Homines libenter quod volunt credunt
Posted in Economic Illiteracy, Environment, Math, Price System, Taxation on Nov 12th, 2013
Just wanted to update my readers on the amount of greed in the economy. In March of this year, the average retail price of gasoline was $3.85. In the first week of November, the average retail price of gasoline was $3.34. So, I guess gas and oil companies are feeling 13% less greedy these days! […]
Posted in Taxation, You Can't Have it Both Ways on Oct 31st, 2013
Some supporters of the minimum wage do so on the grounds that even it is costly, that corporations simply “pass on the cost” to their customers, who are so obviously different and richer than the workers “needing” the pay increase. Fine. Believe it. But riddle me this. What do these same people think about putting […]
Posted in Taxation, You Can't Have it Both Ways on Jun 26th, 2013
Of course there are many. But for my purposes let’s not think of the impacts on capital formation and entrepreneurial innovation. I am thinking from a populist perspective. The problem with raising top income tax rates is that they are not retroactive. I mean that. Among the strongest supporters of raising top tax rates that […]
Posted in Economic Illiteracy, Price System, Taxation on Jun 18th, 2013
That’s what armchair tax theorists are. Consider an example from the book Garbology: Fifteen cents [of a tax] is a relative pittance, but it does add up over hundreds of bags, and so it had an immediate impact on the behavior of Irish consumers … … The tax was never much of a burden because relatively […]
Posted in Government Gone Wild, Taxation on Apr 14th, 2013
The EPA, rightly in my view, understands that storm water runoff is one of the major problems facing our waterways. But that’s about where their “rightness” ends. They’ve imposed yet another unfunded mandate, this time on states in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Read this piece to see how it all shakes out. state lawmakers exempted […]
Posted in Health Care, Politics, Taxation, Welfare State, You Can't Have it Both Ways on Apr 12th, 2013
The town and county portion of my property tax receipt came in the mail today. (This comprises about 1/3 of my total property tax bill – the government schools take the other 2/3). I found their new itemization of uses of tax funds to be interesting. Years ago I noticed that in my TOWN offices, […]
Posted in ethical foundations, Government Gone Wild, Government Thuggery, Health Care, incentives, Price Controls, Socialism, Taxation, Unintended Consequences, Voluntary Society, Welfare State, You Can't Have it Both Ways on Apr 11th, 2013
I usually hate infographics and here is another one just littered with reasons to go crazy. But focus only on the very bottom: The changes Brill suggests would allow the US to provide better care at lower costs without substituting the kind of government-provider system typical in comparison countries. Holy smokes. This is the previous […]
Posted in Politics, Special Privilege, Taxation, Unintended Consequences on Mar 15th, 2013
Assume our preference for redistribution is fixed and that there is an inherent and unchanging desire in the population to equalize incomes, for whatever reason you wish to believe we have that feeling. I for one do not share this belief, nor am I rich. In any case, I believe that one reason folks like […]
Posted in Taxation on Feb 28th, 2013
Last I checked, there were roughly 4 million workers who “earned” the minimum wage in the US (or less). This is an overstatement in some aspects, since tips are not reported here, but just treat it as 4 million. Here’s a question: how much do we think these workers would have earned absent the minimum […]
Posted in Taxation on Feb 13th, 2013
You can bet your sorry asses that the offsets will never be part of it. Nice to know that Bill McKibben is directing economic policy. Tip to the greenies, once you have the tax, the “in energy efficiency and sustainable energy technologies such as wind, solar, geothermal and biomass” are not part of the policy “solution.” […]
