The President’s new budget has been unveiled. There are lots of provisions that deserve detailed attention, but I always look first at the overall trends. Most specifically, I want to see what’s happening with the burden of government spending. And you probably won’t be surprised to see that Obama isn’t imposing any fiscal restraint. He wants spending to […]

One of my goals is to convince people that even small differences in long-run growth can have a powerful impact on living standards and societal prosperity. In other words, the economy is not a fixed pie. The right policies, such as free markets and small government, can create a better life for everybody. And bad policy, […]

Just like Clark Kent could change into Superman, President Obama has a remarkable ability to change into King Obama. Tired of that pesky Constitution? Irritated that the Founding Fathers created a system based on separation of powers? Well,there’s a superhero to overcome those obstacles. Faster than a last-minute Obamacare reg! More powerful than the Tenth Amendment! Able […]

Very few political cartoons make me laugh out loud. Even when I look back at the all-time favorites that I included in my political cartoonist contest, most of them are on that list because they make a very effective and clever point about public policy. Though I do recall being very amused by Glenn McCoy’s cartoon on media bias, […]

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 […]

As part of his State-of-the-Union speech, President Obama announced he was going to unilaterally create a new retirement savings account that supposedly would be available to all workers. Employers would be mandated to facilitate these”MyRA” accounts, and the money collected would be invested in “guaranteed” government bonds. There are some good features to the MyRA plan, […]

The President’s main “accomplishment” has been such a disaster that I wonder whether it’s time to feel sorry for Obama. Today, we’re going to look at the opinions of two experts, both of whom expect further bad news for Obamacare. Here’s some of what Michael Tanner, my Cato colleague, wrote for the New York Post. …“the State of ObamaCare” […]

According to the most recent numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate has dropped to 6.7 percent. Is this good news? Well, it’s depends on your benchmark. Compared to France’s anemic economyand double-digit levels of unemployment, America is in decent shape. But if you use data from the Minneapolis Federal Reserve to compare the current business cycle […]

I hate to dredge up bad memories so early in a new year, but we need to remind ourselves of the awful TARP bailout of 2008. Our financial system had gone out of whack because of bad monetary policy from the Federal Reserve and unsustainable housing subsidies from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Some financial institutions gambled on […]

Normal people aren’t thinking about public policy at this time of year, but I’m a libertarian who has decided to fight against big government in Washington, so I’m definitely not normal and I could be a masochist. And since you’re reading this instead of daydreaming about Santa, you’re also not part of the herd. Which […]