The Unbroken Window

A student forwards me this: Obama administration floats draft plan to tax cars by the mile So, the economist in me is looking through the article for the usual reference to some newfangled negative externality that driving creates, only to be corrected by the wise and beneficent wizards in Washington. But no, we do not [...]

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I happen to live on one of the best public school districts in the entire country. The Pittsford Central School district consistently produces kids with extremely high test scores, almost every kid ends up in a good college, etc. We also spend nearly $18,000 per student on our education in this district. The district is [...]

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Maybe it is well known that the major discrimination faced by blacks in the South originated from government laws like Jim Crow laws that institutionalized something that good economics seemed to have been eroding. But how well known is the fact that early efforts by governments to provide (modest) welfare benefits to the poor were [...]

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Michael Graham describes the apoplexy of Boston’s Mayor Menino in regard to Walmart’s proposed entry into downtown: Wal-Mart does not suit the clientele we have in the city of Boston,” Menino said. “I don’t need employers like that in our city. Read the whole piece. Menino’s position is nothing short of hateful and tyrannical. Graham [...]

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David Henderson points us to this. Here is the story as Henderson tells it: On Tuesday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave a speech at George Washington University in which she criticized foreign governments for cracking down on freedom of speech. In her audience was a retired CIA official, Ray McGovern, who quietly turned his [...]

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From the esteemed Mike Munger, you simply won’t believe it: The NC DOT did an engineering study of a local road widening project, and concluded that no new signals were required at two intersections. A citizen, David Cox, had the gall to disagree. He did some research, and put the research in the form of [...]

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Was that I thought he would curb the abuse of Executive Power that we saw under Lord W. But as the fiasco over Gitmo’s closings, his backroom appointments of Executive Office positions (see the selection of Ms. Warren), and now this, from the insightful Chris M.: “Assassin Nation” – Obama’s Right to Kill Americans: “How [...]

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Nevermind the spinelessness the Administration is showing in its policy of continuing the Bush torture shenanigans (so much for real change), now we see them playing this game: Article II, Section 2 also says “Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone,” but Congress [...]

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Perhaps the most underestimated force for “not good” are the local politicians and the unelected officials on various local committees. Just think of the power local zoning boards have over your life. In my neighborhood, I need to get the “permission” of a bunch of do-gooders if I am to put up a storage shed [...]

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This is truly incredible (I linked to it in an earlier post): The chips will allow city workers to monitor how often residents roll carts to the curb for collection. If a chip show a recyclable cart hasn’t been brought to the curb in weeks, a trash supervisor will sort through the trash for recyclables. [...]

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