by Dan Mitchell | Dec 28, 2025 | Blogs, Economics, Featured, Trade
I don’t agree with Donald Trump’s view that trade deficits are bad. Why? Because I understand that a trade deficit is merely the flip side of a capital surplus. In other words, when foreigners earn dollars, they often think investing in the...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 27, 2025 | Big Government, Blogs, Featured, Taxation
Looking at the title of today’s column, the answer is yes, and it’s been yes for a long time. But what’s been happening so far in California is slow-motion suicide. Every year, it seems, there is more taxing, more...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 15, 2025 | Big Government, Blogs, Featured, Government Spending
I’m not a fan of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). The Paris-based bureaucracy is dominated by Europe’s left-leaning welfare states, so it unsurprisingly has a statist policy agenda (especially on fiscal...
by Dan Mitchell | Sep 6, 2025 | Big Government, Blogs, Featured, Regulations
I wrote two days ago to explain that America’s fiendishly complex tax system means we not only have to give lots of our money to the IRS, but we also have to endure aggravation, uncertainty, and expense as part of the process. Two weeks ago, I wrote...
by Dan Mitchell | Sep 4, 2025 | Big Government, Blogs, Featured, Regulations
I’m obviously fond of the video on tax complexity that the Center for Freedom and Prosperity released 15 years ago. Here’s a more-recent video from the Tax Foundation on the compliance burden. As stated in the video, complexity imposes real economic...
by Dan Mitchell | Aug 13, 2025 | Big Government, Blogs, Featured, Welfare and Entitlements
A few years ago, advocates of a “basic income” seemed to have a lot of momentum on their side. Nations were holding referendums, presidential candidates were embracing the concept, and even some libertarians were saying nice things about the idea. Being a curmudgeon...
