Suppose you are worried that some particular activity threatens the water that you rely upon. In many cases, since there are so many possible polluters invading “our” water resources and since there are so many people who use a water source, the idea of arranging contracts between polluters and pollutees to get an optimum amount […]
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Posted in Politics, Voluntary Society on Nov 4th, 2014
Nothing too deep here today. The reason to be enthusiastic about market institutions is not because there is some moral superiority that those institutions have over others (a case can be made if you wish) or that we should attempt to buy and sell as much as we can for its own sake. No, the reason to be supportive […]
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This may come as a surprise to those who tend to hold diametric socio-political views than myself, but it’s pretty clear to me that the most fashionable young socialists that populate the college campus community are far closer to be anarchists than, say, someone like me. How can I say this? Well, a college campus is increasingly […]
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No new ground broken here, but I just read a news story about the rise of people who refuse to have vaccines administered to their children. Strangely, the families that appear to be most likely to refuse vaccines are the most educated among us, and not like you might suspect, the least educated. The vaccine […]
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I lifted this from the end of my previous post: Why on Earth would anyone be “worried” about this? Prices adjust. Entrepreneurs respond. Unless of course one can’t help but think that everything good in the world comes as a result of conscious policy choices. Drive around Rochester and there are already quite a few […]
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It is typically asserted that on utilitarian grounds we can and should redistribute wealth from the richer to the poorer. On its face and all-alone the argument makes some sense. The argument goes like this: since there is diminishing marginal utility of wealth, a dollar to a rich person is worth less than a dollar […]
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We’re quite accomplished at that here in the United States. I wonder, do you actually feel good when you have to impose force in order to get people to do something? Is it really altruism, when for example, if tax dollars are collected to provide food for the hungry? It may be morally correct, from […]
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If you are inclined to want to put people into groups like “Classical Liberal” so be it … I find it increasingly not useful. But you may put that particular label in your head for now, or perhaps the “libertarian” label. My sense is that if you asked a particular group member what they thought […]
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I just finished reading a wonderful book on the history of Buffalo called City on the Edge. There’s much to talk about in there. But one thing that happened in Buffalo that has happened all over the country was the “flight” from the inner cities by the middle class during the 50s and 60s. This, rightly or […]
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The federal government collected $350 billion from corporations in corporate income taxes last year. Economists have long understood and explain that the US federal (and state) corporate income tax rates are at the same time both too high and too low. Why do we say this? Well, the tax rate is, at the margin, very […]
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