by Dan Mitchell | Jun 26, 2013 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Tax Competition, Tax Havens, Taxation
In a recent interview with the BBC, I basically accused UK Prime Minister David Cameron of being a feckless and clueless demagogue who is engaged in a desperate effort to resuscitate his political future. I shouldn’t have been so kind. Cameron manages to combine bad...
by Dan Mitchell | Jun 24, 2013 | Blogs, Economics, Free Market
In prior posts, I’ve shared some remarkable numbers on the cost of regulation. Americans spend 8.8 billion hours every year filling out government forms. The economy-wide cost of regulation is now $1.75 trillion. For every bureaucrat at a regulatory agency, 100 jobs...
by Dan Mitchell | Jun 19, 2013 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Europe, Government Spending, Taxation
In my never-ending crusade to push for the right kind of austerity, I appeared on RT to pontificate on the merits of limited government. We got to cover a lot of material, so here’s some augmenting material. 1. The right kind of “austerity” is less government...
by Dan Mitchell | Jun 18, 2013 | Blogs, Economics, Government Spending, Taxation
At the European Resource Bank conference earlier this month, Pierre Bessard from Switzerland’s Institut Liberal spoke on a panel investigating “The Link between the Weight of the State and Economic prosperity.” His presentation included two slides that definitely are...
by Dan Mitchell | Jun 17, 2013 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Government Spending, Taxation
I’m not reluctant to criticize my friends at the Heritage Foundation. In some cases, it is good-natured ribbing because of the Cato-Heritage softball rivalry, but there are also real policy disagreements. For instance, even though it is much better than current...