specifically discusses efforts by less competitive supermarkets to block…
You Don't Need to Waste More Money to Shrink Government.
It’s rather symbolic of what’s wrong with Washington that a commission ostensibly created to promote deficit reduction is seeking a bigger budget, as noted in the Tax Notes story excerpted below. Rather than impose a bigger burden on taxpayers, though, I…
Obamacare Kills a Company and Puts 50 More People on the Unemployment Rolls.
In the real world, government policies that raise the cost of doing business often lead to crippling – and sometimes even fatal – results. Here’s a story, which I saw via Instapundit and Megan McArdle, about an insurance company that is closing its…
Will Higher Tax Rates in 2011 Cause an Economic Collapse?
Art Laffer has a compelling column in the Wall Street Journal, where he makes the case that future tax rate increases will cause considerable economic damage because people have an incentive to maximize income this year to take advantage of current tax rates –…
Taxpayers vs. Bureaucrats, Part XXIX
This story from Philadelphia, which I saw on Reason’s Hit and Run blog, is one of the worst examples I’ve ever seen of government bureaucrats bilking taxpayers. The City Manager, who already receives an absurdly extravagent salary and hasn’t even…
Dan Mitchell Gets Results
I gave a speech in Hungary about two weeks ago and now the government has announced a big step in the direction of better fiscal policy. According to Reuters, “Hungary’s new government plans to introduce a flat personal income tax of 16 percent from 2011,…