The destruction that vandals and looters in Wisconsin (and in Minnesota and a number of other states) have carried out in the last few weeks is horrendous. The destruction has largely been wreaked on innocent people. I found very moving the video of the guy, posted the day after the destruction began, whose family business in Kenosha was destroyed…
Tyler Cowen recently made this claim: That is the abstract of a new NBER paper by Andrew Atkeson, Karen Kopecky, and Tao Zha. You will note that when it comes to Covid-19 cases, the superior performance Europe had enjoyed over the United States seems to be evaporating. I view case data as unreliable, especially when making international comparisons. I…
It is no great revelation to say that the policy responses to the COVID pandemic varies considerably between Republicans, liberals, and Democrats. A charitable interpretation of the differences are that Republicans and (classical) liberals are concerned about government overreach, undermining the rule of law, and that the costs of policies far exceed the benefits. Democrats may be seen as concerned…
Over 1,000 people are killed by police in America each year. While some (increasingly) make headlines, most of these deaths go generally unknown. In this episode, criminologist Franklin Zimring joins host Russ Roberts to dig into this uniquely American phenomenon. Zimring begins by noting there are two ways the government can take the lives of its citizens…
Utah’s anti-polygamy laws came under fire on December 2013, by US Federal Judge Clark Waddoups. He ruled in Brown v. Buhman that this state’s ban on polygamy was unconstitutional. This year, Utah state Senator Deirdre Henderson sponsored a measure that would decriminalize this practice but not legalize it. The Utah state Senate approved this bill unanimously. If signed into…
A useful postscript to my reading of Bad Blood and my blog posts about the podcast The Dropout, both of which examined the Elizabeth Holmes/Theranos story, is Tyler Shultz’s new Audible podcast, Thicker Than Water. Shultz is, of course, the grandson of George Shultz and the whistleblower who began the process of exposing the lies and misrepresentations behind…
The Fed recently decided to switch to average inflation targeting, which means making up for past misses of its 2% inflation target by allowing temporary over or undershoots of inflation. So how will we know if it’s a success? I see two key criteria: 1. Does the new policy result in roughly 2% inflation over the long run? 2. Does…
Stuart Ritchie has written a very interesting and timely half of a book in Science Fictions. He has correctly identified and painstakingly articulated why those who claim to have clear cut answers based on “science” should be taken with a grain of salt. His biggest accomplishment is reminding the reader that part of the problem with science is that…
It seems that more and more Americans, pro-Trump or not, are concluding that trade with China is a threat to the United States. The objections are typically one of three: (1) freer trade with China after it was admitted to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001 has cost U.S. manufacturing jobs; (2) the Chinese have thrived by stealing our…
Hang around freedom-friendly circles long enough and you’ll eventually hear a claim like the following. “Under private ownership of roads, congestion would be eliminated through the implementation of market pricing.” Claims like this range the gamut of sophistication. In the more sophisticated, truly dynamic pricing would adjust in real time as cars enter and exit the roadway. A somewhat less…