Michael Giberson
Greg Mankiw called it “the Pigou Club in a Nutshell“, quoting the following from Tim Kane:
we should aim to tax the bad things (noise, gasoline, trash, violent crime, evil foreign dictators) and untax the good things (homegrown profits, employment, innovation).
But take another look at that list of “bad things”: noise, gasoline, trash, violent crime, evil foreign dictators. As they used to sing on Sesame Street (and maybe they still do), “one of these things is not like the others.”
Can you tell which one is not like the others?
If you guessed this thing is not like the others, then you’re absolutely…right!