by Dan Mitchell | Apr 20, 2019 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics
Argentina is a sobering example of how statist policies can turn a rich nation into a poor nation. I’m not exaggerating. After World War II, Argentina was one of the world’s 10-richest nations. But then Juan Perón took power and initiated Argentina’s slide toward big...
by Dan Mitchell | Apr 18, 2019 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Government Spending
There are two things everyone should understand about the federal budget. First, America faces a grim future because Washington spending will consume an ever-larger share of economic output because of demographic changes and poorly designed entitlement programs....
by Dan Mitchell | Apr 17, 2019 | Blogs, Economics, Socialism
Every Thanksgiving, I share the story of how the Pilgrims nearly starved to death because of their experiment with collectivized agriculture. Once the settlers shifted to a system based on private ownership, however, their problems disappeared. The obvious moral of...
by Dan Mitchell | Apr 15, 2019 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Taxation
There are some fortunate people (in the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, Monaco, Vanuatu, Antigua and Barbuda, and a few other places) who don’t have to pay income taxes. The United States used to be in that lucky club. The income tax did not become a permanent blight upon...
by Dan Mitchell | Apr 14, 2019 | Blogs, Economics, Socialism
What’s socialism? Is it the centrally planned economies of Cuba and North Korea? Or the kleptocracies of Zimbabwe and Venezuela? How about the interventionist welfare states of Greece, Italy, and France? Or the redistribution-oriented Nordic nations? Since socialism...
