Economics can be counterintuitive and abstract, but it is also essential for understanding how the world works—especially when we’re trying to make policies in the spirit of good intentions.
The Economic Way of Thinking can help improve decision-making, even in areas you wouldn’t think to look.
Businesses aren’t charities. They are money-making ventures that exist by and for profit. Everything else is a bonus.
Without young, healthy individuals buying insurance and thereby paying into the system, the government is finding itself saddled with the responsibility for supporting the healthcare of the older, sicker population.
After the 2010 earthquake in Haiti that killed around 250,000 people and displaced 1.5 million others, the billion dollar state-led humanitarian relief effort failed to accomplish even the most basic tasks like rebuilding houses. The situation remains dire with 80,000 people still living in “temporary” tent camps. In the new Learn Liberty video below, Professor […]
Why did the United States invade Iraq? The pretense was that Iraq was harboring weapons of mass destruction. Another popular reason, however, was to make the country safe for democracy. The campaign – like so many foreign interventions – was “an abysmal failure,” says Professor Chris Coyne in the new Learn Liberty video below. Over […]
Why do foreign policy adventures so often go awry? In this week’s Learn Liberty video, Professor Abby Hall Blanco reveals how economic principles–like incentives and constraints—can explain the frequent poor outcomes of foreign policy. Incentives are usually defined by economists as the evaluation of the costs and benefits of a particular decision. But incentives may […]
The real minimum wage is zero, despite the best efforts of the economically illiterate public sector do-gooder.
Duke University’s great historian of thought and Hayek scholar Bruce Caldwell sent the following e-mail to me, which I share here with Bruce’s kind permission (link added): Has anyone in the blogosphere noticed the chilling similarity between Hayek’s description in the Road To Serfdom (in the chapter titled “Why the Worst Get on Top“) of […]
Public Choice Theory provides a window into the incentives of government, providing insight into how and why bad and unpopular policies stay in place.
Metro and I do not get along. Even when it isn’t on fire, which is rare, it manages to burn me up. A few weeks ago, I was on my way home from a party. I looked great, was a little tipsy, and was upset because I had dropped my phone while walking to the […]
Pundits like to talk about foreign and domestic policy as if they are completely separate concerns. But as University of Tampa professor Abby Hall has been explaining in Learn Liberty’s six part series on foreign policy, there is not as much distinction between them as people often think. In fact, foreign policy often boomerangs back […]
For the last few weeks, the D.C. metro system has been an even bigger mess than usual. That’s saying a lot. A quick flashback to one of my blog posts in January will give you a snapshot of how ridiculous the whole situation has gotten: A few months ago, Metro had us thinking it had […]
It would not be remarkable to observe that politicians lie. Many people lie. What is remarkable is that politicians keep telling the same lies over and over again. Few people do this. (Donald Trump, who tells a new lie almost every time he opens his mouth, is not a counterexample to this observation because he […]
Many public intellectuals and political pundits were surprised by Donald Trump’s ascendancy to the Republican nomination. In my opinion, this is because they succumbed to what has (unfairly) become known as the “Pauline Kael syndrome.” Pauline Kael is the New Yorker critic who was reputed to have remarked after the 1972 Presidential election that “Nixon […]
Each presidential election year—perhaps this year more than most—we hear from friends, family, and celebrities the familiar refrain of, “If he/she wins, I’m moving to Canada!” Actress Lena Dunham is just the most recent example of this, claiming that if Republican Donald Trump is elected she “really will” move to Canada. The prevalence of this […]
Editor’s Note: This is part one in a two part series from Sarah Skwire on women and liberty. You can read part two here. I’ve been a feminist for as long as I can remember. One of our oldest family stories is of Young Sarah asking Mom why Puppy Chow had a commercial that said “Don’t […]
Editor’s note: This blog post contains descriptions of rape and sexual assault. Reader’s discretion is advised. I lived in Erlangen, Germany for much of 2009, getting around on a bicycle. After the big April beer festival, the “Bergkirchweih,” my lock was cut and my bike was thrown down a hill and set on fire (it […]
Wing-walking was the practice of getting out of the cockpit of a biplane (while someone else was flying the thing) and staggering along the wing holding onto struts or wires. It was a thrill show for onlookers at air shows and barnstorming events in the 1920s and 1930s in the U.S. But for the wing-walker […]
If you follow the news, you’ve probably seen plenty of coverage on ObamaCare or the Affordable Care Act. Even if you don’t follow the news, it’s hard to go for more than a few days without hearing someone mention their insurance premiums, high cost of care, or some other frustration with health care. All the […]
What should you read between now and Election Day? If you’re only going to read one political book, you should make it Jason Brennan’s The Ethics of Voting. If you’re going to read a second, I nominate Bryan Caplan’s The Myth of the Rational Voter. If you’re going to read a third, you should read […]
Alcohol laws are some of the most headache-inducing rules on the planet. Recently, AL.com ran an article about Sunday alcohol sales in Alabama with notes about how you can buy alcohol in some places on Sundays, but only (say) for on-premises consumption. Or only if you’re a restaurant or a hotel. Or only for off-premises […]
We take a trip down memory lane to look at one of our older and perhaps more controversial videos, where we tackle the question of the wage gap. Take a look at the video and let us know what you think.
This post originally appeared on Don Boudreaux’s blog Cafe Hayek on November 25th, 2015. Below is an excerpt: But a well-taught principles course – a course taught, for example, by the likes of Deirdre McCloskey, by my colleague Walter Williams, by Dwight Lee, or by the late Armen Alchian – is one that teaches, and […]