from The Great Degeneration by Niall Ferguson Experts on economic competitiveness, like Michael Porter of Harvard Business School, define the term to include the ability of government to pass effective laws; the protection of physical and intellectual property rights and lack of
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From Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America (published in 1840): Thus, after taking each individual by turns in its powerful hands and kneading him as it likes, the sovereign extends its arms over society as a whole; it covers its
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The call for a higher minimum wage is an admission that policies are stifling economic growth. The best way to increase worker pay is to create a demand for their labor. This means stimulating investment and encouraging risk taking. Capitalism
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a gem from George Will in National Review, The ‘Settled’ Consensus du Jour excerpts: Four core tenets of progressivism are: First, history has a destination. Second, progressives uniquely discern it. (Barack Obama frequently declares things to be on or opposed
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Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what is for dinner. Liberty is a well-armed sheep with the same vote. “Voting is the illusion of influence in exchange for the loss of freedom.” Frank Karsten and Karel Beckman “The
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Neoliberalism – the ideology at the root of all our problems by George Monbioy at the Guardian It is rare that I post such articles. I disagree with just about every word and thought, but this was shared on FB
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from Carpe Diem and Mark Perry, a simple and effective analogy on the minimum wage, What economic lessons can we learn about the $15 minimum wage law from an ‘$8 per pound minimum beef price law’? Economist Walter E. Williams
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The current government and activist movement to raise the minimum wage to $15 had me thinking. What would I do if I owned a business in New York or California and it was such a business that employed low wage
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from a letter to the editor in The Wall Street Journal, Tocqueville and ‘Is This the Best We Can Do?’ Responding to Joseph Epstein’s “These Five Are the Best We Can Do?” (op-ed, April 6): Alexis de Tocqueville answered Mr. Epstein’s
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In National Review, What the Panama Papers Actually Show by Michael Tanner We see something similar, if less dramatic, in the United States. There is a reason why five of the ten counties with the highest median incomes in America
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an excellent post from Scott Grannis at Calafia Beach Pundit, The Bad news is why I am optimistic Grannis is one of my favorite economics bloggers- and one of the few that seems to combine a sense of harsh reality
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from Kevin Williamson at National Review, Capital Matters It matters who owns capital. Go back to 1988 and give young Kevin D. Williamson $10 million, and the only results you’d have seen would be a good year for a Ferrari dealership
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Georgia Governor Nathan Deal vetoed the religious freedom bill and many assume that this was as much as result of the threatened boycott from companies and organizations that transact business in George as it may have been from Governor Deal’s
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Russel Jacoby wrote a thought provoking book titled Bloodlust tracing the biblical roots of our personal violence towards one another. He used the phrase, “narcissism of minor differences”, to describe the violence not between groups that are the most different,
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from Nicholas Kristof in the New York Time, When Whites Just Don’t Get It, Part 6 Why do we discriminate? The big factor isn’t overt racism. Rather, it seems to be unconscious bias among whites who believe in equality but
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I watched with incredulity as businessmen ran to the government in every crisis, whining for handouts or protection from the very competition that has made this system so productive. I saw Texas ranchers, hit by drought, demanding government-guaranteed loans; giant
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from Mark Perry at Carpe Diem, New BLS data show that for all ‘chief executives,’ the ‘average CEO-to-average worker pay ratio’ is less than 5-to-1 For the sample of 20,620 CEOs reported by the BLS, their average pay increased only
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Governmental policies for the limited purpose of saving the most unfortunate citizens from destitution have merged into governmental policies for the unlimited purpose of redistributing income and wealth among virtually all groups, rich as well as poor. as Mancur Olson
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