The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design. – F.A. Hayek
Posted in Socialism on Apr 30th, 2011
Tomorrow is May Day. I plan on rerunning an old piece, so consider this my new piece for this year. I finally got around to reading Free to Choose, Milton and Rose Friedman’s famous book on the power and virtue of the free market. In it, they make a comment that the Socialist Party was [...]
Posted in Welfare State on Apr 30th, 2011
There are exactly as many families that have incomes below the federal poverty level as there are families who receive federal disability benefits (about 7.5 million).
Posted in Health Care on Apr 29th, 2011
The Medicare Administrator tells us how wonderful Obamacare is going to be for the lowering of costs of practicing medicine: The Partnership for Patients is investing up to $1 billion to help health-care professionals learn about and implement proven methods for improving patient safety. Reducing medical injuries and complications for patients will save lives and [...]
Posted in Classical Liberalism, Market Failures on Apr 29th, 2011
I was asked to give remarks at the annual Colloquium of the Alexander Hamilton Institute in Clinton, NY regarding the establishment of a sister organization here in Rochester. A draft of that talk follows. Forgive me for taking the chance to talk a little bit about economics before I say a few words about our [...]
Posted in Taxation on Apr 28th, 2011
My students spent a careful 8 weeks studying FA Hayek’s Constitution of Liberty. What follows is their summary of his Chapter 20, where Hayek reflects upon the justification for Progressive taxation. The book is dense and not extremely well written, so I suspect you will benefit from the summary. Enjoy, I am sure the ancient [...]
Posted in Politics on Apr 27th, 2011
Canada’s Liberal Party is running on a National Food Policy Platform. What a pretty barn. How many of you knew an election was happening up there?
Posted in Uncategorized on Apr 27th, 2011
From Mark Perry: Each gallon of gas sold in 2010 generated … two … cents … of profits for Exxon. Each gallon of gas sold in 2010 generated … forty-eight cents … of tax “revenues” for government. By the way, this does not include the tax … on the profits of the oil companies. I’d [...]
Posted in Economic Illiteracy on Apr 27th, 2011
I love how they mangle article titles. It was supposed to be “Economic Illiteracy.” The comments are great.
President Obama has increasingly reminded us that tax rates were higher during the Clinton presidency and had little negative impact on the economy. For example, today’s top marginal federal income tax rate is 35% while under Clinton it was 39.6%. I’d also remind you that many more poor people paid federal income taxes under Clinton [...]
Posted in Flotsam and Jetsam on Apr 26th, 2011
Robin Hanson links to a video on student opinions regarding redistribution of GPA scores. I would not be in favor, even though I am sure the ancient Athenians must have worked out some pretty cool defense of that too. Go watch the video, my favorite point of his is this one: There is only a [...]
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