by Dan Mitchell | Oct 9, 2011 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Government Spending
The folks at U.S. News & World Report have posted an online debate on the never-ending topic: “Does Stimulus Spending Work?“ You know my thoughts on the topic, including my thumbs-down to Obama’s latest stimulus scheme, so it won’t surprise you to know that I...
by Dan Mitchell | Oct 1, 2011 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Government Spending, Taxation
Today, October 1, is the first day of the 2012 fiscal year. And if you’re wondering why America’s economy seems to have a hangover (this cartoon is a perfect illustration), it’s because politicians had a huge party with our money in FY2011. We don’t have final numbers...
by Dan Mitchell | Sep 26, 2011 | Blogs, Capital Gains, Economics, Taxation
Whether I’m criticizing Warren Buffett’s innumeracy or explaining how to identify illegitimate loopholes, I frequently write about the perverse impact of double taxation. By this, I mean the tendency of politicians to impose multiple layers of taxation on income that...
by Dan Mitchell | Sep 26, 2011 | Bailouts, Big Government, Blogs, Economics
This is getting surreal. We now have layers of bailouts around the world. Different nations are doing their own bailouts. On top of that, the Europeans have set up something called the European Financial Stability Facility, which does bailouts across the continent....
by Dan Mitchell | Sep 25, 2011 | Blogs, Economics, Taxation
Have you ever wondered why the tax code is a Byzantine mess that requires 72,000 pages of law and regulation? Hopefully you don’t ponder such dark and dreary thoughts, but the answer is that politicians and lobbyists have spent nearly 100 years creating all sorts of...