There’s an ongoing debate about Keynesian economics, stimulus spending, and various versions of fiscal austerity, and regular readers know I do everything possible to explain that you can promote added prosperity by reducing the burden of government spending. Simply stated, we get more jobs, output, and growth when resources are allocated by competitive markets. But when resources are allocated […]
read more...If I banged my head against the wall every time politicians advocated bad policy in Washington – which is a tempting impulse, I would have been institutionalized because of brain damage a long time ago. But it’s difficult to maintain my self control when I think about minimum wage laws. All sentient human beings should know […]
read more...Did you sing Happy Birthday? The nation just “celebrated” the fifth anniversary of the signing of the so-called American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, more commonly referred to as the “stimulus.” This experiment in Keynesian economics was controversial when it was enacted and it’s still controversial today. The Obama Administration is telling us that the law was […]
read more...When I give speeches around the country, I often get asked whether it’s time to give up. More specifically, has America reached a tipping point, with too many people riding in the wagon of government dependency and too few people creating wealth and pulling the wagon in the right direction? These questions don’t surprise me, […]
read more...The tax code is a complicated nightmare, particularly for businesses. Some people may think this is because of multiple tax rates, which definitely is an issue for all the non-corporate businesses that file “Schedule C” forms using the personal income tax. A discriminatory rate structure adds to complexity, to be sure, but the main reason for […]
read more...I feel a bit like Goldilocks. No, this is not a confession about cross-dressing or being transsexual. I’m the boring kind of libertarian. Instead, I have a run-of-the-mill analogy. Think about when you were a kid and your parents told you the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. You may remember that she entered […]
read more...Over the years, I’ve shared many charts, graphs, and tables to help people understand that the welfare state is fundamentally unsustainable. And, assuming there’s not genuine entitlement reform, many of these fiscal estimates show that the United States has a very perilous future. According to the Bank for International Settlements, the United States is in worse shape […]
read more...I asked back in September whether all the bad news about Obamacare meant it was time to feel sorry for President Obama and other statists. Some people apparently didn’t realize I was being sarcastic, so I got some negative feedback. I’ve since learned to be more careful with my language, and subsequent columns about Obamacare developments have […]
read more...Looking at labor markets, my biggest concern is the drop in labor force participation. The data from the Labor Department on the employment-population ratio, for instance, suggest a permanent reduction in the share of the population that is working. And since economic output and living standards ultimately depend on the quality and quantity of labor and capital […]
read more...Early last year, with the sequester about to begin, President Obama stated that “these cuts are not smart, they are not fair, they will hurt our economy, they will add hundreds of thousands of Americans to the unemployment rolls.” He made this statement because Keynesian theorysays government spending can boost “aggregate demand” and goose an economy. So less government spending obviously […]
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